Growing up in the south, my favorite thing was always red beans and rice with a piece of sweet cornbread. Not only is it comforting, it feels like home for me at times. Traditionally, this Louisiana-style dish has very central flavors to the region. Where the spice typically comes from cayenne pepper and cajun seasoning. This dish has more of my flavor, where I love to bring in spices from India and parts of Asia into the dish to give it a twist to the original recipe. The other bit of change comes from one of my biggest influences, my mom. When I started this journey to becoming a vegetarian and now a vegan, one of the things she emphasizes is to use more veggies and beans while reducing the amount of rice being consumed. With that in mind, let’s get started.
What you will need:
- 1 cup brown rice
- 1.5 cups of water
- 1 red bell pepper
- 1 green bell pepper
- 1/2 cup of chopped Thai basil
- 1 tbs 7 spice
- 1 tsp garam masala
- 1 cup of adzuki beans
- 2 tsp grated turmeric
- 1 tbs chili oil
- 1 bay leaf
- 2 tbs avocado butter
- Salt to taste
To start if you have an electric pressure cooker that has a brown rice option, it is the easiest and best way, in my opinion, to cook brown rice. To start, add 1 cup of brown rice into a strainer and rice it thoroughly. Transfer the brown rice into the pressure cooker, add 1.5 cups of rice, and salt to taste. Using the brown rice option on your electric pressure cooker, select the option and leave it and forget it until the rice is ready.
Next, add 3 cups of water to a pot and add 1 bay leaf and salt. Once the water comes to a boil add 1 cup of adzuki beans. (Alternatively, the beans can be presoaked with hot water and then added to the pot to reduce the cooking time).
As the beans and rice are cooking, wash your bell peppers and Thai basil. In a food processor or blender add your red bell peppers and Thai basil and blend until it becomes a paste. Transfer the paste into a mesh colander and allow the mixture to strain while collecting the juice.
This mixture tends to have excess water; by straining it we are ensuring that if our brown rice has too much water the rice will not become mushy.
Next cut the green bell pepper and place it into a food processor to chop the bell pepper. I wanted the green bell pepper to be visible in the dish but not to be the focal point.
Returning back to our brown rice and adzuki beans. At this point, both should be ready. Strain the adzuki beans and let them sit in a colander as we prepare the rest of the dish.
In a pot (I used a 4 in-depth, 10 in wide pot), add 1 tbs of chili oil and allow it to come to temperature. To ensure that the oil doesn’t burn off, place the heat around medium to medium-high. Add 2 tsp of grated turmeric, and mix. So the rice can capture all of the flavors, and transferred the rice from the electric pressure cooker into the pot. Next, add 1 tbs of 7 spice and 1 tsp garam masala. Depending on your spice preference, add or reduce the amount of garam masala. For this dish to be mild, add only 1 tsp of garam masala. Reduce the heat to medium-low to low and add the red bell pepper and Thai basil paste that has been strained to the rice and mix thoroughly. Next, add the adzuki beans. Allow this mix to simmer for a bit. While it is simmering for 10 – 12 minutes periodically taste the dish. As it simmers, the flavor comes out a little bit more and depending on your spice and salt preference it is the perfect time to add a little more salt to the dish or heat.
Depending on your preference, mix in the green bell peppers in the last few seconds. I prefer a little bit of a crunch and thought it would be nicer if the green bell peppers were al dente.
I hope you enjoy this dish. Please let me know how you made it your own.
