Serves 6-8
If you're looking for a tasty way to enjoy vegetables, my Italian string beans may be just what you've been looking for. Boiled in olive oil and garnished with garlic, this is a delicious vegetarian/vegan side dish guaranteed to even make meat eaters' mouths water! Italian string beans are very versatile; they can easily be used as a side dish with pasta or rice or by itself as a healthy snack or an hors devour.
You will need:
- a large pot
- a large strainer
- a teaspoon
- a tablespoon
- a large knife
- a measuring cup
- a cutting board
Ingredients:
- 1 cup of water
- 1 lb. of fresh (not canned) green string beans
- 6 sliced garlic cloves, thinly sliced
- 1 teaspoon of salt
- 1 teaspoon of pepper
- 6 tablespoons of olive oil
Note: It is important that you use fresh string beans for this recipe and not string beans from a can, as they are too soft and will turn into mush in the boiling water. Also, you should use 1 cup of water for each pound of string beans you plan to use. For example, 8 ounces of string beans would require half a cup of water; two pounds need two cups.
Start prepping the string beans by cutting off their tips, then place the cut string beans into the
strainer and rinse under cold water. If you're not sure how much of each end you should cut off, your tipless string beans should look like this.
Place the rinsed string beans and sliced garlic into a large pot. Add one teaspoon each of salt and pepper along with 6 tablespoons of olive oil. Then let the ingredients boil for about 90 minutes, until the string beans are nice and chewy.
nce the water begins to boil, you will notice that the garlic turns to mush and fuses itself with the string beans and both flavors fuse with the water. You can use this leftover juice as a garlic marinade for another dish; it tastes great poured over a light, lean meat like chicken or fish. You will want to make this dish in a large quantity because it goes very quickly.
