Arroz con Habichuelas Guisadas (Puerto Rican-Inspired Rice with Stewed Beans)

As a Black and Puerto Rican woman, my cultures are something that I take so much pride in. Both sides of my family have such rich and interesting backgrounds, and it’s been a unique experience getting to witness how we have mingled together to create a deeply loving community. My mom’s mother, who we affectionately call Mama, is the matriarch of my Puerto Rican side. She grew up on her parents’ farm in a little town called Río Cañas Abajo in Juana Diaz, Puerto Rico, before moving to Brooklyn, New York, when my mom was about 2 years old. Today, she lives in a quiet house in South Jersey, where she spends her time caring for her beloved pet birds, thrifting, tending to her garden and, most importantly, feeding her loved ones.

Mama is almost always in the kitchen, preparing meals for whoever happens to stop by. She doesn’t care if you are family or friends or the electrician coming to fix the power. It also doesn’t matter if you aren’t hungry. Once you enter her home, you are entering her kitchen, sitting at the table and getting a plate put in front of you. To Mama, food is a labor of love and a way to show that you care for someone. It is a way to bring you to her home island. And to me, it is a way to immerse myself in part of my culture that I haven’t been as privileged to experience firsthand.

You see, my mom opted not to teach my sisters and me how to speak Spanish, for reasons that will vary depending on who you ask. She’ll say my dad (who doesn’t speak it either) felt left out. If you ask him, he’ll say we were getting too confused hearing both languages. Regardless of the reason, my sisters and cousins were some of the first in the family to be raised solely speaking English. Taking high school and college Spanish gave us some conversational skills, but to this day, the language barrier between us and Mama is painfully apparent. 

Even so, the limited communication did absolutely nothing to lessen the amount of love and care we share for each other. As children, we would play tag and hide-and-seek in her backyard for hours. At the end of the day, we’d gather in the kitchen to devour plates of arroz con habichuelas guisadas, or rice with stewed beans. Mama sat with us at the table, happily refilling our plates until we were full. She packed up the leftovers in an empty Country Crock spread tub for us to take home. 

Getting Mama to share her recipe with me proved to be somewhat of a struggle, even without the language barrier. It’s worth noting that any attempt to help out in her kitchen was met with a swift smack from her dish towel and a stern look that quickly convinced us to take a seat and let Mama do her thing. Because cooking for us is her love language, she has always been reluctant to let us assist. It took several weeks but with my mom’s help translating, I was able to finally get my hands on her prized recipe for arroz con habichuelas guisadas. 

The dish features tender and fluffy white rice that’s served with brothy stewed pink beans. Sofrito—an aromatic paste consisting of fresh garlic, onions, culantro (a sturdy herb similar to cilantro and used in Puerto Rican cuisine), cilantro, peppers and a splash of some good olive oil—makes up the base of the beans’ flavor. While you can add tomato paste to make a red version of sofrito, the green version, also called recaito, is what seasons this dish. So Mama doesn’t have to start it from scratch each time, she makes enormous batches of the dark green paste to freeze in ice cube trays. We use it in just about every savory dish, whether we toss a frozen block into a pot of broth for some extra flavor or use it to season ground beef to make empanadas. For the purpose of keeping things simple, this recipe calls for store-bought recaito, which you can find in most grocery stores. 

The finished dish is rich and satisfying, and it can easily be customized with seasonal vegetables and added protein. In the fall, Mama adds chunks of pumpkin in place of the potatoes and also throws in chicken or even salami. I typically choose to keep things plant-based by adding tofu. Now that I finally have the recipe, I can make arroz con habichuelas guisadas whenever I’m missing my family. It’s also an equally important reminder that love can transcend language barriers. Mama has taught me that a plate of rice and beans is love, no words required.