White Beans with Chicken (Tavuklu Kurufasulye)

Perfect comfort food for a cold winter night. White beans are good source of cholesterol-lowering fiber, as are most other beans. This recipe tastes best if made with Dermason beans. Dermason also called whit beans are legumes rich in nutrients grown mostly in Turkey. They are white in color and can be cooked, baked and blended with any vegetable or meat. If you can't find dermason beans you can use cannellini bean/white kidney bean/fazolia bean or navy beans which can also provide the same smooth texture and nutty flavor.

For vegetarian version of this dish simply skip the meat.

Ingredients:
1 cup dried or 2 cans whit beans

1 lb chicken breast or beef cubes
1 large onion (diced)
1 banana pepper or jalapeno pepper (diced)
2 tbs of canola oil
2 tbs of tomato paste
2 cups of boiling water
1 tsp of black pepper
salt

Directions:

1. Soak the beans overnight (1 cup dried beans yields 2 1/2 cups cooked beans), if you are using dried beans change the water 2 times while soaking, next day boil them until soft. To save cooking time you can skip the soaking process and pressure cook the beans for 30-40 min.

2. In a large pot, heat the oil, brown the chicken and cook for 5 min. on medium low.

3. Add onion and pepper and saute until soft.

4. Add tomato paste and stir for 3 min.

5. Add the beans, salt and water, cook on medium low for 35 min. If you prefer spicy, you can add dried chili peppers.

6. Serve with white rice or bulgur pilaf