Skip the Casserole for Better Green Beans
Give this tender bean the delicate treatment it deserves.
Green beans are at their best when gently cooked until just tender and bright emerald green, so as to preserve their texture and sweet vegetal flavor. Green bean casserole obliterates both. Recipes that use canned ingredients or require extended baking times take green beans well past their peak. Our Green Beans with Spanish Almond Sauce lets the green beans shine while delivering the creaminess and crunch you get with a green bean casserole (without the the limp beans or can of condensed soup).
Preserve texture with blanching
One of the things I love most about this dish is how beautifully it presents on the Thanksgiving table. There are enough soft, scoopable, golden-brown casseroles in rectangular dishes; don’t let the green beans fall into the same category. This dish is more about spotlighting the beans’ natural qualities, rather than drowning it in a gloopy sauce. The key to preserving that eye-catching hue? Cooking the beans gently and quickly via blanching.
Blanching is done by submerging the beans in salted, boiling water for a brief period of time, 2 or 3 minutes. It’s just enough time to tamp down any bitterness, but not enough to render the beans limp and floppy. Blanching is also the most efficient method for evenly cooking a large quantity of beans without drying them out.
Once the beans are fished out of the pot, they’re shocked in an ice bath to stop the cooking. This step ensures their sharp green color stays put. Be sure to drain the beans in a colander soon after they cool. Letting them sit in the ice bath for more than a couple minutes can leave them waterlogged.
A creamy sauce without any cream
Blanched green beans are perfectly snackable at this stage, but for a special occasion like Thanksgiving, we dress them up in a silky Spanish almond sauce. This velvety sauce is made by combining pan-fried slivered almonds, a sautéed shallot and garlic roux, and a dash of smoked paprika. A little white wine brightens, and it’s all blended together to make a creamy, emulsified sauce.
Despite the body and smooth texture, this sauce contains no cream. Dairy-based sauces can mute the flavors of the green beans, so we chose this salsa de almendras (Spanish almond sauce) instead. The toasted almonds complement the flavor of the beans with their nutty sweetness, and a light, allium-infused roux provides plenty of bean-coating body.
Our recipe makes plenty of sauce. After dressing the beans, serve the remainder on the Thanksgiving table so your guests can top up their plates if needed. And if you still have leftovers after the meal, save it for the next day. Salsa de almendras keeps well in the fridge and is gorgeous over broccoli, roasted brussels, mushrooms and carrots.
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Allie Chanthorn Reinmann
Allie Chantorn Reinmann is a Digital Staff Writer for Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street. She’s a Thai-American chef who earned her diploma for Pastry and Baking Arts at The Institute of Culinary Education and worked professionally for over a decade honing her craft in New York City at places like Balthazar, Bien Cuit, The Chocolate Room, Billy’s Bakery and Whole Foods. Allie took her know-how from the kitchen to the internet, writing about food full-time at Lifehacker for three years and starting her own YouTube channel, ThaiNYbites. You can find her whipping up baked goods for cafés around Brooklyn, building wedding cakes and trying her hand (feet?) at marathon running. She’s working on her debut cookbook and lives in Brooklyn, NY.
