Chickpea, Peas and Black Eyed Bean Stew

When I first cooked this, the recipe referred to “broth”, which I have always assumed needed meat and bones to make it tasty. This broth is made out of tomatoes, spices, garlic and onion and it cooks up in 10 minutes. You will not believe how tasty this is and how delicious the mixture of chickpeas, black-eyed beans and peas is. Black-eyed beans are very nutritious and are a wonderful source of iron, folate, copper and thiamine.

This recipe was inspired by Meera Sodha but I have made quite a few changes, some to make it less hot! Feel free to up the chilli if you like your food with lots of heat. 4 tbsp olive oil 2 onions, chopped 4 cloves garlic,

crushed

½ x 400g tin organic tomatoes, chopped

1¼ tsp salt

½ tsp chilli powder 1 tsp garam masala 1 tsp ground cumin ½ tsp ground

turmeric 250g frozen peas,

defrosted 1 x 400g tin organic black-eyed beans, drained

1 x 400g tin organic chickpeas, drained

1 tbsp lemon juice a handful of fresh coriander leaves, finely chopped (I often use mint instead)

Heat the oil in a pot and add the onions to cook gently for 10 minutes. Stir in the garlic and cook for 2 minutes then add the tomatoes. After about 5 minutes, add the salt, chilli and spices and stir-fry for about 5 minutes.

Pour a litre of water into the pot and bring it to the boil then turn down to a moderate heat and let it cook for 10 minutes. Stir in the peas, beans and chickpeas and cook for about 5 minutes.

Take off the heat and mix in the lemon juice and coriander.

I serve this in lovely pottery bowls with sourdough on the side for dipping into the wonderful broth.

Once I made paratha to go with it, which were outstanding!