Kuru fasulye: Turkish white bean stew with pepper paste

Ask friends from Turkey what they would choose for a last meal and more than one will say kuru fasulye with rice. It is a plain dish: dried white beans cooked slowly with onion, pepper paste and tomato until they are soft enough to crush with your tongue and the sauce has turned thick and glossy. In my mother's house in Kayseri it was Wednesday food, made in the largest pot, eaten with a spoon of pilaf on the side, a few pickles and a raw onion cut in quarters for those who wanted it. It cost almost nothing and fed everyone twice.

It is also a dish that rewards a little attention before you start cooking. The size of the bean, the length of the soak and the way you add salt decide whether you end up with creamy beans in a red sauce or tough skins in a watery one. Here is how I do it in Frankfurt, where I buy my beans in a Turkish grocer's that sells them loose from sacks.

Choosing your beans by size

In Turkish markets white beans are often sorted by size, and some shops label them by the width of the bean in millimetres. A medium bean of around 7 mm is the classic choice for kuru fasulye in many homes. Smaller beans cook faster but can turn to mush. The large, flat ones are lovely and buttery but need longer and are more often kept for salads or for special occasions. Outside Turkey you will find the same three sizes under different names.

The times are for ordinary beans from a shop with a good turnover. Old beans, the ones that have sat in a cupboard for a year or two, can take twice as long and sometimes never soften completely. When I buy beans, I look for an even, creamy colour with smooth skins. Wrinkled beans, cracked beans or a lot of dust in the bag tell you they are old. If your beans are a mix of sizes, the small ones will collapse before the large ones are tender, so it pays to buy from one sack.

Soaking, and a quick first boil

Soak the beans overnight in plenty of cold water: they will roughly double in size, so use at least three times their volume. In a warm kitchen, keep the bowl somewhere cool or the beans may start to ferment, which you will smell. In the morning drain them and rinse.

Many Turkish cooks then bring the soaked beans to the boil in fresh water, let them bubble for about 10 minutes, and drain them again before they go into the stew. My mother always did, and I still do. The foam that rises in those first minutes goes down the sink, and the finished sauce tastes cleaner. It also gives you a chance to check the beans: if they are still very hard after this first boil, you know to allow extra time.

If you forget to soak the beans, cover them with water, boil for 5 minutes, turn off the heat and leave them covered for an hour. It is not quite as good as a long soak, but the stew will still be fine.

Building the sauce

The base is simple. Onions go into butter or oil and cook slowly until soft and sweet, which takes longer than most people expect: a good 8 to 10 minutes. Then the pastes. I use both Turkish red pepper paste, which is the backbone of the flavour, and a little tomato paste for colour. Fry them with the onions for two minutes, stirring, until the oil turns red and the raw smell goes. If you have never cooked with pepper paste, our notes on Turkish pepper paste explain the hot and sweet kinds.

Some cooks add a grated tomato in summer, or a green pepper. In winter I leave them out. A piece of lamb or a few slices of a cured beef sausage are traditional in many homes and make a heartier pot; this version is meatless, and I add the meat options below.

Salt at the right time

Add salt only when the beans are nearly soft. Salt added at the start does not ruin the beans, whatever you may have heard, but in my pot it makes them cook unevenly, with some still firm while others split. Adding it in the last 20 minutes gives me the most even result. The tomato and pepper paste are acidic and slow the softening too, which is one more reason to give the beans their first boil separately so they are already partly cooked when they meet the sauce.

How thick should it be?

A good kuru fasulye is neither soup nor dry. When you tilt the pot, the sauce should move slowly and coat the beans, like thin custard. If it is watery at the end, take the lid off and simmer for 10 minutes more, then crush a ladle of beans against the side of the pot and stir them back in. They thicken the sauce naturally. If it is too thick, add hot water a little at a time. Like most stews, it thickens as it cools, and it is better after a rest of 15 minutes off the heat.

Recipe

Kuru fasulye (Turkish white bean stew)

Serves 6 with rice pilaf

Prep

20 min

Cook

1 hr 45 min

Rest

12 hr

Total

14 hr 5 min

Amounts in

cups & spoons grams & ml

Beans

• 2 1/2 cups500 g dried medium white beans (cannellini or similar)
• for soakingfor soaking cold water

Stew

• 3 tbsp45 ml olive or sunflower oil
• 1 tbsp15 g butter
• 2 medium2 medium onions, finely chopped
• 2 tbsp30 g Turkish red pepper paste (biber salçası)
• 1 tbsp15 g tomato paste
• 6 cups1.4 litres hot water
• 2 tsp10 g salt, or to taste
• 1 tsp2 g pul biber (Turkish red pepper flakes)
• 1/2 tsp1 g freshly ground black pepper

Method

1. Soak the beans overnight, 10 to 12 hours, in at least three times their volume of cold water, then drain and rinse.
2. Cover the beans with fresh water in a large pot, bring to the boil and boil for 10 minutes, skimming off the foam, then drain.
3. In the same pot, warm the oil and butter over a medium heat and cook the onions for 8 to 10 minutes, until soft and golden at the edges.
4. Stir in the pepper paste and tomato paste and fry for 2 minutes, until the oil turns red and smells sweet rather than raw.
5. Add the drained beans, stir to coat them, then pour in the hot water; it should cover the beans by about 3 cm.
6. Bring to the boil, cover with the lid slightly ajar and simmer gently for 60 to 75 minutes, stirring now and then, until the beans are almost soft.
7. Season with the salt, pul biber and black pepper and simmer for another 20 to 30 minutes, until a bean crushes easily against the roof of your mouth.
8. If the sauce is thin, simmer uncovered for 10 minutes and crush a ladle of beans against the side of the pot; if it is too thick, add a splash of hot water.
9. Turn off the heat and leave the pot covered for 15 minutes before serving.

Cook's notes

• Very old beans may need an extra 30 to 60 minutes; keep the water topped up so the beans stay covered.
• In a pressure cooker, cook the soaked and boiled beans with the sauce for 20 to 25 minutes at high pressure, then season and simmer for 10 minutes.

Serving it the Turkish way

Kuru fasulye almost always comes with rice. Spoon a little buttery rice pilaf next to the beans, not under them, so everyone can mix as much as they like. Then pickles: cucumbers, peppers, cabbage or a mixed jar of turşu, whatever you have. Their sourness cuts through the richness of the beans. A raw onion, cut in quarters and broken apart, is the other classic, along with a basket of bread for the last of the sauce.

On days when I want more beans than one stew can hold, I cook extra plain and keep some aside for a cold white bean salad the next day.

Variations

• With meat. Brown 300 g of lamb or beef cut into small cubes in the oil before the onions, then follow the recipe; the meat cooks with the beans.
• With sucuk or pastırma. Add a few slices of Turkish cured sausage or cured beef in the last 15 minutes so they flavour the sauce without turning hard.
• Olive-oil version. Use 5 tablespoons of olive oil and no butter, add a grated tomato with the pastes, and serve at room temperature with lemon.

Cooking for more, and storing

For twelve, double everything, but do not double the water blindly. Use a wide pot rather than a tall one so the beans cook evenly, and start with water that covers the beans by 3 cm, the same depth as for the smaller pot. You may need a little less than twice the amount. Allow 15 to 20 minutes extra for the larger pot to come back to the boil.

Kuru fasulye keeps for four days in the fridge and tastes better on the second day. Reheat it gently with a few spoons of water, because the sauce thickens overnight. It also freezes well for up to three months in portions. The rice does not, so cook that fresh.