Cuban Black Bean Soup

Method

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1. Drain the soaked beans, put them in a large pot with the bay leaves and the 1.5 litres of water, and bring to a boil.

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2. Skim off the foam, drop to a gentle simmer, and cook part-covered for 45 minutes. Add no salt yet.

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3. Meanwhile heat the oil in a frying pan and cook the onions and green pepper over medium heat for 12 minutes, until soft and sweet.

   Mark done Start 12 min timer

4. Add the garlic, cumin, oregano, paprika and allspice and fry 3 minutes more, until the mixture darkens and the oil separates and pools at the edges.

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5. Scrape the whole sofrito into the beans and simmer a further 15 to 20 minutes, until the beans are completely tender.

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6. Lift out a ladleful of beans, mash them to a paste, and stir them back in to thicken the pot.

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7. Now stir in the vinegar, salt and sugar. Taste and adjust — it should be savoury, faintly sweet and clearly acidic.

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8. Serve over rice with coriander, raw red onion and a wedge of lime.

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Chef’s Tips

• Salt at the end. Beans salted early can simmer for hours and never soften.
• The vinegar is not a garnish. Without it the soup tastes flat and heavy.
• It thickens a great deal overnight and is better the next day.

Common Substitutions & Variations

• Lemon is the everyday swap for limes in this kind of dish — the acidity plays the same role even though the flavour is not identical.
• An eighth of a teaspoon of garlic powder per clove is the usual stand-in when you are out of fresh garlic — it will not caramelise the same way, but it carries the flavour.
• Fresh herbs work in place of the dried oregano at roughly three times the quantity — a teaspoon of dried is about a tablespoon of fresh, chopped.

Pairing Suggestions

• White rice and fried plantain
• A cold beer
• Pickled onions

Storage & Reheating

Refrigerated for 5 days and better on day two. Freezes for 3 months; loosen with water on reheating.

Common questions

Nutritional Highlights

Per serving, calculated from the ingredient list. Treat these as an estimate — brands and cuts vary.