Broccoli Rising, and Spotted Rooster

The cashier, the guy I see every week or so, scanned my groceries — kale, blueberries, lemons, broccoli (on sale!), brown rice, chickpeas, oat milk, tofu.

“You a vegan?” he asked, not in a judgy way but as someone just figuring something out.

I  looked up from bagging my groceries. “You bet.” I flashed a smile. 

He smiled back, or maybe pursed his lips in sympathy. “I could never be vegan. I love meat too much. I’m from Nicaragua. it’s like we have to eat meat.  I could never give it up.”

Under the buzzing fluorescent lights and in need of coffee, the best I could come up with was,

“Who says you have to? Maybe just eat more vegetables.”

“I don’t eat vegetables.”

No meat on one side, no vegetables on the other.  Hunh,  I suppose it could have turned ugly.  But I’m not the kind of person who gets into it with my nice grocery store guy on a Saturday morning. Or any day. I’m the kind of person who brings her own reusable canvas bags for her plant-based groceries. I may have an irritating level of do-the-right-thing about me but I’m basically harmless. So I just nodded and said, “See you next time.”

I was already at my car when I realized he’d shared something about himself. Now we had a point of connection beyond the usual, “Hey, howsitgoing?” If I’d had my brain with me at the checkout counter, I’d have said, “Nicaragua? I love gallo pinto.” 

Gallo [pronounced GUY-o] pinto is pretty much part of a daily diet in Nicaragua — in Costa Rica too.  It means spotted rooster. Relax, fellow vegans, it’s really rice and beans.  Rice, beans, and a backstory that goes; a century ago, a farmer of modest means invited his neighbors for dinner. Wanting to be a gracious host, he’d fattened up his prize chicken to serve to his guests. Even in those pre-Instagram days, word of a party got out, so the farmer was faced with feeding a good many more people than he’d invited. Fattened or no, one chicken wasn’t going to be enough for everyone (my mother’s worst nightmare). So he cooked up vats of rice and beans and served a feast of plenty. Happy ending. You’d think.

Gallo pinto is simple, yes, but satisfying, soulful. . . and yet super-contentious. In Nicaragua, it’s made with rice and red beans.  Costa Ricans make it with black beans. It’s the national dish of both countries and they each claim to originating it.

Miami is home to a delicious mix of Latin communities — Cubans, Dominicans, Puerto Ricans, Guatemalans, Venezuelans, Colombians, Brazilians, Costa Ricans, Nicaraguans and more.  Every one of them has their own rice and bean recipe.  

It’s a tradition that goes far beyond Latin America: 

• One of my favorites is mjeddrah. This Egyptian dish of lentils and rice is enjoyed all across the Middle East, and here in my home in Miami.  

• India does lentils and rice too.  It’s called kitchri, meaning mess, a glorious golden mess, like gallo pinto, so nourishing and comforting, it’s enjoyed almost every day

• In Italy, they eat risi i bisi — a risotto-like bowl of rice and peas. 

• Hopping john, rice and black-eyed peas, is eaten all over the South, especially on New Year’s Day, when it’s a promise of good fortune.  

• My Caribbean red beans and rice has its origins in waakye from Ghana.  Africa was eating rice and  beans long before any of us.  Okay, Asia was the first to grow rice, but Africa came next, cultivating this staple crop thousands of years before Spain introduced rice to the New World.

Rice and beans in any combination provides abundant niacin, protein, fiber, amino acids and more. They’re fortifying, nourishing, satisfying, versatile, affordable, pantry-friendly, and culturally appropriate for every culture.  They’re belly-filling and magically greater than the sum of their parts. They’re the people’s food — for all people. 

We might spin them a little differently —some of us use red beans, others use black ones, some of us add chile, others add chicken, some of us won’t eat meat, others won’t eat vegetables. Yeah, we can argue about our differences, but at the core, it’s still rice and beans, just as at the core, we’re all human and hungry. Darlings, let’s not fight. There’s gallo pinto for all of us. 

A shared meal of rice and beans, be it gallo pinto, Peruvian tacu tacu, Puerto Rico’s national dish of arroz con gandules or any other reminds us of what we have in common. There’s always a point of connection, or at least I’m always looking for one. Sometimes it starts with rice and beans. 

Gallo Pinto 

Gallo pinto starts with rice and beans that have been cooked and cooled. The rest comes together in minutes. A  traditional breakfast in Nicaragua and Costa Rica, gallo pinto offers sustenance and pleasure any time. It feeds a crowd. Even when you’re not expecting one.

Paid subscribers will find the full recipe at the end of the newsletter.

Note: September is Hunger Action Month. Over 700 million people in the world go hungry.  We’re better than that. 

• Volunteers with your regional chapter of FoodRescue US www.foodrescue.us

• Contribute to your community food bank. 

• Sign the open letter to end global hunger from the Global Alliance to End Hunger and Poverty .  There should be rice and beans to feed all of us. 

We’re barely past Labor Day, but pumpkin spice is back with a vengeance. Paid subscribers, Broccoli Rising – the Pumpkin Edition will be coming your way next week.