Today is Fat Tuesday and I have been sharing some Mardi Gras recipes with you the last couple of weeks. Today is the end of the Mardi Gras series and I am going to give you a bonus recipe today as well. I don't normally eat red beans and rice but my husband likes them and when I found this recipe it looked like something I would enjoy. I will share with you how I made it and then the suggestions made from my husband the red beans and rice eater.
Looks like a lot of ingredients but it really just takes a little prep work. In fact I did a lot of the prep work the night before.
The first thing you need to do is rinse the dried red beans. We will look through them in a few minutes.
Cold water will be fine. I know some beans you have to soak in warm water but you don't have to this time.
Chop one onion.
The recipe calls for 3 stalks of celery. I saw on one of the cooking shows that the leaves of the celery are good to add to a recipe for flavor so I took the inside small stalks with all the leaves and chopped those up as well.
These are the other stalks that I chopped including the leaves.
The chopped celery.
It called for a green bell pepper. I had only colored pepper so I used those. I like the pretty colors.
In Cajun cooking this is called the trinity the onion, celery and bell pepper. All their recipes call for these three things. Also it called for garlic but I forgot to get some at the store. A little later on I will add a little garlic powder.
Look over the beans and take out any pieces or half beans. Discard them.
Put the looked over beans in the crock pot. Then add 7 cups of water.
The recipe called for 2 cans of Campbells chicken broth. I had a big container of broth so I looked on the can of soup and found out that there is about a cup and a half in the cans so I added about 3 cups chicken broth.
Add the chopped veggies.
When I took the picture I forgot the creole seasoning. So don't forget the seasoning.
Add 2 Tablespoons of creole seasoning.
I added about a teaspoon of garlic powder.
I sliced the sausage and wanted to cook off any grease in the sausage. I also thought it would be good to brown it a little. This was the first change I was told about. The recipe called for boiling it but of course I thought I knew better and it would taste better with a little browning on it. Nope, was told that boiling it would probably be better. You dont' have to do either but it does help get some of the grease off the sausage.
That grease is better in the pan that in your crock pot.
I patted them dry on paper towels.
Add it to the crock pot. All those veggies look so good in there. Cover and cook on High for about 7 hours. It can cook longer than 7 hours just make sure there is still liquid in it.
Don't know if you can see it or not but it is bubbling away in the pot after several hours of cooking.
I cooked brown rice trying to be a little more healthy and once again I was told that white rice is better. So use what you want.
Then top with the red beans and rice. I sprinkled parsley on the plate to try and make it look pretty.
Crock Pot Red Beans and Rice Recipe
1 lb bag dried red beans
7 cups water
2 cans Campbells chicken broth or about 3 cups
1 onion
1 bell pepper
3 celery stalks
1 lb smoked sausage
2 T creole seasoning
garlic
cooked rice
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