Habichuelas con Dulce

Ingredients

• 2 tins red kidney beans, drained
• 500 ml water
• 500 g batata (white sweet potato), in chunks
• 1 tin coconut milk
• 1 tin evaporated milk
• 200 g condensed milk
• 120 g sugar, to taste
• 3 cinnamon sticks
• 4 cloves
• a good pinch of salt
• a scrape of nutmeg
• 60 g raisins
• milk biscuits (galletas de leche), to serve — optional

Method

1. Blend the beans and strain

   Blend the beans with the water until completely smooth, then push the purée through a sieve. Straining is not optional — the skins are what stop it tasting like a dessert and make it taste like beans.

2. Why it works at all

   This is a sweet made of red beans, and it should not work. It does because the strained purée behaves exactly like a starch — it thickens the milk the way rice does in an arroz con leche, and the bean flavour disappears under the coconut and spice.

3. Milks and spice

   Pour the purée into a heavy pot with the coconut milk, evaporated milk, condensed milk, sugar, cinnamon, cloves and salt and bring it to the gentlest simmer, stirring constantly.

   15 min

4. Batata in

   Add the sweet potato and cook for thirty minutes at a bare simmer. Stir along the bottom the whole time — this pot is nothing but milk and sugar and it catches in seconds.

   30 min

5. Raisins and nutmeg

   Add the raisins and nutmeg and cook another ten minutes, until it coats a spoon thickly. It thickens a great deal more as it cools, so stop while it still pours.

   10 min

6. Serve cold, with biscuits

   Chill it completely and serve cold in cups with milk biscuits floating on top. It is a Lent dish — Semana Santa — and every family swears their measurements are the correct ones.