Apr 23, 2009, 06:48 PM
Posted on Thu, Apr. 23, 2009
The quest for quintessential black beans
By MARICEL E. PRESILLA
mpresilla@MiamiHerald.com
Cubans call their bean soups potajes, after the French potage. In French cooking, the term is synonymous with soup, from consommés to creamy purées, but for us a potaje is a slow-cooked legume soup with a thick broth. Red kidney or black beans, for example, must be simmered until they are so soft that some melt into the cooking liquid, thickening it, while others retain their shape but melt in your mouth. Though we can eat potaje as a soup, we love it best spooned over fluffy white rice, almost like a sauce. Together they are the backbone of our traditional blue plate, forming a starchy backdrop upon which we build layers of flavor.
When Cuba's quintessential ''potaje de frijoles negros'' becomes ''black bean soup,'' something can be lost in translation, as I discovered on a recent tour of Canadian university kitchens. I had sent recipes ahead and arrived after some dishes were prepared, leaving me to work with what I found.
The chefs who cooked my black bean ''soup'' interpreted it in ways that reflected their own relationship with beans and their understanding of the use of beans in other Latin American cuisines. They had no problem seasoning the beans, but had difficulty grasping their role in a meal and the proper color and texture of the broth.
One chef thinned his beans, as is done in Mexico, and served them in bowl. No soon had I complimented another cook on his deft bean seasoning than I looked back and saw him attacking the pot with a gigantic immersion blender. Before I could scream ''Stop!'' he had puréed them into a paste as thick as Mexican refried beans. In one very large kitchen, the sous chef discarded the inky liquid exuded by the beans and finished them like Canadian-style baked beans.
These misunderstandings reminded me of my own early missteps. While studying history in Spain in the 1970s, I got a few pounds of frijoles negros as a gift and decided to cook them for friends from Havana, where black beans ruled. Coming from the eastern end of the island, where red beans were de rigueur, I followed a kidney bean recipe seasoned with ham hocks and tomato sauce that I had learned from my aunts in Santiago de Cuba.
I thought my friends would be pleased, but they ate in silence, and when they were ready to leave, they thanked me for my red bean potage. Then they gave me an unforgettable lesson in black bean cookery that ended with the stern admonishment: ``Cooking black beans with a tomato sofrito is a sacrilege.''
For years I dutifully followed what I considered an orthodox Havana-style recipe. My sofrito was classically pure, I thought -- only garlic, onion and green bell pepper seasoned with cumin, oregano and bay leaf with a dash of vinegar for acidity. I was particularly proud of the jet-black color of my beans, unsullied by the reddish hue of tomato sauce.
On occasion, I added roasted bell peppers, inspired by a recipe titled Frijoles Negros a lo Valdés Fauly (Black Beans Valdés Fauly Style) in Nitza Villapol's wildly popular Cuban cookbook, Cocina al Minuto. Villapol, who had a TV cooking show, calls for no herbs or spices and instructs cooks to puré the garlic, green bell pepper and onion sofrito in a blender and sauté it in lots of olive oil. Then she has you stir a couple of cans of ground pimientos morrones and some black pepper, sugar and vinegar into the beans.
Being from Santiago, I had no reason to doubt the dish's authenticity until I came across an article that had appeared in the The Miami Herald in 1986 about a family of accomplished Cuban Miami cooks, the Valdés-Fauli. The accompanying recipes included their famous black beans. Not only had Villapol misspelled their last name, I realized, but she had omitted a crucial ingredient: tomato sauce.
It seems the Valdés-Fauli were not alone in their appreciation of tomatoes in black bean potage. The much-loved cooking teacher Ana Dolores Gómez Dumois, who had a distinguished career as a TV chef in Cuba (predating Villapol), published a recipe for Frijoles a lo Menocal (Beans ''Menocal Style,'' after another important Havana family), calling for fresh tomatoes in the sofrito.
While I am still fond of my original black bean recipe, I now have dispensation of sorts to season them with tomatoes if I wish. After a few judgment calls and adjustments, I tested the classic Valdés-Fauli recipe and found it far superior to Villapol's.
Chopping the onion and bell pepper finely by hand and sautéing the sofrito in plenty of olive oil until the vegetables practically caramelize creates a sweet, mellow backdrop for the fruity acidity of the tomato sauce. The contrast is enhanced by a discreet amount of sugar and vinegar, a masterful touch. The pimientos and their juice add an herbal component that I find very appealing.
This black bean ''potaje'' might not be jet black, but it is truly spectacular and fully worthy of its patrician pedigree.
Culinary historian Maricel E. Presilla is the chef/co-owner of Cucharamama and Zafra in Hoboken, N.J. Her latest book is The New Taste of Chocolate.
The quest for quintessential black beans
By MARICEL E. PRESILLA
mpresilla@MiamiHerald.com
Cubans call their bean soups potajes, after the French potage. In French cooking, the term is synonymous with soup, from consommés to creamy purées, but for us a potaje is a slow-cooked legume soup with a thick broth. Red kidney or black beans, for example, must be simmered until they are so soft that some melt into the cooking liquid, thickening it, while others retain their shape but melt in your mouth. Though we can eat potaje as a soup, we love it best spooned over fluffy white rice, almost like a sauce. Together they are the backbone of our traditional blue plate, forming a starchy backdrop upon which we build layers of flavor.
When Cuba's quintessential ''potaje de frijoles negros'' becomes ''black bean soup,'' something can be lost in translation, as I discovered on a recent tour of Canadian university kitchens. I had sent recipes ahead and arrived after some dishes were prepared, leaving me to work with what I found.
The chefs who cooked my black bean ''soup'' interpreted it in ways that reflected their own relationship with beans and their understanding of the use of beans in other Latin American cuisines. They had no problem seasoning the beans, but had difficulty grasping their role in a meal and the proper color and texture of the broth.
One chef thinned his beans, as is done in Mexico, and served them in bowl. No soon had I complimented another cook on his deft bean seasoning than I looked back and saw him attacking the pot with a gigantic immersion blender. Before I could scream ''Stop!'' he had puréed them into a paste as thick as Mexican refried beans. In one very large kitchen, the sous chef discarded the inky liquid exuded by the beans and finished them like Canadian-style baked beans.
These misunderstandings reminded me of my own early missteps. While studying history in Spain in the 1970s, I got a few pounds of frijoles negros as a gift and decided to cook them for friends from Havana, where black beans ruled. Coming from the eastern end of the island, where red beans were de rigueur, I followed a kidney bean recipe seasoned with ham hocks and tomato sauce that I had learned from my aunts in Santiago de Cuba.
I thought my friends would be pleased, but they ate in silence, and when they were ready to leave, they thanked me for my red bean potage. Then they gave me an unforgettable lesson in black bean cookery that ended with the stern admonishment: ``Cooking black beans with a tomato sofrito is a sacrilege.''
For years I dutifully followed what I considered an orthodox Havana-style recipe. My sofrito was classically pure, I thought -- only garlic, onion and green bell pepper seasoned with cumin, oregano and bay leaf with a dash of vinegar for acidity. I was particularly proud of the jet-black color of my beans, unsullied by the reddish hue of tomato sauce.
On occasion, I added roasted bell peppers, inspired by a recipe titled Frijoles Negros a lo Valdés Fauly (Black Beans Valdés Fauly Style) in Nitza Villapol's wildly popular Cuban cookbook, Cocina al Minuto. Villapol, who had a TV cooking show, calls for no herbs or spices and instructs cooks to puré the garlic, green bell pepper and onion sofrito in a blender and sauté it in lots of olive oil. Then she has you stir a couple of cans of ground pimientos morrones and some black pepper, sugar and vinegar into the beans.
Being from Santiago, I had no reason to doubt the dish's authenticity until I came across an article that had appeared in the The Miami Herald in 1986 about a family of accomplished Cuban Miami cooks, the Valdés-Fauli. The accompanying recipes included their famous black beans. Not only had Villapol misspelled their last name, I realized, but she had omitted a crucial ingredient: tomato sauce.
It seems the Valdés-Fauli were not alone in their appreciation of tomatoes in black bean potage. The much-loved cooking teacher Ana Dolores Gómez Dumois, who had a distinguished career as a TV chef in Cuba (predating Villapol), published a recipe for Frijoles a lo Menocal (Beans ''Menocal Style,'' after another important Havana family), calling for fresh tomatoes in the sofrito.
While I am still fond of my original black bean recipe, I now have dispensation of sorts to season them with tomatoes if I wish. After a few judgment calls and adjustments, I tested the classic Valdés-Fauli recipe and found it far superior to Villapol's.
Chopping the onion and bell pepper finely by hand and sautéing the sofrito in plenty of olive oil until the vegetables practically caramelize creates a sweet, mellow backdrop for the fruity acidity of the tomato sauce. The contrast is enhanced by a discreet amount of sugar and vinegar, a masterful touch. The pimientos and their juice add an herbal component that I find very appealing.
This black bean ''potaje'' might not be jet black, but it is truly spectacular and fully worthy of its patrician pedigree.
Culinary historian Maricel E. Presilla is the chef/co-owner of Cucharamama and Zafra in Hoboken, N.J. Her latest book is The New Taste of Chocolate.