Red beans and rice doesn't sound like a very exciting dish, but the staple of Louisiana cuisine can actually be elegant as well as delicious, as long as you put as much care into making yours as BWJones did with his version of the dish. His recipe calls for rice, red beans, onion and a lot of spices, including sage, thyme, bay leaf, cayenne pepper, garlic, paprika and chipotle. His is topped off with crawfish, seasoned generously with Old Bay (not to be confused with Old Spice), although some would say that sausage (andouille, in particular) or ham sets the standard for the dish. The meat can be left off entirely for a less expensive or vegetarian version of the dish.
This is an easy recipe to master and an extremely versatile one. Not only can you play around with the spices, increasing and decreasing the heat, but it can work both as a side dish and as a main course.
1-11-2007 @10:15AM Foodie Bride said... That looks (and sounds) *super* yummy.
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1-11-2007 @3:18PM naugahyde said... crawfish in red beans and rice!!! Blasphemy.
This is some sort of bastard child of etouffe and RB&B. stupid "cajun fusion" trend has screwed-up many great cajun meals and rented out way too many resturaunts in New Orleans.
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1-11-2007 @3:18PM Mark said... Sausage (especially andouille), certainly. Ham? Not for me. Ham *hocks* traditionally could be used, but most people wouldn't think of that as "ham." The classic pork product for RBnR is tasso - hammy for sure, but so much more than that. I agree with others that RBnR is basic, soulful peasant food and it's simply wrong to dude it up with crawdads or shrimps.
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