The Sweet as Pie bonus recipe for the month was Haricots Vert a la Provencale from Julia Child’s famous Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Well, I haven’t mastered it yet. I had high hopes for this recipe since it was one of Julia’s, but it fell flat for us. Here’s how it came together:
I started with fresh beans. I blanched these in boiling water for a few minutes. While I was waiting for the water to come to a boil, I sauteed onions in olive oil.
Next, I added some diced tomatoes, garlic, and an herb bouquet. I didn’t have a cheesecloth (and couldn’t find one) for the herbs, so I took the internet’s advice and used a coffee filter instead. It seemed to work just fine.
Once the green beans were blanched, I added them to the pot and let everything simmer for about 10 minutes. The herb bouquet came out and some additional herbs – basil and tarragon – went in.
The beans were fine, but I was really hoping for something better than “fine”. I’m definitely going to persevere on this front and figure out how to make this recipe work for us. Perhaps I made some poor choices with my herbs (or simply made the poor choice to go with dried in some instances), or maybe I didn’t execute the cooking techniques correctly. I won’t count Julia out just yet though!
