Every time I go home, my grandmother greets me with my favorite dish: arroz con gris, or what I simply know as congrí.
What I call arroz con gris is black beans and rice, simmered in a sofrito of bell peppers, onion and garlic and the rice cooked in the soaking liquid of the beans. However, some Cubans know congrí to be made with red beans, and some say that a black bean dish with rice is actually called moros y cristianos. The dish's nomenclature might also depend on where on the island you're from. In the essay collection, Rice and Beans: A Unique Dish in a Hundred Places, author Anna Cristina Pertierra notes that "people frequently suggested that the term moros y cristianos is mostly associated with the western side of the island, in the area surrounding Havana, while congrí is the name used for the same dish on the eastern side of Cuba." Regardless of what it's called, the resulting dish is tasty and deeply comforting — it's not an in-your-face flavor, but rather the backbone to every Cuban table, the dish that makes every meal feel complete.
