Name: The Black Bean Cake
Yield: Serves 4
Ingredients: 1 tablespoon ancho chill powder; 12 sprigs cilantro, washed, spun dry; 3 cups black beans; ½ cup cilantro leaves, coarsely chopped; ¾ teaspoon salt; ½ cup sour cream; ¼ cup fresh tomato relish; ¼ cup rendered duck fat, lard, or pure vegetable oil (canola, peanut, or safflower); 1 tablespoon milk; 1 small fresh hot green chili, stemmed, seeded, finely chopped; 1 tablespoon ground cumin

Preparation info

Serves
4

Difficulty
Medium

Appears in

Jeremiah Tower Cooks

By Jeremiah Tower

Published 2002

About

This recipe appeared in my first book, Jeremiah Tower’s New American Classics, and when people heard I was doing a new book, everyone said, “Make sure to include the black bean cake!” And that bit about Liz Smith. So here they are.

I think that the columnist Liz Smith’s farewell to Rock Hudson—“So long, big boy, have a good rest”—is what I would like on my tombstone, but it will probably be: “He invented the black bean cake.”

It is simple, beautiful, easy, fast, and i