Rice and peas

I cooked some black eyed beans the other day to make a curry with butternut squash and coconut milk. Mysteriously, it tasted like peanuts, but that's another story.

As usual, I cooked a load and then froze most of them for future use. I got to thinking about rice and peas. We ate masses of it in Belize, and my friend Liz used to make it sometimes. I guess traditionally it's with kidney beans, but somehow I thought it might be good with black-eyed beans.

Actually, I liked the black-eyed beans a lot. They cooked up really nicely from dried. I guess they are in that sweet spot, size-wise, along with chickpeas - I find bigger beans often cook unevenly. They were hard to find though - didn't seem to be stocked in any of the supermarkets.

I adapted this recipe to make a version that uses pre-cooked beans. I guess cooking the beans in the coconut milk would maintain more flavour and the whole dish would taste more beany... but I just know I will never make it if I have to soak an exact amount of beans the night before.

1 tbsp veg oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 spring onions, finely chopped
3 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1/2 tsp finely chopped ginger
5 thyme sprigs (used c. 5 tsp dried instead)
5 allspice berries (did not have - used 2 tsp ground allspice instead)
1 scotch bonnet pepper (used 1 dried chilli instead)
3 cups cooked beans (black-eyed, black or kidney)
1 400 ml can coconut milk
2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
2 cups long-grain rice
550 ml hot water (or bean cooking water if you kept it)


Heat the oil in a large lidded saucepan. Add the onion and fry a bit. Add the spring onions, garlic and ginger and fry a little more. Add the thyme, allspice, chilli, beans, coconut milk, salt and pepper, and bring to the boil. Stir in the rice and add the water. Cover and simmer until all the liquid has been absorbed - approx. 30 min. Remove from the heat, cover and let steam for 10 min before serving. Discard thyme stems, allspice berries and chilli before serving.


This made loads! A half quantity would be fine for us... But luckily it was a big hit with both S and s, so disappeared within a couple of days!