South American black beans and rice?

[MsFogi]

I discovered this at a friend's the other day and loved it so want to start doing it at home. However, can someone enlighten me about black beans - where do you buy yours? When I search for then on the Sainsburys website I only seem to get tinned ones - do these taste okay or should I am for dried. If dried - do they go by another name because I can't for the life of me work out where to find them!
Also any tips very welcome! And ideas on any meats/veg that work well with it - my friend served it with roast cauliflower and smoky sausage which was divine!

Which country? For feijao I use pinto beans (from amazon) but that's a Brasilian meal, I'm guessing that it might be different beans in different countries x

My friend is from Brazil so I assume she is doing Brazilian style black beans and rice.

Black beans are often known as turtle beans in the UK. In my (limited, deliberately) experience the tinned ones tend to be very heavily salted although I think the Aldi ones aren't so bad. No self-respecting South American would use tinned because of the absolutely enormous price differential, but here in the UK tinned ones are barely any more expensive once you factor in the energy costs.

I cannot speak for all of South America, but in Brazil there are two ways of eating it. The first is that the beans are cooked - usually in a pressure cooker - with aromatics such as bay leaves or onions, and often with bacon as well. The meal (breakfast, lunch or dinner - all are fair game) is built around rice and beans like this, with meat or fish - where included - cooked separately then added on top, and augmented with salads. The second is that the beans form the basis of a stew called feijoada, which will have salt beef, pork (i.e. pigs' trotters, ears, lips etc) and chouriço added during cooking. Feijoada is always served with sautéed collard greens (kale) and vinaigrette (diced tomatoes, onions, peppers, parsley, salt/pepper, olive oil and wine vinegar all mixed together into a relish) as well as sliced orange.

In Brazil, choice of beans tends to be regional. In Rio it's always black beans (known as carioca beans for that very reason) but pinto and other varieties are more common elsewhere.

To drink with it, a caipirinha would be best. If you can't find cachaça then make a caipiroska instead with vodka, or serve beer.

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/black-bean-meat-stew-feijoada

I only make feijao (only beans) but this link is feijoada (I'm not a meat eater). Beeb good food is like a happy medium between something that tastes reasonably similar but is doable within constraints of time/English ingredients etc.

Now I'm hungry!

Yes, definitely buy them dry. I get mine from Tesco and they are called ‘turtle beans’. No idea why.

I make this Cuban black bean stew quite often. It takes a long time (3+ hours plus overnight soaking of the beans), but it’s really nice.

https://www.thekitchn.com/recipe-cuban-black-bean-soup-98048