Cooking Black eyed peas - recipes please.

[Phreddy]

I grew BEP this year, courtesy of Seahorse.

Fantastic crop - we have heat wave conditions and they love it, short of water, they don't mind. I am saving seed for next years crop and will be buying some from Sainsbury later.

So, now we are harvesting; we have the fresh young beans as well as those getting dry on the plant.

Any ideas please?

[Two_Sheds]

They don't need to be soaked and boiled like kidney beans do.

Just cook for 30 mins until softened.
I just add them to soups and stews, thereby reducing the amount of meat in a recipe.

[Flummery]

If I remember correctly, black eyed peas and sweet corn were the main ingredients of Succotash -(suffering succotash!) a Deep South dish from the USA. I used to make a version years ago with a home-made herby, oniony, garlicky tomato sauce. Just mix the cooked beans and corn kernels together and stir in your sauce. Not authentic but jolly nice (and great for the digestive tract through-put!)

[Polly Fouracre]

Hoppin' John
Black-eyed peas
Rice
Green peppers
Tomatoes
Onions
Celery
Garlic
(I never weigh so can't give quantities)

Soak peas overnight and cook. Soften onions and garlic,stir in chopped celery(if liked) and peppers.
Cook rice. Stir all together whilst still hot and stir in chopped tomatoes.
Where this got it's name from I don't know. I think it's a Jamacian dish.

[Phreddy]

Hoppin' John
Where this got it's name from I don't know. I think it's a Jamacian dish.

That's interesting Polly. I saw this on the net but with meat.
Hoping not to sound ungrateful but I was hoping for cooking fresh beans. Yes I should have said so!
Seems that one can cook the sprouts, young shoots, young beans, leaves.
I have eaten them raw, not as good as peas or English Peas as they seem to be known in 'black eyed pea' country. They (BEPs) are beans not peas BTW.

[Phreddy]

If I remember correctly, black eyed peas and sweet corn were the main ingredients of Succotash. Not authentic but jolly nice (and great for the digestive tract through-put!)

I must try this come winter. All my beans will be saved as seed this year and I will be buying a 500gr pack from Sainsbury for seed also.

This stuff grows so well and is so useful that I will be growing it as ground cover as well as a vegetable.

I must put up a thread asking others how their crop went.

[Phreddy]

Thanks 2Sheds, that is worth bearing in mind. I am going off meat anyway.

[Polly Fouracre]

That's interesting Polly. I saw this on the net but with meat.
Hoping not to sound ungrateful but I was hoping for cooking fresh beans. Yes I should have said so!
Seems that one can cook the sprouts, young shoots, young beans, leaves.
I have eaten them raw, not as good as peas or English Peas as they seem to be known in 'black eyed pea' country. They (BEPs) are beans not peas BTW.

Nothing to stop you using fresh peas in this recipe.

[Phreddy]

Oh, Polly, we have the BEP's that have grown so nicely for us. We couldn't use 'English Peas' as they are known in BEP country.
If I were using Peas then I would make the Italian Dish of Rizi e Bizi. Really is delicious: Rice peas and chicken stock; onion and garlick to taste or maybe to swamp it!
That's just a boast, we don't get good peas here. Hard little bullets they are. Have to wait until November and UK.
Thanks anyway

[Phyllis Smith]

I was born in Mississippi, USA, and though raised around the country, due to my father's military service, I was raised "Southern." We ate fresh "black-eyed peas," which my grandmother called "crowder peas" or "field peas." I remember them being cooked with a bit of ham or similar meat (gammon would work.) And when we had fresh BEP, Grandmother would often throw a few whole pods of okra in to boil with the peas, which I remember being very tasty, though slimy. They are very nice eaten with, or even on top of, a piece of buttered cornbread, with raw chopped onion or spring onion on top. An uncle used to just chomp on whole spring onions while eating his BEP or beans. I'm curious, Phreddy or Seahorse, as to the seeds for BEP (known as cowpeas in the UK.) It sounds like you just use the dried beans you buy at the grocery store. Is that it? I can't find any BEP seeds online at the usual providers. Can't wait to try growing these, as I adored them as a child, and haven't had any in years. YUM!!