Red kidney beans slow-cooked with salted pigtail and beef in coconut milk, thickened with slender flour dumplings called spinners and seasoned with thyme and Scotch bonnet.
Crowned in September 1992 by Jamaica's Gleaner newspaper (in its Home, Living and Food Guide) as "the best dish made in Jamaica" (specifically stew peas with rice), stew peas is creole comfort food born of frugality, blending the cooking traditions of the island's Spanish, Indigenous Taino and African peoples. Enslaved cooks stretched salted meats and dried beans into a filling stew, and the thrifty addition of hand-rolled spinner dumplings turned it into a complete Sunday meal.
Deeply savory and creamy, the coconut-thickened gravy coats soft beans and fall-apart meat. The chewy spinners soak up the rich broth while a background of thyme and pepper keeps it lively.
Long simmering breaks down beans and collagen-rich pigtail into a naturally creamy, gelatin-thickened gravy. The spinner dumplings release starch as they cook, further thickening the pot.
Variations
Stew peas with pigtail and beef, gungo (pigeon pea) stew, oxtail stew peas, vegan stew peas
On the Palate
Where Jamaican Stew Peas sits in the Jamaican flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 6
How it's made
8 steps · 20 min
- 170 min
Soak red kidney beans overnight, then boil with pigtail and beef until beans begin to soften, about 60-75 minutes.
Watch outSimmer the beans until they just start to give — go too far now and they collapse before the pot's even built.
- 210 min
Add coconut milk, garlic, onion, scallion and thyme; continue simmering.
- 38 min
Roll small portions of a flour-and-water dough between your palms into thin spinner dumplings.
Watch outRoll the spinners thin and even between your palms — fat lumpy ones stay doughy in the middle.
- 48 min
Drop the spinners into the simmering pot and cook until they float and firm up.
- 52 min
Add a whole Scotch bonnet and a few allspice berries for aroma.
- 630 min
Simmer until the broth thickens to a creamy, soup-like gravy and the meat is tender.
Watch outLet it simmer down until the gravy turns creamy and coats a spoon — that thickness comes from the beans and pigtail, no flour needed.
- 72 min
Season with salt and black pepper to taste, removing the Scotch bonnet.
Watch outFish out the whole Scotch bonnet before it splits — leave it and the pot goes searingly hot.
- 83 min
Serve over steamed white rice.
