Paris 2024: A Plant-Based Revolution

As the world turns its attention to the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, athletes focus on physical training and optimizing their nutrition to perform at their peak. This year, Paris is hosting the world’s greatest athletes and pioneering a plant-based revolution, with a remarkable 60% of all meals served to athletes and fans being vegan. The humble bean, a dietary staple for centuries, is one often-overlooked nutritional powerhouse that can give athletes a competitive edge. Packed with protein, complex carbohydrates, fiber, and essential nutrients, beans offer many benefits for athletes striving for gold.

Nature’s Multi-Vitamin for Athletes

Beans are a versatile and nutrient-dense food that can support athletic performance in multiple ways. They provide sustained energy through complex carbohydrates, aid in muscle repair and growth with their high protein content, and offer essential minerals like iron, magnesium, and potassium to support electrolyte balance. Additionally, the high fiber content in beans can help athletes maintain a healthy weight and promote digestive health. Studies have also shown that a diet rich in beans may reduce the risk of certain cancers and heart disease, making them an excellent choice for long-term health and short-term performance gains.

Plant-Powered Olympians: A Growing Trend

Olympians and elite athletes increasingly recognize the value of incorporating beans into their diets. Some of the U.S.’s top professional athletes proudly embrace the plant-based diet. Elite athletes like Diana Taurasi and Kendrick Farris, competing in this year’s Olympics, credit their vegan diets for improved performance and faster recovery, proving that a plant-based diet isn’t just a choice – it’s a game-changer.

For example, Canadian boxer and 2022 middleweight world champion Tammara Thibeault follows a vegetarian diet. In an exclusive interview with Olympics.com, Thibeault revealed that while she appreciates vegetarianism’s ecological benefits and dietary diversity, meeting her protein needs can be challenging, especially when traveling for competitions.

The Vegetarian Athlete’s Secret Weapon

This is where beans can play a crucial role. As a complete protein source that’s rich in essential amino acids, beans can help vegetarian athletes like Thibeault meet their protein requirements without compromising their dietary preferences. Beans offer a sustainable, plant-based solution for athletes looking to maintain peak performance while exploring the rich diversity of vegetarianism.

Here are some delicious and nutritious recipes to try for athletes looking to harness the power of beans in their diets:

Red Bean Power Bowl

A nutrient-packed meal with Red Kidney Beans. Mostly raw ingredients for quick assembly – ideal for athletes needing fast, nutritious meals.

Slow Cooker Vegetarian Red Beans

An easy, protein-rich dish that can be prepared in advance for busy training days.

Instant Pot Lima Beans & Greens Soup

A warming, mineral-rich soup to support recovery and hydration.

White Bean Hummus

A protein-packed snack that’s great for pre-or post-workout fueling.

Red Bean & Goat Cheese Mediterranean Salad

A lighter option that still provides ample protein and nutrients for athletes watching their weight.

By incorporating these bean-based recipes into their meal plans, athletes can enjoy the nutritional benefits of beans while fueling their Olympic dreams. Whether you’re a competitive athlete or simply looking to improve your overall health and fitness, beans are a versatile and powerful addition to any diet.

Sources: Olympics.com (https://olympics.com/), Health University of Utah (https://healthcare.utah.edu/), LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/effect-vegetarian-diets-sports-performance-closer-look-koikc/) Vegancuts.com (https://vegancuts.com/blogs/1/vegan-athletes), bonappetit.com (https://www.bonappetit.com/story/olympians-who-eat-vegan)

Whether you’re vegan or vegetarian, or simply interested in adding more meatless bean recipes to your regular rotation, you’ll want to stash these delicious dishes in your back pocket. From versatile basics and hearty soups to bean salads, dips, and a red beans & rice favorite — these recipes offer up a lot of flavorful bean goodness without the meat.

Instant Pot White Beans

This foolproof Instant Pot recipe is perfect for flavorful beans that can be enjoyed as is, or used in dishes like White Bean Hummus, White Bean Pesto Pasta, and White Bean Veggie Burgers.

Cajun Caviar

Serve with chips as a dip, over greens as a salad, or wrapped up in a tortilla for quick lunch. Works well with any combo of Camellia Brand beans and peas you like.

White Bean & Spinach Soup

Fresh sprigs of thyme and rosemary make this soup fragrant, while wilted leafy greens add a pop of color. Warm and satisfying!

Hummus

A classic recipe for traditional hummus, made with fresh lemon juice and tahini. Because homemade is always better than store-bought, and saves money, too.

Vegetarian Louisiana-Style Red Beans & Rice

Liquid smoke adds wonderful savory flavor to meatless red beans & rice. Remember, a little goes a long way!

Blackeye Pea Salad

A delicious recipe from our friend, Chef Jennifer Hill Booker, this dish comes to life with a tangy apple cider vinaigrette and red pepper flakes.

Beans & Greens Soup

We say any beans & greens mixture is a match made in heaven, and this soup is no exception. This brilliant “master” recipe is meant to be personalized to your tastes.

Instant Pot Black Beans

This versatile recipe makes flavorful beans that can be served over rice with your favorite toppings — or used in other vegetarian dishes like Black Bean Quinoa Salad, Black Bean Hummus, and Black Bean Burgers.

Vegetarian Pinto Bean Chili

One of the easiest chili recipes around, this one comes together quickly and will stick to your ribs.

Flourless Black Bean Brownies

A vegetarian treat that’s rich, fudgy, and yep, features black beans.

When you boil beans in water, the liquid left when the beans are removed is aquafaba.

What is Aquafaba?

When experimenting in the kitchen – whether out of necessity or curiosity – it’s always fascinating to discover new replacement ingredients. Applesauce and mashed bananas can be a low-fat stand-in for butter when baking your favorite muffins. Greek yogurt can take the place of sour cream (or vice-versa), and honey is a golden substitute for white sugar. But perhaps the most unexpected replacement ingredient is aquafaba. It’s simply the liquid left behind after cooking garbanzo beans (aka chickpeas). It whips up into the fluffiest, most perfect meringue you’ve ever seen this side of an egg white.

That’s right – the thick, slightly murky water you cooked your garbanzo beans in last time you made hummus (or the last time you cooked any beans from scratch) is actually a highly successful egg replacement – particularly for egg whites – allowing you to make perfectly light and fluffy macarons, lemon meringue pie, mousse, homemade ice cream, marshmallow cream, frostings and even frothy cocktails, all without egg whites. You can also use aquafaba to make egg-free mayonnaise, flavored aiolis, meatloaf and so much more.

Aquafaba isn’t just for vegans – it’s deliciously economical for everyone.

Even if you’re not interested in giving up eggs, it’s fun to save money with aquafaba! Keep your egg stash for omelets and use the bean-water that you’d normally toss down the drain to create your favorite baked goods, desserts and more. A combination of the Latin word for water (“aqua”) and bean (“faba”), aquafaba went viral in 2015 thanks to the tinkering of Goose Wohlt, a systems engineer from Indiana. While trying to create a vegan meringue, Wohlt ditched the stringy vegan egg replacement he’d bought at the store and tried whipping up bean liquid instead. A wizard-like moment quickly unfolded in perfectly stiff peaks: “Moments later, out of this goopy product, a pillowy, dense foam arose, exactly like you might expect from egg whites,” writes Wohlt in the introduction to Aquafaba: Sweet and Savory Vegan Recipes Made Egg-Free with the Magic of Bean Water. 

Is that an egg-white meringue? No, it’s whipped aquafaba, made with Camellia Brand Garbanzos (aka Chickpeas)!

It’s goopy. It’s thick. It makes the perfect meringue.

The meringues made with aquafaba were practically identical to those made with egg whites – and head and shoulders above those made with commercially available vegan egg replacements. Wohlt shared his story on Facebook with a vegan baking group, and the rest is legume-water history. Home kitchen trial-and-error with aquafaba took off across social media for vegans, those with egg or dairy allergies and anyone curious about the culinary properties that makes something so improbable, work so well.

Five years later, there’s still not a great understanding of why aquafaba is so effective as an egg-white substitute. A study launched in 2018 by the National Institute for Health notes that, “The solution has recently been shown to produce stable foams and emulsions, and can act as a thickener [but] as aquafaba is both new and being developed by an Internet-based community little is known of its composition or properties.”

Aquafaba lovers share their tips and tricks.

One thing’s for sure, though: the grassroots efforts of online aquafaba lovers have led to plenty of best practices, tips and tricks. For starters, the viscosity (read: thickness or stickiness) of aquafaba from cooked, dried garbanzo beans is far higher and more consistent than that of the aquafaba from a can of beans, meaning that a little bit of extra time spent soaking and cooking down dried beans will mean a world of difference in your final, aquafaba-based recipes. What’s more, canned beans often have plenty of preservatives added in, like sodium, which renders the aquafaba less healthy. And if you’re looking to go extra nutrient-rich with your aquafaba, using dried beans allows for the addition of a type of Japanese seaweed called Kombu, which has been proven to help the bean liquid properly set up while adding additional magnesium to the final product – a real win-win.

Aquafaba can be used to make a creamy, egg-free mayonnaise, perfect for potato salad.

Aquafaba basics – plus our very own recipes.

Aquafaba can technically refer to the liquid from any kind of cooked beans – black beans, lima beans, you name it – but beginners usually stick with the more neutral flavor and lighter color of garbanzo bean water. When cooking the dried garbanzos, a general ratio of bean-to-water is two cups of beans and six cups of water, which will typically yield about 2 to 2 1/2 cups of aquafaba. The liquid will store in the fridge for up to a week (and freeze for up to a month), but keep in mind that the chemical properties of aquafaba mean it’s very susceptible to oil – which will break it down and render it useless – so using an oil-free, squeaky-clean stainless steel bowl or mason jar is the best bet for storage.

After separating out your aquafaba, it’s time for the fun part: putting it to the test. There will certainly be plenty of “learning curve” moments along the way with such a novel product, but whether whipping it up into fluffy cookies with a little help from cream of tartar and sugar, or watching it emulsify into creamy mayonnaise and salad dressings, your kitchen will soon start to feel like a science laboratory. “There is no denying that aquafaba is a revolutionary discovery,” writes Zsu Denver in her book, Aquafaba: Sweet and Savory Vegan Recipes. “This must be what Jack was talking about when he bought those magic beans; it has just taken us some time to uncover this truly magical application of the humble legume.”

Magic beans? Try our recipes for yourself:

Traditional Chickpea (Garbanzo) Aquafaba

Potato Salad with Chickpea Aquafaba Mayo 

Any Bean Aquafaba

Chocolate Zucchini Bread with Black Bean Aquafaba

After all, when you’re reeling in Neptune’s endless bounty hand over fist in your sleep and feasting on jambalaya, crawfish pie, and filé gumbo from fais do-do to grave, perfecting the art of melting cheese on bread can get lost in the tricentennial shuffle.

However, times and tastes have changed (along with property values), and this town’s po’ pizza rap is changing faster than the Plaquemines Parish coastline. Mid City Pizza (4400 Banks St. and 6307 S. Miro in Uptown) is among a new breed of purveyors working hard to alter long-held perceptions, partly by employing a “when in Rome …” philosophy that splendidly weds New York-style pizza with South Louisiana flavors. Besides offering a tantalizing array of pies with all the traditional fixings, the pizzeria has turned the heads of local “hey-brahs” with a unique special that honors the Crescent City’s most-cherished Monday meal: red beans and rice pizza!

Served exclusively as a Monday special, the bean pizza has struck a chord both here and nationally. New Orleans ABC affiliate WGNO-TV recently produced a short video feature on the dish, while the organization People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) honored it as “The Best Vegan Pizza in the Nation,” besting a list of rivals operating in Olympian pizza strongholds such as Chicago and Long Island, N.Y.

“The PETA award was such a surprise and an honor,” said pizza chef and co-manager Daniel “D-Ray” Ray, who also is a vegetarian, a musician, and a force behind the DIY record-label collective Community Records. “To this day, I have no idea how exactly they heard about it. They just emailed us one day and let us know! I know I had some friends posting about it on the Internet in vegan blogs and such. I’m super happy to be providing a healthy, filling meal option for compassionate people.”

“A Staple of a Healthy Diet”

Recipes — and red beans — have been coursing through the Slidell native’s blood for as long as he can remember, with the melt-in-your-mouth manna of Grandma’s Thanksgiving noodles, Mom’s baked fresh-caught fish, and Dad’s award-winning chili seared into his vestigial taste buds.

“I started making red beans and rice from scratch every Monday when I was a sophomore at Loyola University in 2007,” D-Ray recalled. “For years, it had been a weekly tradition: I would make a big batch and eat on them throughout the week because I didn’t have time to make dinner every day. Being a vegetarian, red beans and rice are one of the only complementary complete protein sources. Beans and rice have been a staple of a healthy diet for centuries! Anyway, this clockwork motion — mixed with my creativity in the kitchen and love for both red beans and rice and pizza — eventually led me to simply put the two together.”

The Dish on How D-Ray Does It

So how does D-Ray concoct this doughy deconstruction of what is perhaps New Orleans’ most exemplary dish? “The first step comes the night before I want to cook: Soak the dried red beans in water (or some sort of hoppy beer) for at least 24 hours. I start the cooking process by sautéing diced Vidalia onions, green bell peppers, and celery until the onions are translucent and the bell peppers and celery are soft. Next, I add minced garlic and crushed red pepper and continue to sauté for just a little while longer. It’s easy to go past ‘browned’ to ‘burnt’ and you don’t wanna do that. Then I add the soaked, rinsed red beans to the veggies and the coldest water the faucet will give me. The cold water ‘shocks’ the flavor into the beans. Add a few bay leaves, bring the water to a boil and simmer, covered, for about 3-4 hours, stirring occasionally.

“Once it has thickened up a bit, I add parsley, thyme, and salt to taste and continue to simmer on low,” he continued. “I cut the heat and add some basil once I have the desired consistency. At some point, I’ll put some Zatarain’s rice in a rice cooker. Once both are done, I mix them together and put them in the fridge. The red beans and rice become red bean pizza as soon as I scoop them onto the dough.”

Red Beans With Built-In French Bread

Customers’ reactions run the gamut, with the most common being “It’s … interesting” as well as “It’s so filling!” The dish is perhaps most popular with the health-conscious holdouts who lurk among us. “Vegans and vegetarians can’t get enough of it,” D-Ray confirmed. “They think it’s the best thing since nutritional yeast.”

D-Ray suggests that partakers fine-tune their expectations before chowing down. “People go into it like they’re eating pizza when it’s actually much more filling than that,” he observed. “Some people are skeptical because they are thinking ‘pizza’ when they should be thinking ‘red beans with the French bread built in.’”

When it comes to confecting his own red beans, D-Ray — like most New Orleanians — pulls from a time-tested playbook of personal preferences and family traditions. “The most important ingredient,” he believes, “is thyme. For me, it’s what makes them shine.” As for condiments, D-Ray pledges a singular allegiance: “Everyone knows Crystal is the only hot sauce for red beans and rice!”

Secret Ingredient: “Support Local Companies”

Mid City Pizza’s experiments with local specialties don’t stop with red beans. “The shrimp remoulade pizza was invented by my good, good friend, co-manager, and pizza sensei, Sean Barros,” D-Ray said. “It was created as a special around Lent, but had such a great reaction we decided to keep it around.” The restaurant also has offered a jambalaya calzone in the past.

Carnivores and connoisseurs of locally sourced products can find plenty of options at Mid City Pizza, starting with the beans. “I use Camellia red beans because I like to support local companies, no matter how big or small,” D-Ray declared. “Camellia also has a reputation of high-quality USDA standards and the beans are non-GMO.”

Sausage From Over Bayou St. John

Those seeking meat on their pizzas can choose from toppings such as pepperoni, meatballs, marinated chicken, bacon, or ham, but Mid City Pizza also has a special Sicilian weapon: Italian and hot sausage made in-house at Terranova’s, the practically legendary 90-year-old family-run grocery at 3308 Esplanade Ave. near the New Orleans Fair Grounds.

“We have been working with Terranova’s since the beginning, even before it was Mid City Pizza,” D-Ray said. “The Terranova’s family are some of the kindest people you could ever meet.”

And for some of the most delectable pizza you could ever eat west of Naples and south of the Mason-Dixon line, visit Mid City Pizza in the burgeoning Banks Street bar and restaurant corridor, in the space formerly occupied by Crescent City Pie and Sausage Company — and now at a 2nd location Uptown across from Tulane Stadium, in the space that used to house Naked Pizza. Take a well-deserved break from your Monday laundry and Dutch oven to sample their made-to-order special, the red beans and rice pizza. Or, if you’re feeling more like Morgus and Chopsley, throw ethical concerns to the wind and sink your incisors into a flesh-laden Mid City Meat Monster. You’ll taste the difference!