On the weekend the Guardian published some fab-looking Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recipes for dishes with 3 key ingredients. And since broadbeans are supposed to be some of the key spring/summer seasonal ingredients in this part of the world, I had a bash.
Broadbeans are funny things. 500g of big, polarfleece-lined pods yielded a small quantity of greyish beans, which after boiling and shucking left me with an even smaller quantity of glossy bright green beans. I actually found the process of slipping the beans out of their inner skins very soothing - it took me back to being a child and blanching almonds for my mother to make cakes. Which probably didn't happen all that often but has left me with very clear memories! But still, broadbeans are only going to be brought out for appreciative sorts - if I suspect for a moment that someone would prefer frozen peas I will not go to the effort!
The recipe says serves 4 as a starter - so on a bed of lettuce served the 2 of us for a light dinner. Very tasty, but I needed more lemonjuice, and next time I think I will add a couple of slivered cloves of garlic at the same time as the scallops hit the pan.
8 comments:
What a great combination. Sometimes the simple things are the best. We have a whole load of broad beans almost ready in the garden so we'll try this as soon as we can.
No. We did make lots of cakes and prepared the almonds. Back in the days when life was slower and one was a size 12 no matter what one ate.
Lucky alex to have home grown broad beans - but we have just picked our first custard apples and I made this year's cumquat marmelade the other week.
I adore broad beans and I am having a pang of yearning for them as I haven't seen any for months.
Sounds delicious! With scallops and chorizo, you can't go wrong. And I love the pleasant monotony of shelling beans. I'm sure the effort was worth it!
Could you use fava beans for this? They are sort of broad, as beans go. This looks wonderful.
I think fava beans are broadbeans! International terminology strikes again...
Custard apples - erk! But I envy you the cumquat marmalade. If there is any left at Christmas I might see how I can bring some home!
are broad beans the same as favas? the description sounds the same.
i don't see how you could possibly go wrong with those 3 ingredients - yum!
heh, i should really read through all the comments before i shoot my mouth off.
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