Vegan Dinner Recipe: Gallo Pinto (Rice and Beans)

Oh. My. God. It might not look like much, but this guy is the highest level of comfort food known to humans. We discovered gallo pinto (direct translation "speckled/spotted hen") in Nicaragua, where they sold it everywhere for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It's greasy, it's fantastic with hash browns or faux meat sides or veggies or... well, anything. It's a great side, and it's also great in a giant bowl on its own.

And it's cheap. And pretty easy. There is NO DOWNSIDE. Aside from the fact that it's pretty bloody unhealthy, but you know, you can't win em all!




Ingredients:

One cup of rice (I mean one cup of UNCOOKED RICE), cooked in your favourite manner (ie, microwave or stovetop)
A quarter cup of oil
An onion
A tablespoon of ground cumin
A tablespoon of ground coriander
Two teaspoons of ground ginger
Two teaspoons of salt
Four cloves of garlic, chopped
A can of beans (kidney or black, whatever you have)
one tablespoon of soy
one tablespoon of hp sauce
a dash of white vinegar (optional)

Tomato sauce, tabasco to serve (optional)

Instructions:

Cook the rice, as instructed above. If you have time, cook it early and let it cool down, or even stick it in the fridge for a couple of hours. Similar to fried rice, cooling the rice will give it a crispy edge when it's refried.

Heat the oil on a medium heat in a deep pan. Add the onion, cook for five minutes until the onion is soft.

Add the cumin, coriander, ginger and salt. Stir well, turn the heat down to low, and cook for two minutes.

Add the garlic, stir, and continue to cook for five minutes on a low heat so all the flavours meld.

Add the drained beans from the can. Give it a good stir, cook them on low for ten minutes.

Turn the heat up just a little, and add the rice.

Stir it in really, really well. The rice needs to be VERY, VERY hot, and completely mixed in with the beans and spices and stuff. This is maybe another five to ten minutes.

Now, raise the heat for a stirfry style situation. Add the soysauce and hp, and stir it very well continuously. Have a taste. Add a dash of vinegar if you like (if you can get vegan wostershire, add THAT!) and keep cooking it at a high heat, stirring it, for a couple of minutes. The rice will have crunchy fried bits and it should be greasy and tasty and delicious.

Don't eat too much of it at once, no matter how tempted! You may find you need a little sleep afterwards!