Red red with fried plantain

• 35 minutes
• Prep 10 minutes
• Cook 25 minutes
• Serves 4

Our own recipe. The photograph is AI-generated.

• Vegan
• Vegetarian
• Gluten free
• Dairy free

Ingredients

• 4 tablespoons red palm oil (about 60ml)
• 1 medium onion, finely chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, crushed
• A thumb-sized piece of ginger (about 20g), grated
• 1 scotch bonnet chilli, finely chopped, or half for a milder dish
• 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
• 400g tin chopped tomatoes
• 2 tins (400g each) black-eyed beans, drained and rinsed
• 200ml vegetable stock (half a stock cube in 200ml hot water)
• Half a teaspoon salt, then more to taste
• 2 ripe plantains (yellow with black spots)
• 4 tablespoons (60ml) vegetable oil, for frying the plantain
• 1 tablespoon gari (toasted cassava granules), to sprinkle (optional)

Let's cook

1. Heat the palm oil in a pan on a medium heat. Fry the onion for 6 minutes until soft. Add the garlic, ginger, scotch bonnet and paprika and fry for 1 minute.
2. Add the tomatoes and cook for 8 minutes, stirring now and then, until thick and the oil starts to rise to the top.
3. Stir in the beans, stock and salt. Simmer for 10 minutes, crushing a few beans against the side of the pan with the spoon to thicken the sauce.
4. Meanwhile fry the plantain. Peel the plantains and cut them on a slant into slices 1cm thick. Heat the vegetable oil in a frying pan on a medium heat and fry them in batches for 2 to 3 minutes on each side until deep golden. Drain on kitchen paper.
5. Taste the beans and add more salt if needed. Serve in bowls with the plantain beside them and a sprinkle of gari on top for crunch.

Tips

• Plantain is sweetest when the skin is yellow with lots of black spots.
• In Ghana red red is often made with dried beans cooked from scratch; tins make it a quick lunch.
• The beans keep in the fridge for 3 days. Reheat them until steaming hot.

Swaps

• No palm oil: use vegetable oil and add an extra half teaspoon of smoked paprika.
• With fish: flake in a small tin of smoked mackerel at the end, close to the smoked fish used in Ghana.

Tags

• red red
• ghanaian
• beans
• plantain

In Plant powered.

None of the 14 allergens is in this recipe as written. Stock cubes can contain celery, so check the packet.

Check every packet for allergens.