Mini Slow Cooker Red Beans And Rice
This mini slow cooker red beans and rice is a New Orleans classic scaled down to serve one, made from scratch with easy-to-find ingredients like smoked sausage and red kidney beans.
Servings: 1 serving
Equipment
Ingredients
- ½ cup dried red kidney beans (about 3 oz)
- 1 cup sliced smoked sausage (about 4.5 oz / ¼ lb)
- 1 celery stalk - chopped
- ½ cup chopped onion (about 2.5 oz)
- ¼ cup green bell pepper - chopped (about 1 oz)
- 2 cloves garlic - minced
- ½ teaspoon Creole seasoning (use homemade Creole seasoning or your favorite brand.)
- ¼ teaspoon hot sauce
- ⅛ teaspoon dried thyme
- 1 cup low sodium chicken broth
- 1 tablespoon salted butter
To serve
- 1 cup cooked rice
Instructions
- Rinse the dried red kidney beans and remove any broken ones or debris.
- Put the beans in a bowl, cover with at least 2 inches of water, and soak overnight.
- In the morning, drain and rinse the soaked beans.
- Transfer the beans to a saucepan, cover with 1 to 2 inches of fresh water, and bring to a rolling boil.
- Boil the beans for at least 10 minutes, then drain and rinse them again.
- Add the beans to a 1.5-quart slow cooker, along with the sausage, onion, celery, bell pepper, and garlic.
- Stir in the Creole seasoning, hot sauce, and thyme, then pour in the chicken broth.
- Cover and cook on HIGH for 4 to 5 hours, until the beans are soft all the way through. Start checking about an hour before the end.
- Taste and adjust the seasoning, then stir in the butter until it melts into the sauce. For a creamier sauce, mash a few beans against the side of the cooker and stir them in.
- Spoon the beans over hot cooked rice and serve.
Video
Notes
Use a 1.5-quart slow cooker: This recipe is sized for a small 1.5-quart slow cooker, which keeps the beans and broth at the right depth to cook evenly and stay saucy. I also tested it in a 2-quart slow cooker and it works well, so either small cooker is fine. Avoid a full-size pot, where the shallow layer cooks unevenly.
Start with fresh dried beans. Dried beans that have sat in the pantry for more than a year can stay firm no matter how long they cook. Buy them somewhere with good turnover and use them within a year so they soften properly.
Mash some of the beans for a creamier sauce. Near the end of cooking, press a couple spoonfuls of the softened beans against the side of the cooker and stir them back in. The starch they release thickens the liquid into the creamy texture red beans and rice is known for.
Taste and adjust the seasoning before serving. Hours in the slow cooker mellow the Creole seasoning and hot sauce, so they taste milder than they did going in. Taste at the end and stir in a little more of either to bring the flavor back up.
Nutrition
Serving: 1serving | Calories: 783kcal | Carbohydrates: 77g | Protein: 55g | Fat: 74g | Saturated Fat: 29g | Cholesterol: 190mg | Sodium: 2154mg | Potassium: 2164mg | Fiber: 17g | Sugar: 7g | Vitamin A: 1083IU | Vitamin C: 43mg | Calcium: 137mg | Iron: 9mg
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