Burning.Hammer.Press

Eating blackeyed peas on New Year’s Day reminded me that I needed to teach myself how to make my own…the good way…the way great-grandma used to make them when I was a kid. I’m sure these weren’t done the way she did it because I never watched her make them, but I was trying to go off of the tastes that I remembered. It wasn’t exactly right, but I got a pretty good approximation!

Here’s what I did…

1/2 Onion diced in a little bit of olive oil on medium heat until translucent:

Added 1 clove garlic, minced, and let onions just start to brown:

Add chicken broth (8.5oz, I think), bring to boil:

Add 11oz black eyed peas (not the fully dry kind…the partially cooked kind, drained):

Add 4 strips leftover, thick cut bacon, salt to taste and lots of pepper. Turn to low heat, simmer, covered, 30 minutes or until broth is nearly gone:

After broth is nearly gone (partially absorbed, partially boiled away), added one small sliced tomato with seeds removed, and another container of chicken broth (8.5oz?) and brought back to simmer for about 15 additional minutes until it looked like this:

Oh yeah! That’s the good stuff!

Plate it up with some English toasting bread on the side:

Fantastic!

I didn’t think it was going to work out. After the broth boiled away the first time, it wasn’t smelling right…too onion-y, or garlic-y or something, and wasn’t looking right. The peas were still too hard…I hate them when their hard and tasteless like you get at most restaurants when they just boil them in some water or a little bit of stock or something…maybe a little onion, and not long enough. You have to cook them quite a while…about 45minutes or an hour. So glad this turned out. Yum!