Pè Byouk, Teahouse Boiled Beans

Walk into any Yangon teahouse at seven in the morning and someone at nearly every table is eating pè byouk — whole matpe beans boiled with turmeric until they are creamy inside their intact skins, glossed with shallot oil, and spooned over warm naan bya or a plate of fried rice. It is the least glamorous dish in this book and one of the most eaten. Myanmar grows pulses on a scale few countries match — matpe is a national export crop — and pè byouk is what happens when that abundance meets the teahouse.

The pairing tells Yangon's story honestly. The beans are Burmese; the naan they ride on came with Indian cooks and tandoor ovens in the colonial port city, and the teahouse itself is that era's great institution. Boiled beans are surely older than any record, but this breakfast — beans on naan, beside e kya kway, over htamin gyaw — belongs to colonial Rangoon and never left.

There are only two techniques, and both are restraint. Soak overnight so the bean cooks through before its skin surrenders, then simmer gently — a hard boil turns the pot to mud. And salt late, as the teahouse cooks insist; whatever the science, it forces you to taste the liquor when it matters. The shallot-oil finish is the small act of generosity that promotes the whole thing from staple to breakfast. Cook a pot on Sunday and it will improve three weekday mornings without complaint.