vibrant green, red, and yellow — without the meat!
This was inspired by my previous Rajmah Chawal recipe, but sadly I have run out of cumin. No matter, because this still turned out lovely! Adding turmeric to the rice makes it more fun to eat, in my opinion. Plus it takes 15 minutes in my ceramic pot, much quicker than my 30+ minute rice cooker. Sometimes I find myself thinking of the Asian stoves that have a rice cooker button — I’d love that. I’ve been getting better at making rice without the rice cooker as a crutch! I like toasting the rice in oil first, but I find that the resulting rice is too oily. I’ll be experimenting more with that. I also want to make purple rice with purple cabbage!
Ingredients
- 1 cup of kidney beans, dry
- 1 cup basmati rice
- 1 tsp turmeric
- 1 cinnamon stick, and other spices if desired: bay leaf, cloves, cardamom pods
- 1 onion, chopped
- 2 cloves garlic, rough chopped
- 1 pinch of cinnamon
- 1 pinch of cardamom
- 2 tomatoes, chopped
- 1 bunch of kale, chopped
Directions
- Soak kidney beans in water overnight, or at least for 4 hours. This step can be omitted, but it is helpful.
- Cook beans with several inches of water in a rice cooker until tender.
- For the rice, bring rice, turmeric, spices, and 1 cup of water to a boil, then a simmer. Cook for a total of 15 minutes before removing the lid to let it dry out a bit, unless you like more mushy rice.
- For the bean “curry,” cook down the onion in some oil in a hot pan for 5 minutes. Add the cooked beans, garlic, salt, pepper, and cinnamon and cardamom if you have it, cook for another 2 minutes. Add the chopped tomatoes and cook covered, for 7 minutes.
- For the kale, stir fry in a wok with some water and oil. Make sure not to overcook — remove from the heat once the leaves turn an emerald green.
- Serve and enjoy!
