Green Beans Almondine Recipe - Cooking Classy (2024)

FAQs

How to fancy up green beans? ›

French green beans (haricots verts): These are smaller (3 to 4 inches), very thin, tender green beans. They are meaty, with only wispy seeds inside. Italian green beans (not pictured): They may be labeled Romano beans. The pods are wider and flatter than standard green beans.

Here's a secret you may not know: You don't actually have to soak your beans at all. Just add them to your pot and plan on cooking your recipe for another hour or two beyond the usual cooking time. Keep an eye on the level of liquid, adding more water, broth or stock if the pot looks dry.

Some people (especially food service establishments relying upon your satisfaction) add an alkaline ingredient, such as baking soda, to the cooking water to help retain the color of green vegetables.

Put a pan of salted water on to boil. Meanwhile, trim the the beans. Once the water is boiling, steam or boil the beans until tender. Drain well, then tip the cooked beans into the bowl with your dressing and toss everything together, making sure all the beans get coated.

A little butter, minced garlic, and lemon-pepper seasoning are all you need to bring the best out of fresh green beans.

Always Add Aromatics to the Pot

It may sound too basic to be true, but aside from salt, there is no more drastic way to improve the flavor of your dried beans than to cook them with flavor-enhancing vegetables and fragrant, woodsy herbs.

French Green Beans (Haricots Verts or Filet Beans)

French green beans, also called Haricots Verts, tend to be smaller, more tender, and quicker to cook. Their seeds are so small that they're almost unnoticeable.

Ever see those skinny little green beans in the market? They're a French variety of green bean, also known as haricots verts, or filet beans. Haricots verts are more delicate than regular green beans and cook up more quickly.

Why do chefs call green beans haricot vert? ›

In my opinion, French green beans look a little bit fancier and you may notice many nicer restaurants use French green beans instead of regular green beans. Haricots Verts (prounounced “arr-ee-co vair” is the French translation which literally means, “green” (vert) and “bean” (haricot).

"If you rinse your beans thoroughly, you will have a consistently flavored product, but if you do not rinse them, different amounts of salt will remain in the dish each time you cook it, and it will be hard to cook consistently," he says.

Steaming is a simple way to cook vegetables, and it leaves the flavor and much of the nutrients intact. It's slightly healthier than boiling since fewer nutrients end up in the water. Plus, steaming requires little time and attention. A steamer basket is a great kitchen tool to have on hand.

Some green beans come with their stem ends already sliced off – they'll look like they have a flat, cut end. But if the stem ends are still on, snap them off before cooking. For a neater look, line up the ends of the green beans and slice them off on a bias. There's no need to trim the tender shoot on the other end.

Steaming green beans gives them the same crisp-tender texture as blanching or boiling. Yet I think it preserves their lovely green color and allows the home cook more control over their texture than with those other two methods. Steaming is easy, too—and ease is what this recipe is all about.

The key to the best beans is to master how long to boil green beans. Cook the green beans, covered, in a small amount of boiling salted water until crisp-tender: 10 to 15 minutes for whole or cut green beans. 5 to 10 minutes for french-cut green beans.

They are knocked out by heat so putting vegetables into a big pot of boiling water deactivates the enzymes before they can break down the chlorophyll. Briefly steaming greens is the best way to retain their flavour and nutrients.

The 10- to 12-hour overnight soak is the easy and always effective method, but you can quick-soak beans by bringing them to the boil for one minute, then covering the pan and letting them sit for one hour. After their soak, you can quickly cook them in a pressure cooker.