This is what I come home to on some Fridays, rice and black beans – It’s @adjoa’s specialty.

My mom usually announces as soon as I come through the door, “your sister made waakye, if you’re nice to her maybe she’ll give you some,” When ever am I not?

This rice and black beans is of course a riff on the popular Ghanaian street/fast food, waakye.

Traditionally, it’s rice and black eyed-peas cooked with millet stalks, which gives it it’s distinctive reddish to purplish hue.

One day @adjoa discovered that black beans and rice yields the same colour as the traditional waakye, and practically tastes the same, and our version of waakye was born – as close to authentic as we can get from oceans away.

She had to convince my mom though; she starts with, “Our kind adapts…” I don’t exactly know what that means, but it’s the same convincing tone she uses to get us to try Burmese food and capoeira.

So on some Fridays, she goes by the African Market on Kingsway and buys shitto, the hot dried-fish and pepper sauce that usually accompanies waakye.

At home, she cooks the black beans first, then adds the rice when the beans is half done, and then let the rice and beans simmer and cook slowly until it’s tender and fluffy and the liquid is absorbed.

I love coming home to this on Fridays…

[print_this]

Rice and Black Beans

INGREDIENTS

• 2 cups black beans, rinsed (soak overnight or 3 – 5 hrs if you prefer softer beans)
• 3 cups parboiled rice
• 2 tablespoons coconut oil
• Salt to taste

DIRECTIONS

1. Place beans in a large pot with 6 – 7 cups of water
2. Cook covered on high heat for 35 – 40 minutes, or until the beans are soft but not done
3. Add rice, coconut oil and salt, stir and cook for 10 minutes
4. Stir, lower heat and cook on low covered for another 10 minutes, or until rice and beans are cooked through
5. Serve with a tomato based sauce and/or Ghanaian Shitto with a side of greens or steamed/roasted vegetables
6. Enjoy!

[/print_this]