Paranoia and Fava Beans
In preparing to debut this blog, I cooked a clutch of ingredient-laden, spicy dishes. I made extensive notes, readied each recipe, took lots of photographs.
The food was okay, even good: an Indian-influenced chicken dish, flatbread with tomato and scallion, a fiery yogurt marinade. But as I served and ate each one, I realized none honestly reflected my taste or style. None were anything I’d make again. And if I don’t like what I’m cooking, how could I offer it here?
Recently I saw Michael Chabon speak. Asked to offer four words of advice, he said: “Don’t take the bait. ”
Well, I’d done just that. After reading widely about blogging, about “SEO” and traffic and food trends– things I could care less about–acute self-consciousness had set in. I’d temporarily forgotten the best advice I read about blogging: “be yourself.”
So I went back. To salting and trimming and peeling. To lemons and garlic and olive oil.
To fava beans. Does a more labor-intensive food exist? Peel, blanch, peel again. There’s nothing difficult about preparing fresh fava beans, yet you can go mad doing it. Or you can settle into the rhythm of shucking, blanching, peeling. You might plan the next few days, or stare into space thinking nothing much at all. Whatever you do, in the end, you are rewarded with fresh fava beans, a seasonal food at its best simply prepared.
Fava Beans with Garlic, Olive Oil, and Lemon
Serving size: 4 as a side dish
[ingredients}2 pounds fava beans in their pods
1-2 large garlic cloves (to taste) crushed, peeled, minced
1/2
1/2 of medium lemon
1 Tablespoon olive oil
[/ingredients]
Put a large pot of water to a boil.
Shell the beans, then add them to the pot of water. After three minutes, test one with a slotted spoon. Beans are done when you can easily pierce the membrane with your thumbnail. This happens quickly. Drain in a colander. When cool enough to handle, remove the outside membranes.
Pour olive oil into a 12 inch saute pan. Squeeze in the lemon, add the garlic, and sea salt. Cook the beans over medium heat an additional 5-15 minutes, depending on their size and your taste. This late in the season, the beans are likely to be starchy and need the full cooking time.
You can now toss the beans into a dish and call it done. Or…
–Add fresh or frozen peas
–Add fresh or frozen artichoke hearts
–Add sliced shallots
–serve any of the above on pasta
–Mash beans with a potato masher. Pour olive oil over to bind, and spread on bread.
Remember you can only be yourself.
