Here’s an oldie. Really old. The photos clearly show it was shot with one of my first cameras. Without a tripod, on a dark winter day with a terrible color balance. Hey, we all gotta start somewhere! (just covering my butt here). I just didn’t have time to reshoot the recipe.

Anyway, it’s a special thanksgiving recipe that I made for a guest posting a couple years ago. It wasn’t meant to end up on Kayotic Kitchen, but I’ve received so many requests for this recipe over the past year, and now with Thanksgiving coming up the emails started dropping in again. Figured it was easier to just slap it up here rather than mail the basic instructions to those who need the recipe.

Really good recipe trumps bad photography and this recipe is really good, so here ya go.


Ingredients:

1 pound green beans
1/3 red bell pepper
1 clove of garlic
1 small onion
7oz bacon
2 tbsp flour
1 tsp mustard powder
1/2 tsp onion powder
1 1/2 cup beef broth
pepper
salt


Directions:

We’re starting out with lots of fresh, crispy green beans. And bell pepper and garlic. You can do really amazing things with these ingredients.

Peel the bell pepper with a vegetable peeler and finely mince it.

Mince the onion as well.

Grab a garlic clove, lay the flat blade of your knife upon it and give it a good smack. That will make the skin slide right off plus it will also be easier to chop. If you want to keep the clove whole, don’t smack it but press the knife down firmly in stead. This will keep the clove intact.

Mince or grate the garlic.

Give your green beans a good wash.

I removed the stem end of the beans but didn’t trim the other side. It looks prettier when served that way and there’s really no reason to take it off. Go for a rustic look! Rustic is good.

Pre-boil the beans in very lightly salted water. Now I use my microwave rather than my stove top when it comes to pre-boiling, but take your pick. I gave them about 10 minutes at 1000 watts – I like a little bite to them so boil them a little longer if you like them less ‘al dente’, so to speak.

I’m going for a roux based sauce. Mix 2 slightly heaping tbsp flour with 1 tsp mustard powder and 1/2 tsp onion powder and give everything a good stir.

Heat 2 tbsp butter and cook the onions over low heat for about 5 minutes while stirring occasionally.

Then add the bell pepper and garlic and cook for another 5 minutes.

Your beans will be ready by now, drain them and rinse them with cold water. This will stop the cooking process immediately, leaving your beans fresh and green.

Add the flour and cook for 2 minutes over low heat. Bit by bit, pour in the beef broth (chicken broth works as well, but this gives a really nice, deep flavor) while stirring vigorously until you end up with a smooth sauce. I’ve added about 1 and a 1/2 cup but kept a little extra broth on the side, just in case the sauce needed thinning.

Season with pepper and salt to taste.

Get yourself some bacon. Bacon makes everything taste better.

Use roughly 5 green beans at a time and drag them through the sauce.

Wrap the bacon around the beans. My bacon slices were petite so I used two for each bean bundle.

Just keep on rollin’ until you have a huge pile of these beauties.

Now there are several ways to cook them. You can toss them on a grill (just keep turning them), but you can also use your oven, or the broiler/grill in your oven. My oven has a grill, so I went for that.

Preheat your oven to 400F (200C).

Put them on an oven rack and place a baking tray filled with a little water underneath the rack to catch the drippings. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes, until the bacon browns up.

Then flip them over and grill the other side until that’s golden brown and crispy as well. Put them on a pretty platter and garnish with finely minced bell pepper for a bit of crunch and some parsley for a bit of color.

These are absolutely fantastic!