Costa Rican recipe
How to make Rice and beans
Limón and the Caribbean coast
Rice and red beans cooked together in coconut milk, with a hot pepper for aroma. It is usually served with fish and fried plantain. It keeps its English name on the Caribbean coast, home of the Afro-Costa Rican community, most of whose families came from Jamaica.
Ingredients
- 300 g long-grain white rice, rinsed
- 400 g tin red kidney beans, drained
- 400 ml tin coconut milk
- 250 ml water
- 1 small onion, finely chopped
- 2 garlic cloves, crushed
- 2 sprigs fresh thyme
- 1 whole Scotch bonnet or other hot pepper (optional, left whole)
- 1 teaspoon salt
Method
- Put the coconut milk, water, onion, garlic, thyme and salt in a heavy pan and bring to a simmer.
- Add the beans and the rice and stir once. Lay the whole hot pepper on top, if using. Do not cut it, or the rice will be very hot.
- Bring back to the boil, then cover tightly and cook on the lowest heat for about 20 minutes, until the liquid is absorbed and the rice is tender.
- Turn off the heat and leave covered for 5 minutes. Carefully lift out the pepper and the thyme stalks.
- Fluff the rice with a fork and serve with fried fish or chicken and fried ripe plantain.
Made it at home? Tick it off and it goes into your kitchen passport.
It is not the same as gallo pinto. Gallo pinto mixes already cooked rice and beans in a pan, while rice and beans cooks the rice with the beans in coconut milk.
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