eatbensmeat

This is the feijoada (pronounced just like it looks)(fezh-wa-da), which WordPress just tried to tell me should be spelled Felicdad.  So that shows you what wordpress knows. I have no idea what goes in Felicdad.

Now, this is how I like to make it.  This is one of those dishes where everyone who makes it will have a different recipe.  It’s come a long way from the recipe Alan gave me years ago.  I don’t know if it’s any better than his Moms…probably not, but it’s the way I like it.  Feel free to experiment with it.

A few notes:

1. Experiment all you want, but the one thing that you cannot do without (in any recipe I’ve ever seen) is the kielbasa and the bacon
2. I don’t know if other people care, but to me, beans are pretty much just beans.  I can’t really tell the difference in taste.  I use mostly red beans in mine because…well…if you just use straight black beans, it kind of ends up looking like poop.  So, I don’t really recommend that.
3. If you want to season this up, be advised:  the beans are going to soak up all the seasoning you throw at it.  So when you go to season the pot, take whatever you think a reasonable amount is, and double it.  Then you’ll probably have to do that again in a few hours when it doesn’t have any kick.
4. Goes really really well with brazillian vinaigrette, which is a brazillian take on pico de gallo. Sort of.

So, here we go:

The meats!

1 pound bacon, diced

2 pounds kielbasa, cut in to disks

1 pound chorizo, removed from the casing (I highly recommend you get it from a butcher if you can, but the stuff in the plastic tubes still works)

1 leftover ham bone with meat still on it or 3 pounds of pork shank. Ham bone is dramatically better.

The stuff that isn’t meat!

1 pound dried red beans

1/2 pound dried black beans

3-4 large onions, peeled and quartered

salt and pepper to taste

A literal handful of garlic cloves.  20-30. 

Rice

Collard Greens

Directions:

The day before you’re going to cook, put the beans in a pot and cover with cold water.  Leave to sit overnight.

Once you’re ready to cook, drain the beans, then add them to a (giant) pot, along with the garlic, onions, and meat. Add water to cover, and bring it to a boil, then reduce to a simmer.

Simmer it for about 8 hours.

That’s pretty much it.  But after 5 or 6 hours, you are going to have to start watching it closely.  The beans will start to break down in to a paste, which is delicious, but if it gets too thick, it will burn like a motherfucker.  I think I’ve only ever actually made this once without burning it.  So you can either keep the heat really low and stir it pretty often, or you can add water to keep thinning it out.  I prefer the former, but if you find it starting to stick, remove it from the heat and stir vigorously, scraping the bottom until it feels clean.

Once it’s ready, cook up some rice in a different pot, and saute the collard green in oil and garlic until they wilt.  If you aren’t familiar with them, the greens should look something like this when they’re done, which is the first result that came up when I googled “sauteed collard greens”.

Put the things you want to eat in a bowl and mix them all up and eat them.

Options!

1. You can use spinach instead of collard greens if you like, it can be much easier to find, but I like the bitterness of collard greens
2. HOT SAUCE HOT SAUCE HOT SAUCE
3. You can also put Brazilian Vinaigrette on top of it, which I will throw a recipe up for some other night.
4. You can also add farofa to it (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Farofa) which is toasted cassava  flour.  Personally I don’t think it really adds anything, but some people love it.