Faux Bubble and Squeak

Faux Bubble and Squeak

The traditional Bubble and Squeak is a British dish that is composed of cabbage and potatoes. The name is derived from the sounds that emanate while cooking this dish. The components are placed over medium-high heat until it bubbles vigorously, and then when the liquid evaporates, the vegetables squeak as if to say, 'I'm done! Take me off the heat!'

I came across this recipe with green beans on a Tik Tok video and because it's so easy, requiring minimal intervention, use it on occasions when a side dish is required to complement a meal. The first time I made it, the squeaky sound at the end caught my attention, so I call it Faux Bubble and Squeak because even though it's nothing like the original, the cooking sounds are the same. It takes only 3 ingredients, canned green beans, and a tablespoon each of oil and sugar.

Spicy Garlic Green Beans

 

Spicy Garlic Green Beans

Spicy green beans, served in Chinese restaurants, is difficult to reproduce at home, so I came up with my own recipe. To retain crispness in the green beans, they are tossed with besan or chickpea flour and fried before stir-frying. If you prefer to use green beans without the besan, make sure the oil is very hot before frying them so that they remain crisp.

Five Vegetables Stir-Fry

Panch Mishali Sheddho

Panch = 5, Mishali = Mixed, Sheddho = Boil

Potatoes, carrots, green beans, green peas and radish are each boiled separately, just until tender. They are then combined and stir-fried together for a wholesome vegetable side dish. Different from gota sheddho or whole boiled vegetables, these are cut into bite-sized pieces. Any combination of five or seven vegetables can be used to make this side dish.

Mum's Green Beans

Mum's Green Beans

Mum made this for us when we were growing up. Blanch the green beans, if necessary, but when they're in season, the beans are very fresh and tender and cook easily without blanching. No water is added during cooking because the onions and tomatoes release sufficient moisture when cooked over medium heat. Adding black pepper right at the end, pumps up the flavour, so make sure to have ground black pepper on hand.

Green Beans Shorshe Bata - Green Beans in Mustard Sauce

Green Beans Shorshe Bata

A super speedy alternative to making mustard paste at home is to use hot mustard powder dissolved in water that is served in Chinese restaurants. The traditional method is to soak black mustard seeds in water overnight and grind it to a smooth paste the next day. 

These green beans were blanched in boiling water for 2 minutes, then stir-fried with diced potatoes and mustard sauce. Mustard powder needs to dissolve in water and set aside for at least 15 minutes to achieve maximum pungency. It's an easy side dish to serve with steamed rice or chapatis/tortillas.

Mum's Green Beans & Potatoes

Mum's Green Beans

Over the Christmas holidays we lunched at Burger King once and returned home with french fries by the bucket full. Since it goes against all my principles to throw them away, I decided to use them in Mum's Green Beans. 

Mum's Original Recipe

I've made these green beans often because I love the flavour of black pepper in combination with an overabundance of sliced onions and tomatoes. The french fries were fully cooked, nice and crispy, so they were added towards the end of the cooking process. They are also liberally salted, so no salt was added to the green beans. The crispiness of the green beans and the eventual soft texture of the fries were an interesting combination that tasted really good.

Ready to Eat!

Mum's Green Beans serve as a side dish to a Bengali meal that usually consists of a meat/fish/seafood main dish, a vegetable side and lentils. Extras include a tomato chutney, something fried such as Begun Bhaja, a salad or raita and hot, steamed basmati rice served with a dollop of ghee, or chapatis (tortillas). A variety of desserts round out the meal, my favourite being Bhapa Doi or Steamed Yogurt.

Green Beans Alu Posto - Green Beans & Potatoes in White Poppy Seed Sauce

Green Beans Alu Posto

Green beans are plentiful at the market throughout the year. Make sure to pick up at least a pound because they reduce considerably during cooking. The white poppy seeds need to be soaked in boiling water and left to cool at room temperature before blending to a smooth paste.

Fresh Green Beans

The mound of green beans looks pretty daunting at first, and it would be awfully tedious to remove the stem and tail ends one bean at a time.

Ready to chop

However, they are easily dealt with if they are lined up, ten at a time, and chopped up in batches. Line up the stem ends and remove with one slice of the knife. For this preparation, I cut the beans into small 1/2" lengths and removed the tail ends.

Recycle those Plastic Bags

Here's how I recycle those plastic bags in which vegetables are packed. Lined inside a deep bowl all the vegetable scraps can be disposed of and the bag easily lifted out and thrown away with minimal fuss.

Green Beans Kasundi

Green Beans Kasundi

Indian markets can now be found in practically every town in Michigan. A Bangladeshi market opened up recently just 3 miles down the road and I found a bottle of kasundi which looked really tempting.

Weikfield's Kasundi

Kasundi is a fiery mustard sauce that originates in West Bengal in India. It is used as a condiment at the Indian table for dipping fried foods and as a sauce for stir-fried spinach. Today I decided to spice up my green beans dish with a dollop of this sauce. Taken on its own, it imparts a pungent flavour of mustard that can make your sinuses flow. 

Even though there is no comparison between the two, if kasundi is not available, try substituting with coarse-ground dijon mustard.

Green Beans & Mung Dal

Green Bean & Mung Dal
Stir-Fried with Onions & Tomatoes

A group of buddies at work decided to have lunch at an Indian restaurant one day. We decided to go to one that served a buffet at lunch time. Indian food pre-Y2K was not as commonplace as it is in Michigan today. So we all lined up to fill our plates and returned to our seats at the lunch table to eat. All of a sudden the guy sitting across from me turned red in the face and began choking over his food. It turns out he had helped himself to some innocuous-looking whole green chilies, thinking they were cut-up green beans. Poor chap took a while to calm down enough to enjoy his lunch.

Mum often made a green beans dish which inspired me to try with mung bean lentils that were pre-soaked for about an hour. Mum's green beans were cut in one-inch lengths and stir-fried over high heat along with onions, tomatoes and quite a bit of ground black pepper. Yummy to eat with both hot rice and puffy chapatis or tortillas.

I diced the green beans and stir-fried it the same way as Mum used to, except that I added the softened mung dal. It was just as yummy with an extra bite from the lentils.

Stir-Fried Green Beans, Potatoes and Salad Shrimp

Farashi Bean, Alu aar Choto Chingrir Chochori

When there are just of handful of green beans available, a russet potato always comes to the rescue to add a soft and silky contrast to the crunch of the beans. Tiny salad shrimp pump up the flavour and when all of it is stir-fried and simmered over low heat, this dish cooks in its own juices without any added water. Adding salt when the green beans are added to the skillet and cooking this without a cover ensure that the green beans retain their vibrant green colour and crunch.

Serve this as a side dish to any Indian meal with steamed Basmati or other long-grain rice or chapatis.

Baked Herbed Cod Dinner

Baked Cod with Green Beans Almondine
 & Pan Fried Potatoes
on a Bed of Basmati Rice

Who knew cod could taste so good? 

I generally avoid buying cod because they're pretty tasteless, fall apart easily and doesn't seem to be able to withstand simmering in a gravy. These fillets, however, were thick, meaty and very fresh. They turned out to be succulent and flaked easily after baking. Any fish fillet will work in this recipe.

Green Beans in White Poppy Seed Sauce

Green Beans Posto

Posto or white poppy seeds when ground to a paste with salt and green chillies makes a wonderful sauce for all kinds of vegetables. The vegetables are first cooked with ginger paste until almost done and the poppy seed paste is added at the end and simmered for a very short time. 

This dish is a favourite in the Bengali household. It is generally eaten at lunch, makes one feel really mellow and induces sound sleep. 

Ingredients:
4 Tbsp. white poppy seeds (posto)
1 cup Water

3 Tbsp. vegetable oil
½ tsp. nigella seeds (kalo jeera/kalonji)

1 lb. green beans, sliced width-wise into small circles

1 russet potato, peeled and diced 
2 tsp. ginger paste
Salt to taste

1 tsp. ghee or melted Butter
2 – 3 green chillies, left whole

Directions:
1. Boil a cup of water in the microwave, pour over poppy seeds in a bowl and cover.

2. Set poppy seeds aside for half an hour to cool and soften.
2. Puree poppy seeds and soaking water in a blender until it reaches the consistency of a thick sauce. 
3. Heat oil in a pan over medium-high heat and add nigella seeds.
4. When the seeds begin to sputter and sizzle, add vegetables, ginger paste and salt.
5. Lower heat to medium-low and cook for 10 minutes until vegetables are tender.
6. Adjust salt to taste and cook for 5 minutes.
7. Add pureed poppy seeds and stir until well combined.
8. Cook for 2 minutes until sauce reduces and just coats the beans.
9. Garnish with ghee & whole chillies and transfer to a serving dish.

Serve with steamed Basmati rice or chapatis.

Note:
The green beans can be replaced with several other vegetables, such as eggplant, cauliflower, potatoes, zucchini, ridge gourd (jhinge), sweet potatoes, pumpkin, etc.

Stir-Fried Green Beans with Onions, Tomatoes & Black Pepper

The crowning touch to these green beans is the freshly ground black pepper cooked along with the green beans and used as a garnish. The green beans need to be blanched (step 1) only if they are mature. The young and tender green beans cook up really easily as they simmer. Adding water is not necessary because the onions and tomatoes release enough moisture to cook the beans.

Stir-Fried Green Beans & Chickpeas

Green Beans & Chickpeas

My intention was to stir-fry green beans with diced potatoes, but this was made at the tail-end of preparing dinner last night. Feeling too tired to peel and dice a russet potato, I went in search of a can of diced potatoes in the pantry. 

Lo and behold, this can of chickpeas (garbanzo beans/chana) was staring me in the face! I figured the texture was pretty close to cooked potatoes and size similar to diced potatoes which resulted in a delightful stir-fry that was peppery and full of texture. 

The next time, I will add grated coconut for more flavor.

Burmese Green Beans & Ham

Green Beans & Ham

Left-overs mixed into a bowl of noodles

A great way to use up left-over Easter ham.

Green Beans in White Poppy Seed Sauce

Green Beans & Shrimp Posto

Green beans, peas & shrimp cooked in a white poppy seed sauce

Serves: 6
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cooking Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients:
4 Tbsp. white Poppy seeds (Posto)
1 cup Water

3 Tbsp. extra light Olive Oil
½ tsp. Nigella seeds (Kalo Jeera/Kalonji)

1 lb. green Beans, sliced width-wise into small circles 
2 tsp. Ginger paste
Salt to taste
1 cup frozen Peas, thawed
10 – 15 medium shrimp, shelled and deveined

1 tsp. Ghee or melted Butter
2 – 3 Thai red chillies, left whole

Directions:
1. Boil a cup of water in microwave, pour over poppy seeds in a bowl. Set aside to cool and soften.
2. Puree the poppy seeds and water in a blender until it reaches the consistency of a thick sauce. 
3. Heat oil in a pan over medium-high heat and add nigella seeds.
4. When the seeds begin to sputter and sizzle, add vegetables, ginger paste and salt.
5. Lower heat to medium-low and cook for 10 minutes until vegetables are tender.
6. Add peas & shrimp, adjust salt to taste and cook for 5 minutes.
7. Add pureed poppy seeds and stir until well combined.
8. Cook for 5 minutes until the sauce reduces and just coats the beans.
9. Garnish with ghee & whole chillies and transfer to a serving dish.

Notes:
The green beans and peas can be replaced with several other vegetables, such as eggplant, cauliflower, potatoes, zucchini, ridge gourd (jhinge), sweet potatoes, pumpkin, etc.

Burmese Green Beans

I've given Mum's recipe a slight Burmese twist with the addition of dried shrimp powder, soya sauce, fish sauce and toasted sesame oil.

Green Beans Casserole

Servings: 10

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Cook time: 30 minutes

Ingredients: 

1 (10-3/4 oz.) can Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom Soup        

Dash of pepper
½ cup cream or milk                                                 

4 cups cooked cut green beans
4 Tbsp. soy sauce                                                                               

2 containers French’s Fried Onions

1 Tbsp. vegetable oil.

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350°F and grease a 9"x13" glass baking dish with oil.  
2. Mix soup, cream, soy sauce, pepper, beans and 1 container fried onions.  
3. Bake at 350°F for 25 minutes or until bubbling.  Stir. 
4. Garnish edges of dish with 2^nd container of onions. 
5. Bake 5 minutes more.   

Red Lentils With Green Beans

Ingredients:
1-1/2 cups red lentils, washed until water runs clear
1/2 lb. green beans, sliced into small rounds
1 large onion, chopped
6 cloves garlic, chopped
1 medium or 12 plum tomatoes
salt to taste
2 Tbsp. vegetable oil
1/2 tsp. panch phoron (Bengali five spice)
1 tsp. ghee
cilantro, chopped

Directions:

1. Wash and soak lentils for 1/2 an hour.
2. Cook over medium heat until lentils disintegrate.
3. Heat oil over high heat and sputter panch phoron.
4. Fry onions and garlic until onions turn translucent.
5. Add tomatoes and cook until they break down.
6. Turn heat to medium, add green beans and cook until tender.
7. Add cooked lentils, adjust salt to taste, stir and simmer for 10 minutes.
8. Garnish with ghee and cilantro and serve with cooked rice or tortillas.

Green Beans with Black Pepper

This preparation reminds me of Mum because she used to make this for us.  She was a wonderful cook and instilled the love for cooking in each and every one of her 8 children.

Green Beans with Black Pepper

Ingredients:

1/2 lb. green beans, cut in 1/2" pieces

1 russet potato, diced
2 Tbsp. extra light olive oil

½ tsp. kalonji/kalo jeera/nigella seeds (optional)

1 tsp. black pepper, or to taste

2 large onions, sliced

2 large tomatoes, chopped

salt to taste

Directions:

Heat oil in a pan and fry kalonji till seeds sputter.

Add chopped onion and fry until onions turn translucent.  Do not brown the onions.

Add chopped tomatoes and fry until tomatoes break down.

Add diced potatoes and green beans and simmer until potatoes are fork tender.

Sprinkle black pepper and salt and stir well.

Garnish with ghee or butter, if desired, and serve.