Hi, Camille speaking here. I love black eyed peas because they are a bean that doesn’t need any soaking to cook from dry! It’s great when I haven’t planned ahead and still want a fairly quick meal (extremely quick if you have an Instant Pot) and still not too long if you are cooking on the stove. When I lived in Senegal, bean sandwiches was a common and delicious breakfast if you had enough money to afford it. This recipe is very similar to the sauced beans that I ate there and would be delicious served on a baguette. We also used them in our Last Chance Veggie Skillet.
Serves: 4 as a side
Time: 25 minutes
Ingredients
1 Can Black Eyed Peas or 3/4 cup dried black eyed peas
1/2 onion
olive oil
2 cloves garlic
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp oil from Mama Lil’s Peppers
salt
1 cup vegetable stock (or bouillon cube and water), gluten-free option, soy-free option
handful of cilantro
If you are using dry black eyed peas, cook them according to the instructions at the end of this recipe. If you are using canned black eyed peas then open the can and rinse the cooked peas.
Chop the onion so that the pieces are about the same size as the peas. Mince the garlic. Cook the onions on medium heat with olive oil until they begin to become transparent. Add the garlic for an additional minute. Add the hot pepper oil and tomato paste. Stir to coat the onions. Add the cooked beans and stock. Stir well. Bring to a boil and then turn down to a simmer and cook until it’s the consistency that you like, stirring regularly. Wilt the cilantro in. Stir and enjoy!
*Cooking black eyed peas from dry:
In the Instant Pot:
To cook in an Instant Pot, add 3/4 cup of dried black eyed peas to the pot. Cover the beans with water (in the small Instant Pot this is about 6 cups of water), season with 1 tbsp kosher salt. Additionally if you happen to have the following add these as well: 1 tbsp cumin, 2 tsp garlic powder, and 1/8 tsp cayenne. Set the Instant Pot to pressure cook for 6 minutes letting depressurize naturally. Drain and rinse before adding to the dish.
On the stove:
If you don’t have an Instant Pot, you can easily black eyed peas from scratch with no planning. They are a bean that doesn’t need any soaking, yay! Put the black eyed peas in a pot with salty water. These will be cooking for about 45 minutes so you don’t want as much salt as you would use for pasta, but you do want to add enough that you can taste the salt. The best way to get good at this is to practice. Each time you salt the water, taste it and when the beans are done taste them to see if they are well salted. A well salted bean should taste flavorful but not salty. If it tastes like you are eating salt, you added too much. If the bean lacks flavor then you didn’t have enough salt.
Additionally if you happen to have the following add these as well: cumin, garlic powder, and a tiny amount of cayenne.
Cook the peas until they are soft but not falling apart (this will take about 45 minutes). We recommend checking the beans at 20 minutes and then every 10 minutes o cook until they are soft but not disintegrating. Make sure your pot has enough water as I have definitely cooked all the water off before and burnt the beans!
