While this NYT Cooking recipe no doubt counts as sacrilege in my current city of residence, it does produce an excellent vegan red beans and rice. Full of umami flavor, I've made this recipe 2-3 times already and plan on making it again this week. I don't know if there could be a bigger endorsement of a recipe than this frequency of production - especially after what appears to be a decade-long hiatus from making vegetarian red beans and rice.
I've halved the recipe each time I've made it, and omitted the dried sage as I don't have it my kitchen. I've used dried thyme instead of fresh, and halved the recommended smoked paprika per some of the reader comments. Also per the reader comments, I've added some shakes of gumbo filé at the end of the cooking process (one can't live in Louisiana without some filé in your cupboard!).
I've found that 55 minutes is the optimal pressure cook time for my Instant Pot and Camellia red beans. I do find that cooking the red beans for a few more minutes on saute is great to get the creamy bean texture that is a hallmark of red beans and rice.
The recipe uses soy sauce and miso (I know, I know New Orleanians), but the complexity those ingredients add to the final flavors can't be understated. Salty and savory, this is a great recipe!
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