Brazilian Black Beans

Well it’s World Cup season and over here we cheer for the American, Canadian and Brazilian teams. To be festive this week I made Brazilian Black Beans. These beans come with a story.

About 10 years ago my husband served a mission for The Church Of Jesus Christ Of Latter Day Saints in Brazil for 2 years. We had been dating before he left and when he got home we were married. He often spoke of some of his favorite foods from Brazil. Of course one of his favorite foods was the beans. For the last few years I took it as a challenge to try and re-create these famous Brazilian beans. I tweaked, and tweaked, and tweaked how I made them. Every time I made them he said they tasted good but weren’t exactly the same. Just an FYI… recreating food you have never tasted is actually quite challenging. He kept saying “They must just have different spices in Brazil”.

Well about 5 months ago a dear friend from my husband’s mission was in town. She came over and taught me how to make Brazilian beans. Well it turns out it wasn’t spices I was missing. It was sausage and bacon. Ummmmmm DEAR HUSBAND: SPICES CAN’T TAKE THE PLACE OF SAUSAGE AND BACON. Anyways, here’s the recipe for how dear Sueli from Brazil taught me how to make my husband’s favorite mission food.

Brazilian Beans

Ingredients:
2 cups of dry beans soaked
5 cups of water (or chicken broth – see notes for how I make my chicken broth)
A large sausage or 4 small ones of your choice
4 pieces of bacon diced
1/2 green pepper
1/2 onion
Salt and Pepper

Directions:

Pressure cook beans in water or bouillon for 15 minutes on low. Release pressure. At this point you want them kind of soft but not all the way cooked. In case you are using old beans or didn’t soak them long enough cook again until they are soft on the outside not all the way cooked on the inside.
Add 4 sausages or 1 large one cut into 4 pieces into the pressure cooker. Cook on low again for 10 minutes. This will flavor your beans. The sausage I use is pictured above. It is a natural chicken sausage and it works great.
While sausage is cooking fry bacon, green pepper, and onion in a frying pan.
Once the beans are done their second cook remove sausage and cut into bite size pieces. Each individual piece will be more juicy by leaving them in the larger chunks during the pressure cooking process.
Add bacon, green pepper, onions and sausage pieces back to pressure cooker and simmer for about 10 minutes.
Add salt and pepper to taste.

ENJOY!

Notes:

She taught me how to make these with my electric pressure cooker. I absolutely love the electric pressure cooker. Love it. Your kitchen tools may vary so make adjustments as needed.
Chicken Broth: When I pull out an appliance I like to use it a few times (since it’s out already). I usually cook 4-5 frozen chicken breasts in water, garlic, onion, salt and pepper on high pressure for about 16 minutes. The liquid that this makes is am amazing broth. I then use the broth to make beans, soups or anything that needs broth.