According to Smithsonian Magazine somewhere in the neighborhood of 20,000,000 people will be eating green bean casserole this Thanksgiving, many of them following some version of the recipe Dorcas Reilly (pictured below) created in 1955. Dorcas was a food expert working for Campbell’s Soup Company at the time.
If you want to give it a go, here is her original recipe. The recipe card is now housed in the National Inventors Hall of Fame. Interest in the recipe has exploded over the years, so much so that Campbell’s Soup now estimates that 40% of the cream of mushroom soup they sell goes into green bean casseroles.
If, however, you are weary of Dorcas’ ubiquitous casserole and thinking of going rogue with your holiday menu this year, here is a wonderful option: Green Beans With Walnuts and Dried-Cherry Vinaigrette.
There is no can of cream of mushroom soup in this green bean recipe. No canned fried onions, either. I promise. Cross my heart.
Instead, this holiday green bean dish combines cherries, roasted walnuts and a drop-dead good vinaigrette dressing with fresh tender-crisp French green beans. Sweet. Sour, Crunchy. Beautiful. Fresh. (Good words, all.)
Be sure, though, that you buy fresh French green beans or French green beans that have been quick frozen immediately after being harvested. It would be a shame to diminish the flavor of this dish by using less-than quality beans. Green beans, after all, are one of the most fragile vegetables out there. Their tissue is very active. A lonely bag of fresh green beans left in the refrigerator too long consumes its own sugars and loses sweetness. How sad is that!
Green Beans With Toasted Walnuts and Cherry Vinaigrette
Ingredients
- 1/3 C. extra-virgin olive oil
- 1/3 C. minced shallots
- 3 T. plus 2 t. sherry wine vinegar
- 2 T. chopped fresh mint
- 1 1/2 t. kosher salt (coarse)
- 1 t. sugar
- 1/2 t. black pepper (plus extra for serving)
- 1/3 C. dried tart cherries
- 1 1/2 pounds slender French green beans (haricots verts)with ends removed
- 1/2 C. walnuts (toasted and chopped)
Directions
- Step 1 Roast and chop walnuts. Set aside.
- Step 2 Slowly whisk olive oil into sherry vinegar. When the mixture is emulsified, add shallots mint, salt, sugar and pepper. Stir in dried cherries. Set vinaigrette aside. Re-whisk before using and use at room temperature.
- Step 3 Put ice in a large bowl with some water. Set aside.
- Step 4 Using a large pan like a soup pot, bring water to a roiling boil. Add a lot of salt to the water. You want the water to taste very salty like the ocean. The very salty boiling water will season your green beans and will help make the beans more tender. Add the green beans all at once and boil for three to four minutes until the beans are crisp tender.
- Step 5 Using a kitchen spider, remove the beans from the boiling water, drain and transfer the beans to the bowl of ice water to stop the beans from cooking further. After two to three minutes, remove the beans from the ice water. If you leave then in the ice water for too long, they will begin to get soggy. Drain and dry the beans on paper towels.
- Step 6 When you are ready to serve, toss the dried green beans (at room temperature) with the roasted walnuts and the dried cherry vinaigrette.
This Green Beans With Walnuts and Dried-Cherry Vinaigrette recipe is adapted from one that was taught in a great “Thanksgiving Sides” class taught by the very talented Chef Brian at the Costa Mesa (California) Sur La Table. That recipe was originally published in Bon Appetit Magazine here.
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