“Comedian Romesh Ranganathan was a welcome guest on The Snack Hacker [podcast], and he told me about going to university and his mum, Shanthi Ranganathan, inventing a simple baked bean curry that he could make in halls when she wasn’t sending him food packages,” shares comedian, cook and content creator George Egg, known as the Snack Hacker.
“He challenged me to invent something using the ubiquitous breakfast staple and I came up with this. Despite tasting very dal-like, the flavour of baked beans still pushes through in a reassuring way.”
Baked bean dal
Serves: 4 as a side dish or 2 as a main
Ingredients:
2 x 400g tins of baked beans
3 slices fresh ginger (about the thickness of a pound coin)
1 tsp turmeric powder
2 hot green finger chillies
50g ghee or butter (or a vegan equivalent)
8 cloves garlic, sliced into matchsticks
2 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp cayenne pepper or hot chilli powder
1 tsp garam masala
½ tsp brown sugar
Small bunch coriander, roughly chopped
Method:
1. Semi-rinse the beans. You need to lose a little bit of their sauce but not all of it as it’s nice to retain some of the familiar flavour, so pour the beans into a sieve and run the cold tap over them for just a second as you give them a quick swirl, then dump the beans and whatever water and sauce has clung to them straight into a deep saucepan.
2. Add the ginger, turmeric and one of the chillis whole (they look great as well as creating potential jeopardy later on), but no salt as the beans will be pretty well seasoned.
3. Set the pan over a medium heat and as the contents start to warm, semi-mash the beans with a potato masher. You want them busted but not pureéd. Set the heat to low, put a lid on and let them heat through for 10 minutes, giving them a stir every now and then to stop them sticking. They’ll start to dry a bit as the moisture evaporates, so don’t be afraid to add a generous splash of water (about 100ml) if they do. Have a taste and if it’s not salty enough, add some.
4. While the beans are cooking, put the ghee, butter or vegan equivalent in a cold shallow pan, add the garlic and the cumin seeds and set over a low heat so the fat melts and the garlic starts to sizzle. Keep an eye on it as while golden garlic is delicious, burnt garlic will ruin everything.
5. As soon as the garlic is pale gold and smelling good, take the pan off the heat, add the cayenne or chilli powder, give the pan one stir and pour the contents into the beans.
6. Sprinkle over the garam masala and the brown sugar. Turn the heat off and give the whole pan a very rudimentary mix. You want those oily, buttery pools in places rather than an amalgamated mass. It’s much more appetising.
7. Finally, scatter over the coriander and the other chilli, roughly chopped.
Recipe from ‘The Snack Hacker: Rule-Breaking Recipes for Cooks and Non-Cooks’ by George Egg (Blink, £22).
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