Time for French Fridays with Dorie! Our recipe of the week is Pancetta Green Beans, since I don't eat pancetta, I tried to figure out a substitute, and still follow the cooking directions in the recipe. I decided to go with two different versions, one half batch with cashews (my first choice) and then, just for fun, I made a half batch with Bac-Os.
According to my google search, Bac-Os or some other kind of frozen fake bacon are popular subs when people try to swap the bacon out of recipes. I have never been a fake bacon eater, but I do like Bac-Os on my salad every now and then and had some in the pantry, so I figured I'd give them a shot.
Here are the beans in their water bath. I really appreciated the cooking times in this recipe because my beans turned out perfectly, and sometimes I struggle with how long to cook beans to get them to just the right tender crisp texture, soggy green beans really bug me. My husband usually likes his softer than I like mine, but the texture of these seemed to please us both.
I used butter in place of the tbsp of pancetta fat you are supposed to leave in the pan. Then followed the directions with the cashews and Bac-Os in two different batches.
They both turned out nicely and my boys liked them as a lunch side dish. I prefer the cashew version, they were delicious, but the Bac-Os version was fine too, and my boys really liked them. I will be using the bean cooking method (5 minutes in boiling salted water, ice bath, sauteed 2 extra minutes) in the future since we are all green bean fans in our house and I am always looking for new ways to cook them!
13 comments:
Love the cashews! Will remember that next time for a non-meat option.
The cashew version looks great! I'll have to try that next time.
Bac-o's... what a great idea! I love the thought of the cashews too!
Both variations look amazing! I could seriously dig in right now! :)
The cashew version looks delicious!
What a great thought with the cashews. It is really helpful to see how people adapt dishes like this to suit vegetarian diets!
Great ideas on both options. I agree that although it was a fairly basic recipe (thank goodness this time :) it was still really nice to have the water bath details and cooking times spelled out. It helped me as well.
How creative to substitute cashews for the pancetta. Sounds delcious. Would probably be good with walnuts with the walnut oil too.
Love the idea of using cashews here! I will definitely try this sometime if I'm preparing this dish for vegetarians, it's a great substitute! Both versions look lovely! :)
Your children are gorgeous! Love learning about new ways to do things and have never heard of Bac-O's! Fascinating!
They look great. I liked how you tried different toppings on them! I would have loved the cashew version!
Great experiment! I think I'll have to keep the cashew version in mind for future attempts. I love the blanching method of cooking vegetables. I usually just steam them, but blanching gets such great results for not much more work.
Cashews are a great idea! You have adorable 'little loves'.
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