Friday, November 23, 2007

I Pod! Cooking Broad Beans

OK, the title was a gratuitous pun. But I really did pod half a kilo of broad beans. In my new tradition of trying weird and wonderful veggies from the farmers market, I bought a whole heap of the lumpy pods. I'd never tried cooking them before, and I've probably only eaten them once or twice.
After some brief internet research, I discovered that they needed to be podded, blanched and then possibly shelled. Which was a soothing activity to do in the early evening.
I ended up with surprisingly small pile of beans. I only peeled the big ones - partly because that was what the instructions said, and partly because I am lazy. Limes and Lycopene had some useful info. In the end, I blanched some flat beans, and steamed some asparagus, and called the whole thing salad. Dressed with extra virgin olive oil, cracked pepper and lemon juice, it was a nice dish that said 'Yay for summer!'

2 comments:

Rosie said...

These are really hard to find fresh where I am. I've thought about trying to grow them but even the seed is hard to find. It sounds really good though!

Kristin said...

We don't get broadbeans often- certainly not in the supermarket. That's why I grabbed them when I could!

thanks for the comment, Rosie!