Fabulous Fava Beans

Happily, we've been trying lots of new veggies since we began frequenting the Farmer's Market as our main grocery source. We go to the market on Sunday morning and pick up whatever catches our eye. And hopefully, I can work a little kitchen magic, with the help of an online recipe search. I never have all the ingredients but I improvise. This sort of kitchen bravado isn't always reliable but hey, it's been fun.

A couple weeks ago, we bought fresh fava beans for the first time. You can see one peeking out right above the egg carton in the basket.


So, fava beans are kind of more work than I expected. In fact, even before I had finished cooking the dish, I already swore that we would never buy them again. You have to shell them twice! But then, we ate them. Yum. Yummmmmmm....

I bought them again and I cooked them last night.



What I did:

Shell beans from outer pods.
Cook beans in heavily salted water for 3 minutes.
Drain and quickly dump beans in ice water to stop the cooking.
Shell skin from beans. You'll be tempted to pop the bean out of the skins by squeezing the little suckers but you risk smashing the tasty bits if you do. (I did the first time.)
Sautée fresh garlic and onion in butter. Salt.
Toss in the beans until all coated and warm again.
Salt again as needed.

I was tempted to drizzle a bit of truffle oil on top. If I had a hunk of Parmesan I would have topped it with a few shavings. Next time, maybe I will.