MAKES 6 CUPS
This dish is a tribute to New Year’s Day in the South. Its three main ingredients—black-eyed peas, greens, and some kind of pork—symbolize your intentions. The idea is to eat like a poor man on New Year’s Day, then be rich for the rest of the year. Peas are coins, greens are dollars, and the pig is a good luck symbol.
Ingredients
• 4 cups fresh or frozen black-eyed peas
• 4 ounces Jowl Bacon, cut into ¼-inch dice
• 2 stalks celery, cut into 3-inch chunks
• 1 onion, peeled, stem and root ends trimmed, quartered
• 1 carrot, peeled, cut into 2-inch chunks
• 1 dried bay leaf
• 4 cups packed collard greens, cut into 2-inch pieces (about 6 ounces)
• 1 cup Ham Broth, Chicken Stock, or chicken broth
• 2 tablespoons Pepper Vinegar
• 1 tablespoon Frank’s RedHot sauce
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 2 teaspoons kosher salt
Instructions
1. In a Dutch oven, combine the peas, bacon, celery, onion, carrot, and bay leaf and add just enough water to cover the peas. Bring to a boil over high heat and, using a slotted spoon, skim and discard the scum. Cover, lower the heat so that the liquid simmers, and cook until the peas are tender, about 1½ hours. Check about 1 hour into cooking to make sure there’s plenty of liquid; sometimes the peas will soak it right up, so add water as needed.
2. Remove the Dutch oven from the heat, and using tongs, remove the bacon and reserve. Remove the carrot, celery, and bay leaf and discard. Gently stir the peas to break up the onions into the liquid.
3. Add the collards and broth and return to a simmer. Cover and cook for another 30 minutes. Remove the lid and cook just to evaporate some excess liquid, another 4 minutes.
4. Aggressively stir in the vinegar, hot sauce, butter, and salt. This will break up the peas a little, releasing some starch to make the mixture even creamier.
Find these and more recipes in Kevin’s cookbook, Fire in my Belly.
