18 March 2024

Rice And Beans For Supper!

Categories: Food

Good food is very often, even most often, simple food.
– Anthony Bourdain –

This is a dish I enjoy very much! It has the kind of simplicity that is for me sometimes an absolute necessity. One needs to eat supper, and it must be filling, tasty and nutritious but ask nothing of you. Neither in the making nor in the eating!

So, I use onions, peppers, parsley and tomatoes as a base. I don’t chop anything very fine for this, in fact chopping isn’t really in my skill set. If I need something finely chopped, I use my trusty mini chopper powered by a stick blender. But for this I want actual pieces, makes it look good and I like the texture.

I don’t like too much in with the rice because I want it to be a rice dish, clean and simple. That’s why I use so few seasonings: salt, pepper, one shake of chilli flakes and origanum. One could make it spicy with paprika or cayenne pepper but then you wouldn’t taste the rice! I use long grain rice because I want it to be wet but have the grains remain separate. Oh, forgot to mention the stock cube! Now I added a few peppadews, but if I didn’t have it in the fridge, I would not even have given it a second thought. Any beans will do, I love butter beans, but I think black beans would taste good and look great! And you can of course meat it up with smoked sausage or bacon.

I add enough water to cover generously, but it is a play it by ear issue. I keep coming back and checking, testing the rice for doneness, there has to be enough liquid in there when the rice is done to make it a bit sloppy.

When I check and find the rice just a tad chewy but almost almost there, I turn the heat down and put a lid on the pot for the last few minutes. Make sure there is enough salt and pepper at this stage. I used close on three cups of rice because leftovers last well in the fridge, warms up beautifully and we will lunch on it for however long it lasts!