East Africa · Side

Ibiharage (Simmered Red Kidney Beans)

Name: Ibiharage (Simmered Red Kidney Beans)
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 75 min
Total time: 90 min
Yield: 6 servings
Cuisine: Rwanda
Ingredients: 450 g dried red kidney beans (or speckled Rwandan bush beans), rinsed and soaked for 8 hours; 1.5 l cold water for initial boiling; 200 g red onions, finely chopped; 250 g ripe Roma tomatoes, skinned and crushed; 20 g garlic cloves, finely minced; 45 ml unrefined red palm oil (or neutral sunflower oil); 15 ml tomato paste; 10 g ground coriander seed; 2 whole dried bay leaves; 10 g vegetable seasoning bouillon powder; fine sea salt, to taste; freshly cracked black pepper, to taste

Tender red kidney beans slow-simmered with sweet red onions, garlic, and rich red palm oil until suspended in a glossy, deeply seasoned savory liquor.

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beans-legumesdaily-staplerwandan-classicvegan-side

The story

In Rwanda's fertile volcanic hills, Ibiharage forms the nutritional backbone of the daily diet, consumed by virtually every household for lunch and dinner. Beans are so vital to Rwandan agrarian society that over two hundred local landraces are cultivated and traded across village cooperatives. Technically, traditional cooks rarely discard the bean cooking liquor, instead reducing it directly with aromatics to emulsify the starches into a rich, self-thickening gravy.

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