Tuesday, June 06, 2006

Mixed Bean Salad

borlotti

Borlotti beans are one of the more striking beans - inside these marbled shells lie firm, speckled orbs in a mix of pink, cream and brown.

borlotti beans

Usually, I'll use either the dried or canned versions but since they are in season I thought I'd incorporated them into a salad with another in-season bean, Broad or Fava beans and some young green beans. This is a world away from those tins of questionable three bean mix. To make the salad a little more special I've added walnuts and complimented that with a walnut dressing

salad

Mixed Bean Salad with Walnut Dressing

250g fresh green beans, boiled until just tender
250g fresh broad/fava beans
250g fresh borlotti beans
100g walnuts, roughly crushed
fresh parsley leaves, to taste, torn roughly

Walnut Dressing
1 tablespoon Walnut Oil
3 tablespoons Olive Oil
1 tablespoon Sherry Vinegar
shredded parsley
salt and freshly ground pepper

To prepare broad/fava beans
Shell the beans then cook boiling water for a couple of minutes only, remove and place in cold water. The next step is the most important. You need to remove the thick outer skin. The inner beans should just pop out when squeezed. If you didn't do this and boiled the beans until the outer skins were tender then the inside would be rather unappetising.

To prepare borlotti beans
Shell the beans then cook in boiling water, around 10 minutes or until tender. You'll notice that I don't salt the water, this is to stop the beans from becoming tough.

Make the dressing
In a small bowl, add the oils, vinegar, parsley, salt and pepper and whisk together. Taste and make any adjustments to suit your palette.

Assemble the salad
Place the various beans, walnut pieces and parsley into a bowl, drizzle over with the dressing and toss to combine.

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Serve with grilled meats.

This is also part of the on the road version of Weekend Herb Blogging, this week hosted by Cate from Sweetnicks

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7 comments

  1. Looks just fabulous. This would be a wonderful post for WHB if you feel like sending it. (It can be about any vegetable, herb, plant, or flower.) Sweetnicks is hosting this week, so you'd need to add a link to her. I don't think anyone has ever written about these beans before.

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  2. Wow! That salad is stunning- and those beans are gorgeous!

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  3. Thanks Kalyn -I'll add the link and send it!

    Thanks Erika!

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  4. ooh. I have never seen those beens.

    I agree. perfect for WHB or even ARF which Cate does too.

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  5. Haalo,
    These look gorgeous. I have never seen these beans quite in these colors. I've just come back from my vacation in the US and just had to catch up with your activities ;-)

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  6. Thanks Gabriella - not too sure how common they are in the US but I believe the season runs late summer to winter - if you can't find them fresh you should be able to find them dried or in cans but the flavour of the fresh ones are nicer, especially for something like this type of salad.

    Thanks Meeta and welcome back - hope you had a great time!

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  7. beautiful borlotti. i just love the reddish hues. i saw them at my grocer on sunday and wondered what recipe i should make. now i've got a good idea.

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