Super Bowl Red Beans & Rice with Buttermilk Bread

According to sports reporter Darren Rovell, 440 gallons of red beans and rice were prepared at the Superdome in New Olreans, Louisiana for the Super Bowl today.  I decided to make a gallon of my own here in Vermont to eat while we watched the game.  Red beans & rice is a staple dish of Louisiana Creole cuisine and historically was  prepared on Mondays, since Mondays were also the traditional laundry day and, therefore, were good days for slow simmering a pot of beans.  Ham was the customary Sunday meal, which meant that there were ham bones left over on Monday for the pot of beans.  I don't have a ham bone, but I do have some delicious Daily Grind pork sausage from Vermont Salumi seasoned with Lincoln Peak Marquette wine and garlic.   For the beans I chose to use 1 1/2 cups of traditional dried red kidney beans plus 1 1/2 cups of Jacobs Cattle Beans.  The latter are heirloom beans grown in Maine which are similar to kidney beans.  I soaked the beans overnight, then slow cooked them this afternoon while listening to some of my favorite New Orleans blues music and gearing up to watch the big game. 

Red Beans & Rice

3 C Red Beans
1 1b sausage
splash red wine
1 medium onion, chopped
1 medium shallot, chopped
1 medium green bell pepper chopped
1/2 C carrots, chopped
1/2 C celery, chopped
1 jalapeno pepper, minced
4 cloves garlic, minced
4 C water or broth
2 C cooked brown rice

1 bay leaf
1 tsp thyme
Salt & Pepper

Brown whole sausages on all sides over medium-high heat in a hot soup pot or dutch oven.  Remove the sausages and set aside.  In the retained sausage drippings, add the splash of red wine and scrape the brown bits from the bottom of the pot.  Add the onion, shallot, bell pepper, carrot, celery, jalapeno, and garlic.  Cook over medium-high heat, stirring, until softened.  Add seasonings, then the rinsed beans, and 4 cups of water.  Bring to a boil, then cover, reduce heat to the lowest setting, and simmer for an hour.

Meanwhile, cook the rice in a rice cooker or on the stove top and slice the sausage into one-inch bias- cut slices.  After an hour, or when the beans turn soft, add the sausage and rice.  Stir and heat through.  Serve with a slice of crusty bread and enjoy.   You'll be glad you made a big pot, since the leftovers are better than the original.

Even though a crusty French bread would be the customary accompaniment to my red beans & rice, I have a recipe for buttermilk bread that I have been excited to try out.  The recipe comes from The Laurel's Kitchen Bread Book- a Guide to Whole-Grain Bread Baking.  There is a great dairy farm in Orwell, VT called The Animal Farm that makes the most delicious fresh-churned butter and buttermilk from their small herd of grass-fed Jersey cows.  They ship most of their supply of dairy products to two restaurants run by Chef Thomas Keller:  The French Laundry in California and Per Se in New York.  It's highly unlikely on my budget that I will ever visit either of these, so I'm lucky that what little they have left, they sell at my co-op.   I love using their buttermilk in everything from mashed potatoes to biscuits and was excited to try it out in a bread recipe.  Here is what you will need:

Buttermilk Bread

2 tsp active dry yeast
1/2 C warm water 
3/4 C hot water
1/4 C honey
1 1/4 C cold buttermilk
5 1/2 C whole wheat flour
plus more for dusting
2 tsp salt
2-4 Tbsp cold, unsalted butter

Dissolve the yeast in the warm water.  Ideal temperature range is between 110 and 115 F.  Mix the hot water with the honey and stir until the honey is dissolved. Add the cold buttermilk.  Meanwhile, mix the salt and the flour in a large bowl.  Make a reservoir in the center of the flour and pour the buttermilk mixture and the yeast mixture in.  Stir from the inside out until all the flour is incorporated.  Turn it out onto a floured surface and knead for 15 minutes.  Cut the cold butter into bits and knead it into the flour.  Knead an additional 5 minutes.  Form the dough into a ball and place in a large bowl.  Cover, and place in a warm, draft-free place for 1 1/2 hours.  To check readiness, poke the dough in the center 1/2 inch deep with a wet finger.  If the hole doesn't fill back in, it is ready for the next step.  Press the dough flat, form it into a ball again, and return it to the bowl.  Cover again and let it rise another 45 minutes.

Press it flat and divide it into 2 separate balls.  Let it rest for 15 minutes.  Deflate it, and shape it into two loaves.  Place them into loaf pans or just onto a baking sheet and let them rise in a warm place until the dough slowly returns a gentle fingerprint.  Preheat the oven to 325 F, brush the loaves with some melted butter or buttermilk, and bake for 1 hour.