Creole Hoppin' John

Apologies for the lack of updates. We both had a pretty busy month, but we should be back to our regularly scheduled updates now.

adapted from Culinate.com's Creole Hoppin' Jean

Serves 6 (main dish servings)
Soaking time: 8 hours • Passive cooking time: 1 hour • Active cooking time: 40 minutes

Ingredients

3/4 cup black-eyed peas, sorted, soaked 8 hours, drained, and rinsed
½ cup short-grain brown rice
1 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil
½ cup finely diced shallots
⅛ tsp. onion powder
¼ tsp. garlic powder
½ tsp. paprika
½ tsp. chile powder
¼ tsp. red chile flakes
⅛ tsp. cayenne pepper
¼ tsp. dried thyme
¼ tsp. dried oregano
2 cups vegetable stock
1 (14.5-ounce) can diced tomatoes, drained
~ Coarse sea salt
~ Freshly ground white pepper


Steps:

1. Sort through the dry beans, rinse with cold water, and cover with an inch of water. Let soak for 8 hours until rehydrated. After rehydrating, drain and rinse the beans. Return to a large pot and cover with 4 cups water.

2. Bring to a boil, skim off foam, and let simmer for about an hour, stirring occasionally. At this point, beans should be quite tender. Drain beans and set aside.

3. In a separate pan, boil 1.5 cups water. Add short-grain brown rice, return to a boil, reduce heat to low and simmer for approximately 20 minutes with a lid on. Stir occasionally.

4. Heat 1 TBSP oil in a skillet. Add the shallots, onion powder, garlic powder, paprika, chile powder, red chile flakes, cayenne pepper, thyme, and oregano. Continue cooking, stirring frequently, until the shallots are soft, about 3 minutes.

5. Add vegetable stock, tomatoes, and 1 tsp. salt; bring to a boil. Add rice and black-eyed peas to the sauce and stir well. Return to a boil, cover, and reduce heat to low. Simmer until most of the liquid has been absorbed, approximately 20 minutes. Remove from heat, and let sit with lid on, approximately 10 minutes.

Notes: This is a spicy dish associated with the Carolinas, but is eaten throughout the South. It is often eaten on New Year's Day and is thought to bring the eater good luck. If you aren't a fan of spicy foods, I'd recommend skipping this one.

Coconut Rice with Edamame and Sweet Potato

Found somewhere on the internet.

Serves 4 (main dish servings)
Passive cooking time: 25 minutes • Active cooking time: 10 minutes

Ingredients

1 tsp canola oil
1 cup peeled and diced sweet potato
1/2 cup chopped scallions
1 tblsp minced fresh ginger
10 oz bag shelled edamame soy beans
1 1/4 cup jasmine rice
15 oz can coconut milk
1 1/2 tblsp lime juice
1 tsp salt
1 cup water
1 tsp grated lime zest
1/2 cup chopped peanuts (optional)


Steps:

1. In a large saucepan, heat the oil over medium-low. Add the sweet potato, scallions, and ginger and saute until the scallions have softened.

2. Stir in the edamame, rice, coconut milk, lime juice, salt and water. Bring the mixture to a boil. Reduce heat to a simmer, and cover. Cook until the rice is tender and the liquid has been absorbed (approximately 15 minutes).

3. Use a fork to fluff the rice, then stir in the lime zest. If desired, served with peanuts on top.


Notes: We're not quite sure what the origins of this dish are. We surmised it may be Caribbean, with the coconut milk, lime, and sweet potato flavors. This is a rich and delicious dish, with all the flavors complementing each other well. I will say, be sure you purchase shelled edamame, as we spent quite a bit of time shelling our edamame. We also appreciated that this recipe only uses one pan to cook all the ingredients. Very tasty!