Collard Greens, Ham Hocks, and Black-Eyed Peas
Takin' a trip back to when I used to cook in restaurants. Vegan option at the end!
I recently celebrated my 69th birthday. I’m officially referring to it as “70 minus one” because that’s the most interesting thing about turning 69.
We went out to dinner at one of my favorite Portland restaurants. Shout out to Bergerac, our friendly, neighborhood French bistro.
We had too many people, and we’re trying to be COVID-safer, so Bergerac staff set up a long table for us on the sidewalk. They even erected a large umbrella to block out the sun.
Okay, well, that blew over a few times until one of our handier friends strapped it to a tree. She just happened to have a strap in her bag. It was a sweet evening in Portland.
At one point, we got to talking about my years working as a cook, pastry chef, waiter, and occasional bartender. Next morning, I woke up and went through some recipes I learned while cooking in restaurants in my 20s!
I haven’t posted a recipe in a while, and I came across this beauty. It’s absolutely the least labor for the most flavor you are ever going to find in the recipe world. Enjoy!
The recipe: Collard greens, smoked ham hocks, and black-eyed peas
Originally from Tin Pan Alley, NYC circa 1980.
Ingredients
Adjust for the numbers of people you want to feed!
Two, three, or four bunches of collards, washed and roughly chopped
A half pound or pound or ? of dried black-eyed peas, rinsed
A smoked ham hock or two
A half-can or whole can of beer or a bottle of stout
Water to cover by a few inches. You could also use broth of some sort.
Ground pepper - lots
Salt - you probably won’t need salt because of the smoked ham hocks. But if that doesn’t do it for you, add salt to taste
A healthy swoosh of balsamic vinegar - don’t use other kinds of vinegar
A small swoosh of tabasco sauce, optional
Instructions
Throw everything except the pepper, salt, vinegar, and tabasco into a stock pot. You could also use a pressure cooker, but don’t ask me how.
Bring to a boil and then reduce to a simmer.
Cook with the lid on, stirring occasionally until the collards are soft and some of the beans are just starting to split open. You may have to add more water. The end result should be slightly soupy.
Remove from heat.
Scoop the ham hocks from the pot with a slotted spoon. Take off the skin and discard. Pull the meat off of the bones, and roughly chop. Add back to the pot.
Stir in the pepper, salt, vinegar, and optional tabasco.
Serve with rice and/or mashed potatoes or other mashed root veggies/ and or cornbread with plenty of butter. Jam is always nice.
Note: Smoked ham hocks are sometimes hard to find depending on where you live. If it comes to that, you can order them online direct from producers or speciality grocery stores. You could substitute high-quality smoked ham, but it won’t be the same.
Options
The broth will thicken slightly as the beans cook. Good enough for me. But if you want to get fancy, you could cook some of the black-eyed peas separately, blend them into a mash, and use to further thicken the broth. You could also use canned black-eyed peas for this purpose.
You don’t want to use canned beans for the whole dish. Collards take a looong time to cook. You couldn’t leave canned beans in the pot for that long because they’d turn to mush. So you’d have to add them near the end, which would result in an entirely different-tasting dish.
Shaka, a Jaya Kula community member, suggested a vegan version. Leave out the ham hocks, of course. Add some peanut butter made from roasted peanuts to the broth. I would add that you could toss in a handful of pan roasted red peanuts. You’ll definitely want to add salt if ham hocks are not included.
Enjoy!
Lots of love,
Shambhavi
Not quite ready to fire up a paid subscription, but want to show your appreciation?
Please join Shambhavi and the Jaya Kula community for satsang & kirtan every Sunday at 3:00pm Pacific. Come in person to 1215 SE 8th Ave, Portland, OR, or join Jaya Kula’s newsletter to get the Zoom link for satsang. You can also listen to my podcast—Satsang with Shambhavi—wherever podcasts are found.
Good southern country food I grew up on.