French Beans (1907)
Reader ratingsFrench beans as Escoffier wrote them in 1907: thin green beans boiled until just firm, tossed over the heat to dry, then finished with fresh butter, salt and pepper.
- Recipe makes
- 4 servings
- Prep
- Cook
- Total
Thin beans boil in 4 to 7 minutes depending on size. Have the butter cut and the plates warm, because the beans go straight from the pan to the table.
Buttered thin green beans with black pepper.
The story behind the recipe
Haricots verts du Saumurois, green beans from the country around Saumur on the Loire, follow the poularde on the sultan’s train menu of 1 July 1945. Escoffier’s London Guide of 1907 shows how a French kitchen of his day cooked them, and he writes about them with feeling.
“The greatest vegetable delicacies”
Escoffier opens his entry on French beans with praise: they are “among the greatest vegetable delicacies,” and “when they are cooked with care, no other vegetable can surpass them in perfection of flavour.” He also admits the trap. They come out well, he says, even “in spite of faulty preparation,” which lets careless cooks get away with it.
His rules are short. Take them “quite fresh.” Don’t cook them too long: they are best when they “seem a little firm to the teeth, without, of course, being in the least hard.” Don’t cool them in water after cooking. Toss them over the fire to drive off their moisture, season them, and add about three ounces of “very fresh butter” to the pound, cut small, tossing until it binds them. Parsley is allowed only if it is “very tender and gathered and chopped at the last moment.”
The same book shows how much a French menu leaned on these beans. Escoffier cuts them into tiny diamonds for clear soups, the Consommé Printanier on this menu among them, and his French Guide of 1903 sets a bunch of them at each end of the dish for Poularde à la Niçoise, the poularde listed just before them on the train’s menu.
Read more about this recipe
Making it today
The beans are boiled in well-salted water, as Escoffier boils green vegetables. We keep his three ounces of butter to the pound, a generous amount; two will do for a lighter dish. Ours is the choice of thin haricots verts, the nearest thing in American shops to young French beans.
The timetable filed with this menu is in What Was on the Royal Train’s Menu in 1945?. The beans can share a plate with the Paupiettes of Sole Choisy (1907).
French beans are among the greatest vegetable delicacies; but they have to be prepared with the utmost care. ...
Recipe makes: 4 servings
Ingredients
For 4 servings. Quantities are shown as written.
Quantities as written here, for 4 servings.
- Thin green beans (haricots verts), stem ends trimmed1 lb
- Coarse salt, for the cooking water2 tbsp
- Unsalted butter, cold, cut into small pieces3 oz
- Fine salt1 pinch
- Black pepper1 pinch
- Parsley leaves (optional)1 tbsp
Measurement notes
Ingredients as written here
- 1 lb thin green beans (haricots verts), stem ends trimmed
- 2 tbsp coarse salt, for the cooking water
- 3 oz unsalted butter, cold, cut into small pieces
- 1 pinch fine salt
- 1 pinch black pepper
- 1 tbsp parsley leaves (optional)
Equipment
- Large pot
Colander- Wide sauté pan
Instructions
Bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil and add the coarse salt.
Add the green beans and boil, uncovered, for 4 to 7 minutes, tasting one from about 4 minutes. Stop when they are tender but still a little firm to the bite.
Drain them well in the colander, without rinsing.
Tip them into the sauté pan over medium heat and toss for a minute or two, until the steam stops rising and they look dry.
Take the pan off the heat, season with the fine salt and pepper, and add the butter. Toss until the butter has melted and coats the beans.
If you use parsley, chop it now and toss it in. Serve at once.
Nutrition
190calories per serving
- Recipe makes
- 4 servings
- Servings
- 4
Estimated per serving from USDA FoodData Central values for green beans and butter.
Recipe notes
When adjusting quantities
Cook more than 2 pounds in two batches so the water keeps boiling.
Notes
Quantities mentioned in these notes don’t change when you adjust the servings.
Escoffier serves the beans as soon as they are buttered; they don’t hold well. If they must wait, keep them hot uncovered, and add the butter at the last minute.
Scaling changes the ingredients only; pan sizes and cooking times need their own judgment. To adapt this recipe further, try the recipe tool at TuneMyRecipe (opens in a new tab), our sister site.
Sources and attribution
After A. Escoffier, A Guide to Modern Cookery (London, 1907), no. 2157
Recipe details
- Course
- Side dish
- Dish family
- Vegetables & Sides
- Region
- French
- Era
- Edwardian
- Source decade
- 1900s
- Main ingredient
- Vegetables
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Season
- Summer