Hoppin’ John. PHOTO BY LEIGH BULLARD
A vintage New Year’s card. COURTESY IMAGE
Tinky Weisblat enjoys a dish of Hoppin’ John. PHOTO BY LEIGH BULLARD
A pot of Hoppin’ John. PHOTO BY LEIGH BULLARD
I spent a number of years living in the American South. There the traditional food for the new year is Hoppin’ John, aka black-eyed peas and rice.
Black-eyed peas are actually beans, not peas. They are believed to have originated in Africa although they have also been cultivated for centuries in China and India. I was pleasantly surprised recently to find them in an Indian grocery store.
They may have been brought to this continent by enslaved people from West Africa — or perhaps merely by their captors. The details are murky. However the beans came to this country, many enslaved people were doubtless happy to have a reminder of home.
Slave owners fed the beans to livestock as well as servants; they are also known as cowpeas. They are nutritious and quite tasty for humans, especially combined with rice, a little protein and some vegetables as they are in Hoppin’ John.
Like most beans, black-eyed peas are best eaten in conjunction with rice. As readers may know, beans and rice eaten individually are incomplete nutritionally, but when eaten together they provide amino acids to make a complete protein.
No one knows how “Hoppin’ John” got its name. That hasn’t stopped would-be historians from making up stories.
Perhaps there was indeed a disabled man in Charleston, S.C., who moved oddly as he sold it on the street. Perhaps children gleefully hopped to the table when they heard this dish was being served. Or maybe a casual host invited a guest to partake of the meal by saying, “Hop in, John.”
In any case, it has come over the decades to symbolize good luck in the new year. It is traditionally served with rice, greens and cornbread. The rice, as I noted, makes it more nutritious. It also makes sure that the eater gets every bit of liquid in the dish.
The greens (traditionally collard greens, although I most recently just made a green salad) symbolize paper money. The cornbread symbolizes gold. The beans themselves represent coins. The overall idea is that anyone who eats this dish will have a prosperous new year.
I personally have never found or inherited a windfall after a meal of this new year’s staple. It does help one’s pocketbook, however, by lasting a long time. I often make it for New Year’s Day and then continue to eat it for most of the next week.
Interestingly, leftover Hoppin’ John consumed after New Year’s Day is called “Skippin’ Jenny.” “After that,” writes southern chef Pamela Roberts, “we just call it beans and rice.”
According to the Vicksburg, Miss., Convention and Visitors Bureau, one group for whom a form of Hoppin’ John was particularly lucky was the citizenry of Vicksburg during the Civil War siege of that city. Union forces destroyed most foodstuffs and cut off access to more.
“Stories say peas and salted pork were … left untouched, because of the belief that they were animal food unfit for human consumption. Southerners considered themselves lucky to be left with some supplies to help them survive the winter,” notes that bureau’s website.
Below is my favorite recipe for Hoppin’ John/Skippin’ Jenny. I eat meat so I tend to throw in a ham hock (my most recent ham hock was actually the enormous end of a ham) and some sausage.
The fat in the meat doesn’t overwhelm the healthiness of the beans. I help minimize that fat by skimming it off the top of the dish after it has sat overnight in the refrigerator.
If you’re a vegetarian, feel free to omit the meat and substitute vegetable stock for the chicken stock. A chopped chipotle in adobo sauce or two will give you some of the smoky flavor normally imparted by the pork.
I hope that however you make it, the dish helps you start the new year in a happy and healthy way … and perhaps brings you luck and prosperity.
A small amount of extra virgin olive oil or bacon fat for sautéing
1 10- to-14 ounce can tomatoes with green chiles
Extra smoked sausage, chopped and lightly sautéed (optional)
A few sprigs of fresh thyme
Salt and pepper to taste
Wash and sort the peas, and soak them in cold water. Ideally, they should soak overnight, but a couple of hours will do if you’re in a rush. Drain and rinse them when they have finished soaking.
In a 5- to 6-quart Dutch oven, heat the oil or bacon fat, and use it to sauté the onion, garlic and celery over medium heat for five minutes. Add the beans, tomatoes, pork, stock, water and seasonings.
Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring to make sure it is well blended. Skim off as much of the bean scum as you can.
Reduce the heat, cover the pot and simmer the mixture for at least one and a half to two hours, or until the beans are tender. (The best way to determine this is to taste them.)
If you have time, cool the dish, store it overnight in the refrigerator and skim off the fat after it has congealed. (It tastes better the second day.)
Remove the ham hock. Tear its meat into shreds and add that meat to the pot of peas, discarding the fat and bone. Serve the beans with rice, cornbread and greens. Serves eight to 10.
Tinky Weisblat is the award-winning author of “The Pudding Hollow Cookbook,” “Pulling Taffy,” and “Love, Laughter, and Rhubarb.” Visit her website, TinkyCooks.com.
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