Red Beans and Rice

This is a vegan version of the Cajun classic, (don’t leave any comments about sacrilege or desecration or fake food or whatever). I’ve made substantial modifications from the vegetarian version offered in America’s Test Kitchen Vegetarian cookbook. We eat this about every other week. It will feed the five of us for dinner, lunch, and about a quart leftover to freeze for later. This recipe scales well but also freezes if you are into making a ton of it on a weekend and then using it up to a month later.

This will take some time, and I’ve not been successful with converting it to an Instant Pot or slow-cooker yet. So use your Instant Pot to make a batch of white rice per the multi-cooker’s instructions.

Ingredients

• Kosher salt
• 2 pounds small red beans (about 4 cups), rinsed and picked over
• 1/4 cup olive oil, plus more
• 2 medium onions, chopped
• 2 green bell peppers, seeded and chopped
• 4 celery ribs, chopped
• Seasoning Pack:
  • 8 medium garlic cloves, minced or pressed through garlic press (about 1 tablespoon)
  • 1 teaspoon dried thyme
  • 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
  • 4 bay leaves
  • 1/2 tsp chipotle pepper powder
• 2 tablespoons Worchestershire Sauce or Liquid Aminos
• 6 cups low-sodium vegetable stock AND 6 cups water OR
  • 12 cups of water AND concentrated vegetable base
• 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar, plus extra for seasoning

Directions

1. Soaking – soak the beans overnight in cold water (or at least 4 hours in hot water) so that they are submerged by at least 3 times more water than beans. You’ll know they’re done soaking when the beans have taken up most of the water. Either way, you’ll want 1 tbsp of kosher salt for every quart of water. For the above, I would plan 3 quarts of water for the 2 lbs of beans.
2. Drain – Drain and rinse the soaking liquid off the beans and let them sit in the colander while you spend the next 30 minutes chopping and measuring.
3. Sweat – In a large dutch oven over medium heat, warm the oil.  When hot, add the onions, bell peppers, and celery (the Cajun trinity) to the pot, with a heavy pinch of salt, and let them get soft. Then add the seasoning pack, and move it around for 30 seconds or so then the Sauce or Aminos (you can also add the stock concentrate at this point). Add the beans and move them around to get the flavor base incorporated all over the beans.
4. Simmer – Add the liquid (water + stock or just water), cover, and bring it up to a boil. The liquid should just cover the beans, by no more than a quarter of an inch. Once boiling, put it on low, give it another stir, put the cover back on. Then go about your life for an hour.
5. More Simmering – Take off the lid, (not much will have changed) add a tablespoon of the red wine vinegar, and stir. You will now need to keep an eye on things. You will need to stir once every 10 minutes, and then it will decrease in frequency until you are down to about every minute and the beans are starting to stick to the bottom. But the starches will show up and the liquid will start to thicken. I wish I had a decent timeline, but this step will take 1.5 to 2 hours. Luckily, with this big of a pot of stuff it doesn’t cool off easily; so if you are making this for a dinner party situation you should plan on it taking 2 hours and it should be done in time.
   Note: I recently had a pot of this stuff go for 3 hours on this step and I’m not sure why. So we went out for tacos and ate it the next day. Beans can be tricky depending on age, treatment and grower.
6. Eating – Chuck in at least 2 more tablespoons of Red Wine Vinegar and 2 tablespoons of oil. Taste for salt and pepper needs. Hopefully, you didn’t forget to make the rice. Because you need it now. We like to eat this with collard greens.
7. Reheating – When this cools, it hardens up like mortar. So the next day, throw it back on the stove with up to a cup of water to loosen it up and make it not look like dog food
8. Freezing – When it freezes, it expands. Like more than you think, I’ve shattered a quart-size Ball jar and a medium-sized Ziploc food container because I tried to squeeze too much into a container.

That’s it good luck. If you want to comment please make it constructive, no trolls or MAGA-hats (but really what’s the difference).