The market · Beans and pulses · The Americas

Black beans

Small, glossy black beans — earthy and creamy, the everyday bean of Mexico, Central America, Cuba and Brazil.

earthy · creamy

What to do with it

Classics built on it
BrazilianFeijoadaBlack beans stewed slowly with salted, smoked and fresh pork and dried beef, served with rice, greens, farofa and orange.No one here has made it yet

Kinds

Black turtle beans
The usual one, dried or tinned.
Fermented black beans
Salted, fermented soybeans for Chinese cooking — a different thing entirely.

Goes with

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Knowing it

Where to buy
Latin American grocers. Dried beans cook creamier than tinned.
Worth knowing
Keep the cooking liquid: frijoles de olla are served in it, and refried beans need it.

Kitchens that keep it in

Brazil — the eastern half of South America, from the Amazon to the southern pampasBrazilianBlack beans and rice every day, cassava in a dozen forms, fish stewed in palm oil and coconut, and meat roasted over coals on long skewers.10 classics

More beans and pulses

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