Smoky Bean & Sausage Ragout

Smoky Bean & Sausage Ragout is the ultimate comforting, warming and quick to put together supper. This recipe is a store cupboard dream. Just remember to keep some sausages in your fridge or freezer. This is also great last-minute food with a short cooking time, and it’s good for big impromptu parties as you can easily scale the recipe up for 20 or 30 people.

Smoky Bean & Sausage Ragout is a tomato-ey, smokey paprika flavoured stew or ragout as I like to call it - blame my age, and the fact ragout was an important word in the French cooking that fired me up in my teens. Ragout = a stew of meat and veg. 

Before eating, dollop on a couple of spoons of aioli - either make your own or add a couple of crushed garlic cloves to some bought mayo. Sometimes though, I just like the dish naked, with no extra adornment.

Ingredients

Serves 2 hungry people

200g de-podded edamame beans (fresh, frozen or tinned) or soya pieces/optional

1 jar multicoloured peppers, roughly cut up 

2/4 sausages, chorizo flavoured (in the UK, I use M&S vegan posh dogs)

2 fat slices of toasted and torn up wholemeal sourdough bread (optional)

Parsley, roughly chopped to garnish/optional

1 red onion halved and finely sliced

2 cloves garlic, peeled and finely chopped

Olive Oil oil for frying

1 tbsp smoked paprika 

1/2 tbsp ground cumin

1 400g tin tomatoes, crushed, or 300 ml passata 

1/2-1 can tap water

2 tbsp tomato paste/optional

1 400g tin cannellini or butter beans, drained

Method

1.  Brown the sausages in a little oil in a large frying pan or wide-bottomed saucepan. When they are coloured, take them out of the pan and put to one side.

2. Add more oil if needed and fry the onion until soft and beginning to brown, 10-12 minutes.

3. Add the garlic and fry for 2 minutes. 

4. Add the tomatoes and the spices and cook for five minutes until there’s a rich tomato sauce. Crush the tomatoes with a potato masher if they are whole.

5. Add the beans, the peppers, the sausages, the soya if using, and 1/2+ can of tap water and let the whole lot simmer gently for 15 minutes. The sauce should reduce and become rich and syrupy. If it is not thick enough, cook to reduce further. Add the edamame beans three minutes before the end of the cooking time if used.

6. Now for a tasting. To beef up the tomato-y flavour, add the tomato paste. Also, add more smoked paprika if your taste buds demand it.

7. Leave to sit until you are ready to serve. Just reheat before eating. 

8. Garnish with parsley and serve with toasted sourdough croutons and aioli.