Regina Schrambling's Beans with Lardons and Sage

Oh, I don't know. This is an unspectacular picture illustrating an unspectacular recipe. I had such high hopes for it! Dried beans, fresh sage, canned tomatoes: I feel like it's a parade of some of my favorite foods. I looked forward to making this all week, but then was totally deflated when the stew ended up being just... ordinary. In an unfamiliar and uncomforting (you know what I mean) kind of way. I'd rather have Depression Stew any day of the week.

I'm not sure what the problem was. It didn't lack for salt, or an interplay of flavors (bay leaves, bacon, whole garlic cloves). But after eating a single bowl of it the other night, I had to force myself to save the rest in Tupperware. Was it because my bacon was cured, not smoked? Was it because I harbor a not-so-secret burning love for canned beans, and find soaking and cooking dry beans to be too much work for no good reason? Or was it just an uninspired recipe?

I'll stick the rest in the freezer and hope that on days when I find myself scrounging about in there for something to eat, I won't care what I find. In fact I'll be grateful to find a perfectly edible, if utterly forgettable, meal to defrost and eat. But what irritates me is that I can't throw the recipe out just yet, because I glued this one on the back of it, and even though I professed skepticism about Mr. Minimalism, I'm intrigued...

Beans with Lardons and Sage
Serves 4 to 6

1/2 pound (1 1/4 cups) dried beans such as flageolet, Jacob's Cattle or cannellini
2 ounces smoked slab bacon, cut into 1/2-inch cubes (1/2 cup cubed)
1 (28-ounce) can plum tomatoes, drained and chopped (about 2 cups diced)
8 leaves fresh sage
8 cloves garlic, peeled
2 dried bay leaves
1 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper
1 teaspoon salt

1. Sort the beans to remove any stones. Place them in a bowl and add cold water to cover by 3 inches. Soak overnight, changing the water once or twice.

2. The next day, boil a small pot of water, add the bacon and blanch 10 minutes. Drain and reserve.

3. Drain the beans and place in a large pot. Add the bacon, tomatoes, sage, garlic, bay leaves and pepper. Mix well. Add about 8 cups cold water (to cover the beans by 3 inches) and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to a simmer, cover and cook, stirring occasionally and adding water if necessary, until the beans are very tender, 3 to 3 1/2 hours. Serve in a warm bowl.

Comments

[Ilva]

This is like the fagioli all'uccelletto you make in Tuscany minus the smoked bacon (I take some nice salsicce) and I use fresh tomatoes. I love it, it's sooo comfort food and I can't stop eating beans made in this way! I don't know what happened, maybe you didn't boil the beans long enough so that they get mushy and tasty? Btw, I have a 'dish' like that as well so from now on I'll think about you every time I use it!

[Luisa]

Ilva - actually, I cooked the beans for a bit less than the recommended time because they were totally falling apart. I prefer a cooked bean that still has its shape, I suppose. Your description of fagioli all'uccelletto sounds delicious, but so did the recipe for this stew...

[Molly]

Luisa, I hear you on this "it sounded SO good, but eh..." business! Last weekend, remembering a dish made for me many years ago by a friend of my father's, I pulled out my clipping of a NY Times recipe by Amanda Hesser for chicken with Coca Cola and lemons. I was VERY excited. Coke and chicken may sound like a strange combination, but the version I remember was so delicious - moist, with a light, caramelized sweetness. While Amanda's recipe was good enough that I've been eating leftover chicken all week, I can't say that it does anything special. In fact, it mainly tastes of lemon to me. Nothing special. So sad. Meh.

[Lindy]

Hm. I wonder. Much though I love tomatoes, for some reason, I don't like them with legumes. I don't think any of my favorite bean recipes have tomatoes.

BTW, I made that Amanda Hesser recipe Molly mentions, and I did like it. I actually thought it was sort of caramelly, but I didn't have anything to compare it to. And I do have a huge weakness for lemons with chicken. With anything, really.

That recipe on the back sounds interesting to me too...though I'm also leery of Mr. Minimal.

[marcus]

When I have some bland leftover soup, I'll cut up a hot Italian sausage, cook it in a little olive oil in a saucepan, then dump the soup into the pan to heat up.
Instant zing.

[Diva]

Ciao from Florence
I can help!
1.the beans should be cooked with sage garlic and olive oil. slowly...
2. grill your sausage ( or lardons)

3. saute garlic and sage in olive oil, ( I also like some chili) add canned tomato, salt to taste and cook until the tomatoes fall apart.

4. Add cooked beans.
If you put beans in tomato sauce, they will take forever to cook! (acidity in tomato).

heat together. Serve with sausage( I like to cut the sausage into serving chunks and let it all heat together)

Enjoy!
It is one of my FAVORITE Tuscan comfort foods.

great even made with canned beans rinse off first.

[Diva]

ps...
only salt the beans in the cooking water at the end of the cooking time.

The presoaked beans should only take an hour to cook.

[Julie]

I've been reading you for a couple of weeks now. You're a good writer and I'm impressed by your photographs, even this one.

To me the beans look a lot like canned baked beans.

I'm no stranger to that whole thing of finding a recipe, being excited by it, spending time on it (and sometimes spending ridiculous amounts of money on it) and when it's all said and done being completely underwhelmed by it. It's rarely a case of actively disliking something, just not being that excited by it.

The chicken, coke and lemon thing though...

[Luisa]

Julie - thank you so much. I'm glad you're liking the site. I harbor a secret passion for canned baked beans...so maybe that contributed to my disappointment? I knew these wouldn't taste the same, but the visual similarity... oh well.

Diva - thank you for all those tips; they all sound very sensible and like they'd lead to a fantastically flavored end result. I totally agree with you on the cooking time for presoaked beans, by the way.

Marcus - that sounds delicious.

Lindy + Molly - I'm glad I heard from both of you on that recipe. I have it clipped, of course, and have been trying to figure out when I'd ever get around to making it. You've both got me even more intrigued now. I wonder what I'll think of it!