These latin-inspired black beans will be perfectly at home in some burritos, topping some nachos, over some rice (we recommend yellow rice | arroz amarillo of course), throw in some vegan sausage for brazilian feijoda, add some chopped green bell pepper, a splash of vinegar and wine (at the end of cooking) for some cuban style beans, or add a little curry powder for a more caribbean island fare.
Ingredients are pretty simple and hopefully you’ll have most of them at hand. Black beans (of course), a mirepoix/sofrito of onion, celery, garlic, and sweet bell pepper make up the base for the flavours, some chopped roasted chiles (canned ones are totally fine here, we used some lovely hatch chiles), some broth (any broth will do depending on how rich you want it), some mushroom granules/seasoning (or some bouillon) for a little umami hit. For our herbs and spices we keep it “simple” to enhance the beans and not cover them up, some green mex seasoning for lovely herbal yum, smoked paprika for sweetness, richness, and smokiness, and some chipotle for a wee bit of heat and even more smokiness.
We start buy sauteeing our mirepoix/sofrito just until it starts to brown and stick, leaving a nice brown fond on the bottom of the pan, then add a little broth to remove said fond, scraping and stirring to get it all off the bottom. Then everything else gets tossed in and cooked/simmered until the beans are tender! Super easy, right? Right.
Look at this sexy action shot! It’s like an oil painting, all the swirls….it’s hypnotizing…..
Don’t add any extra salt to this until after cooking and only to taste, i don’t add any extra at all since the broth i use and the mushroom granules add enough salt on their own for me, but you decide how salted you’d like it.
Now, you can serve this however your heart desires, or add whatever you’d like to it (like my suggestions at the beginning) or serve it over some yellow rice and top with some turmeric+mustard seed onions (recipe coming soon!) and some sour cream and be done! You can also easily turn this into a delightful black bean soup, simply blend up about a cup of the beans, add them back in with enough broth to get the consistency you want and boom! soup! If you want your beans with a thicker coating, simply simmer them for a little while until they get to the thickness you want, keeping in mind they thicken a LOT when they cool or sit.