Easy Feijoada

wikipedia

I grew up eating feijoada and watching my Brazilian friends making it and thought... this is way too difficult... but after a few adjustments, I realized my fears were all for nothing. It isn't any harder and doesn't take any longer than most homecooked meals.

Ingredients:

black beans (1 pound bag)

bacon (about 6-8 slices)

1 lb smoked pork sausage (not fresh sausage)

(additional smoked ham or smoked ribs can be used**)

1 large onion

3 garlic cloves

1 bay leaf

Cook the dried black beans in unsalted water. If you have a pressure pot, these are done once pressure has built for about 40 minutes. If you don't have a pressure or instant pot, soak the beans overnight in the crockpot and in the morning turn them on HIGH for 4 hours. 

Cut up the bacon, and fry the diced onions and minced the garlic in a large frying pan. If the bacon is lean, add a little olive oil. Then slice up the smoked sausage and fry with the onions and bacon. Taste and add salt to the onion/meat combo if needed to be nice and salty.

Add the meat/onions and bay leaf to the already cooked beans, make sure there is plenty of liquid, and let simmer for 20-30 min.( If you have additional smoked ham, you can just add directly to the already cooked beans with the bacon/sausage/onions.)  Taste for salt. The beans will absorb the salt slowly but don't over salt because bacon and meat will have some salt in it.

Serve over white rice, with Brazilian farofa, orange slices, vinagrette, stir-fried kale leaves. (THINLY slice the kale leaves and pan fry with olive oil and add some salt and garlic.)

wikipedia

Quick college hacks: Use two large cans of black beans with their juice and then add the cooked up meats and onions.... simmer for 20 min. If you need extra liquid add water or chicken broth. If you don't have fresh onion or garlic you can use onion and garlic powder and add that directly to the canned beans when you add the fried bacon and sausage.

Vinagrette: dice up 1-2 tomatoes very small, add 1/4 diced onion, add a little salt and let the tomatoes build up juice, squeeze the juice from one lime and a tablespoon of olive oil.

**Aldi might have smoked ham. They also have the smoked sausage.