Dried lima beans (butter beans) simmered slow with smoky pork neck bones until the beans go creamy and the meat falls apart. Cheap, complete protein from the bean shelf and the discard cut.
Beans-and-a-bone is the deepest grammar of Black Southern cooking — a pot that turned the cheapest legume and the cheapest cut into a complete, filling, nourishing meal. Neck bones and limas fed families through the lean stretch between paydays and crops, and it still does.
Lima beans are a genuine nutritional powerhouse — high in soluble fiber that lowers cholesterol and steadies blood sugar, and rich in potassium and magnesium, the very minerals that counter sodium-driven and stress-driven (weathering) hypertension in Black Americans. Paired with rice, the beans form a complete protein. The neck bones add iron, B12, and irresistible flavor; the rehabilitation simply reduces the pork to a seasoning so the beans' medicine leads.
Soak dried lima beans, then simmer with browned neck bones, onion, garlic, and bay until the beans are creamy and the meat is tender, 1.5-2 hours, adding water as needed. Salt at the end. Serve over rice or with cornbread.
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