I was trying to come up with a new beef stew recipe for Kayotic Kitchen. The best side for beef stew, in my opinion, is a crunchy green bean dish and steamed rice.

I already posted an Indonesian-style green beans recipe some time ago, but you can never have enough recipes for those green little fellas, right? Especially recipes that have an Indonesian influence. They’re so darn tasty.

Here’s an oldie that I tweaked a wee bit. I started out with a basic sambal goreng buncis but ended up changing it as I went. Don’t I always?

 
Ingredients:

1 1/2 pound beans
1 large onion
1 red bell pepper
1 garlic clove
1 big red chili pepper
thumb-size piece fresh ginger
1/2 tsp laos (ground galanga root)
1 tsp sereh (ground lemon grass)
1 tsp ketoembar (ground coriander seeds)
3 tbsp Kecap manis (sweet soy sauce)
2 tbsp high-heat cooking oil
5 tbsp coconut milk
salt to taste

 
Directions:

Here’s said beef stew before the 10 hour slow cook. It was everything I had hoped it would be… and then some.

 
But back to the beans.
 

Start with a seriously tangled pile of green beans. Had a lovely morning sun in my kitchen.

Trim the ends, wash them and parboil them in salted water for 15 minutes. Don’t overcook them.

 
Time to do some chopping.
 

Wash the red bell pepper, remove the seeds and slice it in thin strips.

Cut an onion in half, give each half three parallel cuts towards the root, flip it over and slice it.

 
Then I noticed I had run out of sambal. So I just used a chili pepper instead. It happens *shrugs*
 

Remove the seeds from the chili pepper (unless you want it really hot) mince it and grate the garlic and ginger.

Mix the laos, lemongrass and ground coriander seeds.

 
You can leave the laos out if you can’t get your hands on it, and the lemongrass can be replaced with fresh lemongrass that you bruise and cut in coarse pieces.
 

Drain the green beans and rinse them with cold water before you move on.

You’ll be needing high-heat cooking oil, like peanut oil or sunflower oil. For Pete’s sake: don’t use olive oil for this one!

Get your pan really hot, add the onions and stir fry them for a minute or two before adding the bell pepper. Give it 2 more minutes.

In with chili pepper, garlic and and ginger. Give it another minute.

Cook the spices along with the veggies for at least 30 seconds to get the flavors going.

Time to add your beans. Stir-fry them along with the rest for a minute or two.

Pour in the sweet soy sauce and coconut milk.

Let it simmer for a few minutes while stirring now and then. At least until the beans have heated through.

 
Taste the sauce to see if it needs an extra pinch of salt. Always taste what you’re doing.
 

This is what we want, for the sauce to cook down enough to coat the beans. It’s delicious.

My favorite topping: fried onions. I always keep a bag or jar in the pantry to top these type of dishes with. Seroendeng is also really tasty.

I’m pretty sure you’re gonna like this new spin on your green beans!