Not Your Grandmother’s Green Beans: Dal with Long Beans, Green Garlic, and Fenugreek (vegan)

If you’re a regular reader of The Expat Epicure (thank you!), then you’re familiar with Michel’s adventures in exotic food stores.  He recently went to Patel Brothers on a quest for fenugreek leaves which are widely used for many culinary and medicinal purposes, especially ayurvedic applications.   My utterly non-scientific Google search for fenugreek led me to wildly divergent homeopathic treatments for everything from thinning hair to weight loss to lactation problems.  As for culinary uses, fenugreek seeds and leaves are quite commonly found in Indian cooking—curries, dal, etc.—even salads.   Some cooks use the leaves like those pretentious “microgreens” I fail to understand.  

 

Fenugreek Leaves--photo from BBC Good Food website

Michel conducted his on-site interviews at Patel’s just the way he always does, asking other customers how they use various greens and odd-looking vegetables.  His interview subjects are always friendly, sometimes offering entire recipes on the spot.  After all his questions had been asked (at least for the moment) and answers weighed, the fenugreek leaves were acquired along with some long beans which were sort of an impulse buy, not unlike those memorable fresh garbanzo beans that turned out to be such a pain to peel.   

 

long beans

Michel has always asked lots of questions.  About everything.  In food stores, the most common question is “What is that?!”  Like I would know.  He admits this trait must have driven his parents and teachers crazy when he was a child.  Some people still find it unsettling, while others find it amusing and even fun.   For me, it depends on the topic at hand. I have resigned myself to the fact that I can never answer all of Michel’s questions, even though I’d like to be able to.   To that end, I have devised a short series of hand signals that indicate to what degree I don’t know the answer to a given question.  This little set of gestures saves time and minimizes frustration. It’s like a sign language consisting of only three phrases and it has served us (me) well so far. 

Back to the beans.  Michel bought the long beans because “you don’t always see them.”  They are used a lot in Chinese cooking and they’re quite different from traditional “green beans” or string beans in texture and taste.  Those childhood neighbors of mine who would show up at the door with “a mess of greens” from their summer garden would also bring enormous amounts of green beans.  It was my job to snap the beans into bite-sized pieces and peel away those annoying strings from the edges.   Most of the cooks I was around as a child would either cook the beans to death with a hunk of ham bone for seasoning, or can them in very large Mason jars for winter meals.  Bless their hearts.  They meant well.   Long beans are less belligerent than Western string beans, I think.  They require less cooking time and have a slightly sweet taste.   

Here is Michel’s new recipe.  Hope you like it! 

Dal with Long Beans, Green Garlic, and Fenugreek

You will need: a large skillet, a soup pot, and something for steaming the beans.

Here’s a list of ingredients (à la Trader Joe’s soft-sell junk mail shopping list):

Fresh ingredients	Other ingredients and spices
1 bunch long beans	1 ½ cups lentils
6 slices fresh ginger	1 tablespoon dried fenugreek leaves
½ an onion	1 tablespoon turmeric powder
4 Thai chili peppers	1 tablespoon mustard seeds
5 cloves garlic	1 tablespoon cumin
3-4 stems green garlic	1 teaspoon pickled mango ginger               (or pickled mango leaves)
	1 teaspoon salt
	2 tablespoons olive oil

dried fenugreek leaves

First, the long beans:

·        Cut into 2-3 inch pieces.

·        Steam for about five minutes.

·        Set aside for later. 

steamed long beans

In the soup pot, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil then add:

·        5 cloves garlic, finely chopped

·        3 slices ginger, chopped

·        4 green cayenne peppers, chopped

Thai chili peppers

Sweat the ginger, garlic, and peppers.

Add:

·        1 tablespoon turmeric powder

Stir, then add:

·        1½ cups lentils

·        4-5 cups water

·        1 teaspoon pickled mango ginger and 1 teaspoon salt

pickled mango ginger

Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer uncovered for 30-45 minutes until lentils are done. Stir occasionally, using your kavvam if you have one.  (I wrote about the kavvam adventure in a previous post.)

In the large skillet, heat one tablespoon olive oil then add:

·        3 slices ginger, chopped

·        ½ an onion, chopped

·        3-4 pieces of green garlic, chopped

green garlic

Sweat the garlic, onion, and ginger. Move everything away from the center of the pan, then add:

·        1 tablespoon mustard seeds

·        1 tablespoon cumin

Let seeds and cumin “start to explode a little and that’s what you want.”

After the seeds and cumin have exploded and the herbs and onion have had a good sweat, add steamed long beans. Gently mix to coat beans with spices.

Add bean mixture to lentils and top with crushed dried fenugreek leaves. 

And there you have it: Dal with Long Beans and Fenugreek. 

Serve over quinoa, cauliflower “couscous,” or any grain of choice. Delicious with freshly pickled cucumber slices on the side.

Bon appetit!