Hermitcraft: Hoppin' John

'Way back at university I decided I had to do something about New Year's Day. Here in Anglophonia, it's only a holiday in the most technical sense. Aside from disposing of the Christmas tree – and in my house, steaming the next year's Christmas pudding – nothing fun, special, or out of the ordinary is scheduled for this day.

So when the local newspaper ran a bit on a classic New Year's meal from the American South, I was all over that. The dish itself – which could be summed up as "rice and beans cranked up to 11" – is deceptively simple, but hearty and sustaining. And, if attentively developed, incredibly delicious.

Like most traditional foods, hoppin' john varies from region to region and even family to family, to the extent that recognising versions separated in space and time may be challenging. Over the years, with the benefit of experience and helpful Southerners, I've made mine memorable and worthwhile. So I'm sharing it here. (Note that vegan hacks are also included in the recipe below.)

Whatever your own recipe becomes, hoppin' john is earthy and flavourful and I look forward to it all year, full as much as the Christmas turkey. (The dark leftovers of which could be fortified with a few drops of liquid smoke and used here in lieu of bacon, now I think of it.) I like to serve it in the pot it was made in, for an extra nod to self-sufficient cheer.

As for the name, nobody seems to know for sure where that came from. But I rate this meal a fine note upon which to hop into the coming year.

Hoppin' John

To serve 4:

For the blackeyed peas:
4 cups soaked blackeyed peas (1 1/3 cup dry; other beans – red, black, white, pinto – can be substituted if necessary)
2 cups chicken stock (or substitute lentil stock)
2 cups tomato or vegetable juice
2 tablespoons chopped Italian parsley stems (reserve the leaves for the main recipe)
1 teaspoon powdered thyme
1 teaspoon powdered sage
1 teaspoon rosemary
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon celery seed
1 bay leaf

For the rest:
3 slices jowl bacon (if necessary, substitute Spam, another bacon, ham, or sausage; for vegan, leave out the meat and sprinkle smoked almonds on the finished dish instead)
1/2 medium red onion, chopped
1/2 medium yellow onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
one each green, red, and yellow bell pepper, seeded and chopped
minced jalapeño to taste
4 cups cooked brown rice
1 teaspoon powdered thyme
leaves of 6 or 7 large stems Italian parsley (substitute celery leaves if necessary)
salt to taste

Simmer all blackeye ingredients in a covered pot till the beans are soft, about 40 minutes. If they end up soaking in the liquor for a while afterward, so much the better.

In a large skillet or pot, fry the bacon soft. Drain both bacon and pot well. (Too much jowl grease is too much.) Chop the bacon and lay aside for later.

In the residual grease in the bottom of the pan (or olive oil), sauté onions, garlic, and peppers. Add bacon and salt. (I seldom add salt to any dish, but this one tends to want some. Proceed mindfully.)

When the vegetables are bright and glistening, stir in the rice and thyme and toss assertively. You want a certain amount of crushing and bruising here, to integrate flavours and textures.

Add the beans and their liquor. Toss well again to mix completely.

Cover and steam over low heat for 15 minutes, until the rice is hot and liquid absorbed. Add water if necessary.

Remove from heat. Scatter parsley leaves on top, recover, and let rest for a minute or two before serving.


Best of 2023s to everyone, and may we meet again here 12 months hence.

Hermitcraft: Red Spaghetti (and Similar Rhodophytes)

As spring brings back the tender new seaweed, I rate it proper to share one of my favourites. This is Gracilariopsis sjoestedtii, a rhodophyte also known as "red spaghetti". As that name suggests, it's edible, though not in exactly the way you might conclude.

G. sjoestedtii is native to the eastern Pacific but relatives with similar attributes can be found across the planet. Like many in its phylum it's a good source of agar, a vegan jelly put to a wide range of uses in science and industry. And more importantly, gastronomy.

To that end you can poach rhodophytes in water or milk and press the gunk out of them, as humans have done for millennia, then use it to thicken soups and desserts. But for my money G. sjoestedtii is best simply eaten raw, more or less as-is, in the Korean style.

Unlike most seaweeds, this one is tender, succulent, and mild straight off the beach. Which is why I often eat it straight off the beach. However, it's also salty, so don't do this unless you're near home or packing drinking water.

If you bring some home, refrigerate immediately and wash it just before eating. Fresh water destroys marine algae at the cellular level, resulting in instant putrefaction.

You can chop chilled Gracilariopsis and add it to salads. Or just make a Gracilariopsis salad; cut the stems into bite-sized lengths, toss with a little finely chopped red onion, maybe other ingredients as called; dress lightly with oil and vinegar. Rice vinegar is particularly good, but I've also had plenty of success with herbed vinegars or plain old apple cider vinegar.

Though the noodle-like red algae don't cook especially well, turning instantly to stringy bright green hair, you can add them raw to hot soups or noodles, just before serving, for a pleasant touch of the sea.

And they make an excellent topping for crackers, baked potatoes, and hamburgers. On franks and brats, the shred-like pieces are remarkably suggestive of a marine sauerkraut.

Or just pitch bite-sized bits into your Bassho bowl (recipe: cooked brown rice, vegetable, protein – microwave, or steam lightly in a lidded pan), where they can serve for either vegetable or protein, according to need. I particularly like to pair Gracilariopsis with beans in this quick, sustaining monastic meal.

Nothing better in your Buddha bowl.

Hermitcraft: Tea Hacks

Tea is an integral part of Zen practice, and, for those of us with old-school British or Japanese roots, life. It can also become an attachment in the negative sense when you can't get any, or the stuff you've got is uninspiring. Over the years I've learned a few tricks to smooth out these bumps, and this week I'm sharing them in the hopes they'll do good for others.

Accidental treasure

I'll start with one I discovered by accident: if you seal a sachet of robust green tea, such as Dragonwell, in the same container with another of lapsang souchong, and leave them there for a while, the green acquires the other's smoky character, resulting in a brew that's good both hot and iced. Doesn't seem to damage the lapsang souchong, either.

Upgrading bad tea

Sometimes you have tea – black or green – but it's not very good. Though Not Very Good Tea can be depressing, you can amend it into Passable Tea (or even Enjoyable Tea) with other herbs.

The list of candidates is inexhaustible, but a few are so useful, and so common, that they deserve special mention.

Mint (Mentha) is common in most parts of the world, typically growing in drainage ditches and near any body of fresh water, to say nothing of residential areas where it's escaped cultivation. Throw in assertive, pleasant flavour, and mint may be the most useful tea-mixing herb there is. I especially prize the endless spectrum of flavours brought out by mint's promiscuous lifestyle. As varieties freely cross-pollinate, no two patches taste the same. Some are peppery, others icy, still others citrusy… the discoveries are endless. And of course, mint anchors a fine herbal mix all by itself if you have no real tea at all.

Several mint relatives are also handy. Catnip (Nepeta) is especially tasty, and frequently found feral. Lemon balm (Melissa), easily identified by its very mint-like appearance but strong Lemon Pledge odour, is too harsh to anchor a mix but welcome in restrained quantities in others. And bee balm (Monarda), a popular garden flower that was used as a tea substitute in colonial times, also mixes well with green or black tea.

Common non-mint tea stocks that

Bee balm (Monarda).

can enliven an uninspired cup include sweet white clover blossoms (Trifolium repens), lemony sheep sorrel (Rumex acetosella) or wood sorrel (Oxalis; see photo below), and orange peel or zest. Both of these last tend to be fairly bitter, especially whole peel, so proceed mindfully.

No tea at all

When you're flat out of Camellia sinensis, a few substitutes can put you back in the game.

Blackberry or raspberry (Rubus ssp) leaves, dried and crumbled, are a defensible green tea surrogate. I've found that the red winter leaves of our local native trailing blackberry (Rubus ursinus) work best, having a rosy flavour and less tannic bite, but I've had good luck with other species as well. Add amendments, and you have a worthwhile mix

Many people don't think of conifers when preparing food and drink, but at the risk of ripping off Euell Gibbons, many parts are useful.

Black spruce (Picea mariana) is a famous beverage stock, for its comparatively sweet bouquet. (Bearing in mind that all conifers taste like turpentine. They're an acquired taste, but once acquired, nothing else will do.)

The soft new pale-green tips of many others can also be tasty and nutritious. (Loads of Vitamin C, for starters.) Among my favourites are Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga) and Sitka spruce (P. sitchenensis). Hemlock (Tsuga) is another standby, but because it's fairly tannic, I prefer to mix it with weaker herbs to give them a real-tea edge, rather than use it as an anchor.

Roasted rice is another good stop-gap. Just spread a handful of brown rice in the bottom of a dry skillet and toss it over medium heat until the grains become dark brown and smoky. Some may even pop like popcorn.

The toasted grains can be infused as-is, but make a much better beverage if ground first. A mortar and pestle is adequate for this. Grind only as needed to preserve freshness and potency. Useful amendments include milk, baking spices (cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg…), toasted fucus, or orange peel. Some like a few grains of salt in it.

Civilisation in a cup

Tea-mixing is a huge topic, the possible ingredients literally endless. These are some the most easily- and universally-accessible, and all of them support my practice on a regular basis.

Here's hoping they enrich yours as well.

Wood sorrel (Oxalis).

(Top photo courtesy of Kristina Walter and Wikimedia Commons.)

Hermitcraft: Solitary Sesshin, Pt. 3: Food

(A sesshin schedule template is available in Part I. For general tips on sesshin planning, see Part II.)

For an activity that's all about putting sensual stimulus in context, sesshin is remarkably dependent on food. Right food equals good sesshin; the opposite can significantly compromise it.

I've had best luck when sesshin meals conform to three principles:

1. Simplicity.

When preparing dishes from scratch, this is holy writ; you just don't have time for feats of gastronomic splendour. But even with pre-cooked food, extravagance derails the mind of sesshin. Simple, straightforward meals work best.

On the other hand, spending a day looking deeply tends to lead you to taste deeply, too. You'll find that simple food becomes remarkably delicious during sesshin.

2. Diversity

But you do want a spectrum of flavours and textures. This supports the sesshin theme of discovery and gives freshly-honed senses something to chew on. (So to speak.) My favourite sesshin dishes (see "Lunch", below) fill this requirement nicely, as you can throw almost anything into them.

3. Mindful restraint

This means not eating more, or more often, than you need. In a culture that bombasts constantly about more! and choice! and luxury!, it can be easy to forget that true enjoyment comes from the opposite: mindful consumption of just-enough. So when you reach that point, stop. If it later turns out you didn't fuel up quite enough to stave off obstructive suffering, issue yourself a snack.

Better yet, if you consistently fall in a hole at a given point in the day, schedule tea meditation there next time. (This is were recordkeeping shows its stuff.) Sit comfortably in a chosen location and enjoy a good cup of tea while meditating for twenty minutes or so. This allows you to maintain the forms; gain a meditation period; and care for yourself and your practice – for a Zen grand slam.


Application of these principles looks like this:

First thing in the morning I make a pot of good green – traditional, simpler than black, compatible with meals – for use all day, reheating as necessary. Since it's astringent (makes you thirsty), I serve water at meals as well.

Breakfast is a bowl of grain; fresh fruit; tea; and water.

I like a hot main course, typically brown rice with a blork of soy sauce and a little black pepper. That's it; no butter, vegetables, or other amendments. Porridge or other hot cereal are also good.

Lunch (see photo above) can be any leftover on hand; if none, then Bassho bowl or noodles. The first is a bowlful of brown rice with a protein source (beans, nuts, cheese, seaweed, cooked egg, leftover meat) and a vegetable. The second is the same again, but with ramen instead of rice. Because the soup is less consistent, I toss in more vegetables. I also use half or less of the very salty flavour packet.

For a side dish I prepare a flavour plate, an ancient Zen tradition designed to provide a sensory work-out. Traditionally it contains five flavours: sweet, tart, salty, bitter, and savoury. (Apparently the Ancestors didn't do spicy.) I don't obsess over these categories; just lay out a variety of colours, flavours, and textures. (This is one place where a good shelf of pickles pays off.)

And of course, tea and water.

Dinner is the same as lunch, except with ramen if I had rice before or vice-versa, and fruit on the side instead of the flavour plate.

Formal tea is my last meal of the day, taken with a snack during study period.

I don't observe oryoki at-table; when eating on the ground, I use my outdoor oryoki. If you find oryoki useful at-table, or you prefer to eat on the cushion, monastery-style, work up a solitary ceremony that fills your needs. Make sure to document it in detail. Not only does that allow you to share it with others, you'll forget many of the forms between sesshins and need a refresher course yourself.

Final hint: don't overthink things. Your food doesn't have to be Japanese or vegan or "Zen" or whatever. Just enjoy it. Experience it in depth, both preparing and eating. Be aware of every step and condition that brings food to your bowl, and the debt that implies.

Done properly, the ritual of eating will join meditation and work to become the third pillar of sesshin.

Congratulations; you're working the feed to feed the work.

WW: Home

(Pot o' rice, fresh pat of hermit bread, a whistling tea kettle
-- why envy the immortal gods?)

WW: Fiddleheads and rice

Hermitcraft: Dehydrated Beans

Click on photo for a closer look

There is no food as perfect as rice and beans. It's nutritious and filling (if the rice is brown), simple to make, endlessly variable, and cheap. Especially if you buy in bulk.

When I went into the woods last summer, I bought fifty pounds of each from a restaurant supply store. Total cost for 300 meals: around a hundred dollars Yank. Or 33 cents a-piece. (I only sat for a hundred days, but you want a cushion. No pun intended. Also, I ate zenola, a cereal invented for ango, for breakfast.)

Beans have one major drawback, however: they take forever to prepare. First they have to soak for hours, then simmer for an hour more until tender. It requires a lot of water, which is a labour-intensive resource in the forest, even where water is plentiful. This puts unprocessed beans out of reach of anyone living alone outdoors, especially if that person expects to do anything besides cook beans. (Such as travelling, meditating, bathing, sleeping...)

But dehydrated beans cook in the same amount of time and water as rice, which makes rice and beans a one-pot meal on the mountain.

I've found a fair amount of nonsense online about the relative impossibility of dehydrating beans, so for the benefit of all who need good food fast, here's the drill.

1. Procure beans. To determine what kind, I use a scientific formula: (all available beans) minus (all except the cheapest) equals (my beans). Where I am now, that leaves pinto beans. When I lived in Québec, I mostly ate Iroquois (white or navy) beans.

2. Cook as usual. (Soak in cold water overnight, drain, add new water to cover, and simmer gently until just tender but not mushy, 30 minutes to an hour, depending on bean and heat.)

3. Spread the cooked beans on a flat surface to dry. If you have a food

It takes weeks to dehydrate 50 pounds of beans

dehydrator, proceed as normal. If not, or you need more beans than the device can efficiently produce, place them outside. A baking sheet will work as a rack; a window screen propped up on something for airflow is better. Then subject them to sun and/or wind until dry. In a pinch you can also dry beans over a radiator or furnace register, near a woodstove, or in a warm oven with the door cracked. Unlike most foods, beans actually dry pretty well that way, but don't use a convection oven; the beans will come out beautifully uniform, but impossible to rehydrate.

4. The beans are dry when they resemble split baked potatoes, powder when pounded, and jingle when poured into a container. (Seriously. Check it out.) They'll take up about the same space as when raw, and be slightly lighter in weight. You can store them in anything, but something airtight is safest. For my 100 Days I poured most of them back into the large paper sack they came in and cached it in a garbage can in the barn. In spite of an interminably rainy summer, they kept just fine.

To reconstitute, put beans and about twice as much water in a pan, cover, and bring to a boil. Simmer for about ten minutes, or turn the heat off and let stand for twenty minutes or so. You can also pitch a handful in with rice, increase water accordingly, and cook as usual. Or use them in soup.

So not only is it possible to dehydrate beans, contrary to what some websites say, but they're actually one of the most effective foods to preserve that way. They keep well, rehydrate well, and eat well. Very well, when you're sitting under a piece of Tyvek in the jungle, and it's cold and pouring rain and you just by God need something to work.

And by the way: I'm still eating my surplus from last summer. And they're still just as good.

Drying by the stove fan