Make red beans soft and sweet with my easy-to-follow recipe. Once you have this sweet ingredient, use it for pastries, bread, milk tea, and many more. All you need is half a pound of red beans, white sugar, and a rice cooker.
What Are Sweet Red Beans?
Red beans or adzuki beans are used in many ways in Asian cuisine, and one of them is this sweet red beans recipe. Once you have sweetened red beans, combine this with sago to make a sweet red bean soup with sago (红豆西米露) or to your grass jelly dessert.
You might be familiar with red bean paste, which, despite sharing the same main ingredient, serves a different purpose. Red bean paste is commonly used as filling in Asian desserts and pastries like red bean paste buns and red bean bread.
On the other hand, sweet red beans are often used as toppings, such as in taro bubble milk tea and Double Skin Milk.
You can even have a healthy snack or breakfast by making crispy red bean pancakes. It is a healthy ingredient that you don’t want to miss out on. In fact, red beans are known to drain dampness in traditional Chinese medicine.
In addition, it helps reduce coldness in the body, improve blood circulation, remove toxins, and minimize swelling. Not only is it healthy, but it is incredibly delicious as well. It is mildly sweet and nutty.
In this recipe, instead of plain mashed red beans, I increase its sweetness and improve its texture by adding sugar and a drizzle of honey (or maple syrup if you prefer). Store your sweetened red beans in the fridge in an airtight container. In this way, you can easily make the recipes mentioned above any time you crave a red bean recipe.
Ingredients And Kitchenware
Use a rice cooker or cooking pot to cook the beans in water. But before that, you will also need a bowl for overnight soaking. Have an airtight container ready as you store it in the fridge.
The ingredients needed are:
- 1/2 lb of red beans
- Water (for soaking and cooking)
- 100g of white sugar
- 1 tbsp of honey or maple syrup
How To Make Sweet Red Beans
Soaking and cooking in a rice cooker are the only steps to do. Of course, you just need to adjust the level of sweetness according to your taste. Watch the steps here on my Instagram or TikTok tutorial videos.
- Soak red beans overnight with more than enough water to submerge. This step is key in cooking the beans faster. If not, you might need a high-pressure cooker to cook it fast.
- Wash and transfer beans to a rice cooker. Add water about twice the amount of the beans.
- Press the cook setting of your rice cooker and let the beans cook. If cooking manually with a cooking pot and lid, let it come to a boil on medium-high heat. Once it boils, lower the heat to low and cook for 30 to 40 minutes or until soft.
- Once done, they should have a dry, granular texture. When pressed, it should mash easily with your fingers. Plus, the water should have also been completely absorbed by the beans after cooking. In case there is still a bit of water left, simply drain the excess water before proceeding to step #5.
- While the beans are hot, add white sugar to the pot and stir until it melts.
- Transfer the beans to a bowl and stir in a tablespoon of honey or maple syrup for added flavor.
- Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight to fully enhance the taste.
How to Make Sweet Red Beans (Adzuki Beans)
Ingredients
- 1/2 lb of red beans
- Water for soaking and cooking
- 100 g of white sugar
- 1 tbsp of honey or maple syrup
Instructions
- Soak red beans overnight with more than enough water to submerge. This step is key in cooking the beans faster. If not, you might need a high-pressure cooker to cook it fast.
- Wash and transfer beans to a rice cooker. Add water about twice the amount of the beans.
- Press the cook setting of your rice cooker and let the beans cook. If cooking manually with a cooking pot and lid, let it come to a boil on medium-high heat. Once it boils, lower the heat to low and cook for 10 to 15 minutes or until soft.
- Once done, they should have a dry, granular texture. When pressed, it should mash easily with your fingers. Plus, the water should have also been completely absorbed by the beans after cooking. In case there is still a bit of water left, simply drain the excess water before proceeding to step #5.
- While the beans are hot, add white sugar to the pot and stir until it melts.
- Transfer the beans to a bowl and stir in a tablespoon of honey or maple syrup for added flavor.
- Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight to fully enhance the taste.
Lovely recipe that is very easy. I cooked the beans in an electric pressure cooker and skipped the soaking step. Thank you!
Hi Deborah,
Thank you so much! I’m glad you found the recipe easy to follow.