Here’s another version of stew peas, also known as stewed red kidney beans, similar to the Jamaican stew peas I shared some time ago. As you travel across the Caribbean and even into the southern states of the USA, you’ll find many variations of this warm and comforting dish. Each version reflects local traditions, available…
A classic dish during pigeon peas season (usually from late December to early April) in the Caribbean. Freshly shelled pigeon peas are pre cooked, then added to traditional stewed chicken for an iconic dish to enjoy with rice, dumplings, roti or a side to ground provisions. Almost the same dish is made with a curry…
If you’re looking for a bit of luck in the new year while enjoying a delightful dish, I got you. It’s said that by cooking/enjoying black eye peas on the first day of the new year, brings a wealth of good luck the entire year. So I thought I’d put my leftover ham bone to use and share the recipe with you. Typically I’d do a traditional Caribbean soup with my ham bone, but I thought it would be an excellent way to add additional flavor to the somewhat bland black eye peas. Did you know that black eye peas is really a bean?
Here’s another one of those classic soups you’ll find being made on a Saturday throughout the Caribbean, with each household putting their own personal twist on things. While it’s loving known as Red Peas Soup, the key ingredient in most cases is usually red beans (Kidney Beans). And though in this recipe I didn’t use any ground provisions (I explain more in the demo video) it’s also customary to add stewing beef and/or smoked meats as well. I went pretty basic to keep it simple for you to duplicate, while giving you maximum flavor and heartiness.
TinTin (Christina), my dad’s mom guarded her dried pigeon peas like they do gold at Ft Knox. It was common knowledge that if peas were out of season, she had some stored in airtight bottles somewhere in the dimly lit-smoky kitchen of hers. I still recall the scent of that kitchen, a mixture of the musty tobacco she always had drying in the ceiling and the smoke from the different types of hard-wood she would use to fire-up the coal pot she would use to to cook her meals. Not to mention the actual smoke from the pipe she smoked all her life! To this day, I’m still to taste a stewed dried pigeon peas like the stew this woman would make on that coal pot, in that simple kitchen.
