Green Beans Provencal — Dale Knows How To Host

Mom’s inscription to me in The New Basics cookbook. (We hate goat cheese.)

The Zydeco Dots at my wedding reception at the now defunct Blanco’s in Houston, TX. 2000.

My “Green Bean” tattoo, 2 ways. (Wedding photos)

Somehow I missed this smoking monkey at our reception, but my friend the famous photographer Jennifer Shaw caught it!

The sweetest photo of my mom and Chris, right before our wedding. Houston, TX. 2000.

I was using my food processor yesterday, shredding carrots for a quick pickle for a homemade banh mi (Do it! So good!), when I noticed 2 untouched blades I’d never even unwrapped or investigated. I’ve had this food processor for years. It turns out the blades are slicers, one thick and one thin. It’s ridiculous that I didn’t know I had these. Now I can take that deathtrap mandoline slicer off of my Amazon wishlist! As I was washing out the Cuisinart I had a feeling of deja vu. You see, I spent my childhood washing food processors. They’re a lot easier to wash now since they redesigned the lid. I remember when my mom got her food processor. (I don’t think it was a Cuisinart, those were too expensive!) IT WAS A VERY EXCITING DAY IN THE REED HOUSE. Not for me, so much, but my mom and Nonnie were thrilled with this invention. They talked about food processors ad nauseum and made everything they possibly could with this piece of equipment. One summer we spent a few weeks at the beach with my Nonnie and she made gazpacho all the time. I thought it was the most disgusting thing in the world. Funny, because now it is one of my favorite foods. Mom made hummus on the regular. My friend Amy had it when she came home from school with me and was amazed at how simple it was to make. I just saw Amy in New York last Fall and she tells me that homemade hummus is still in her repertoire.

It was a similar experience, although slightly less glamorous, when the microwave came out. We excitedly researched this amazing new invention and then got one. Mom purchased a book called “How to Cook with a Microwave” and then obtained some very ugly beige microwave-specific cookware. We tried it all and kept remarking, “It’s amazing how you can cook something in the microwave and it will taste slightly less good than it would if you cooked it normally! Now THAT’S progress!”.

As I mention on the homepage of this blog, when I got my first apartment in college, Mom shipped two large boxes of cooking equipment to me including a double boiler and a copy of the The New Basics cookbook (by the authors of The Silver Palate) inscribed, “It is important to remember that chevre is goat cheese”. (We both hate goat cheese.) I love that Mom had such high expectations of me! I basically lived on bagels for the next few years. Every now and then I would cook something special and I was grateful to have the tools. One time my college boyfriend had a windfall and gave me $40 cash to make whatever I wanted. I consulted The New Basics and made some sort of beef dish. After college I was dating a Texan in Brooklyn and was invited to participate in a chili cook-off with his childhood friends. These guys were serious! They flew in “Uncle Larry” from Austin to judge the contest. Uncle Larry was a guy they had hung out with in college who, while older, was decidedly NO ONE’S uncle. (Rumor was that he had sold weed to Willie Nelson. That commanded some respect. Now that I live in Texas everyone claims to know someone who sold weed to Willie Nelson, so it’s way less impressive.) But, in 1994 I wanted to dazzle Uncle Larry, so I hit up The New Basics for a chili recipe. It did not let me down. Enthusiastic as my competitors were, they did not have any basics of cooking so mine was really the only edible chili (except for the cheater who went to Wendy’s and repackaged it as his own). An art school friend of mine commented that my boyfriend’s chili was like “dog food with an oil slick on top”. Ouch. Needless to say, I won the competition and the guys were NOT thrilled that a Carolina girl who was usually a vegetarian took the trophy. Tough luck, fellas. I did finally move to Texas, making the win retroactively ok. Once I was established in the great state I frequently got invited to potluck Thanksgiving dinners, since I was so far from home. What did I always take? Green Beans Provencal from The New Basics! That’s the recipe I’m sharing today. These green beans are not pitched as a holiday item in the cookbook, I just decided that they would be a perfect counterpoint to heavier foods. And, they are! I served them to Mom at some point and they made their way into her recipe folder.

It’s funny that I locked on to green beans as my go-to dish in the mid-90s, as I had no idea what was about to come. In 1998 I met my husband, Christopher Bean. I made it about one week into dating him when I realized, washing my hair one day, that I, Sarah Greene Reed, could become Sarah Greene Bean if everything worked out! Well, it did work out and nine months later we were engaged. Half the world lobbied for me to change my name, half the world was horrified. Twenty plus years later I’m still mulling it over, but I did commit to getting the Chinese symbols for “Green” and “Bean” tattooed onto my ankle. Chris got them on his upper arm. We actually did this on Valentine’s Day before we got married (a leap of faith!). We thought it would be fun and romantic to go to our favorite Thai restaurant, Patu, and then go get a TATTOO. (See what we did there?) The plan was going great until we showed up at Patu and they were closed. So, we went across the street to Nit Noi. It didn’t rhyme but it was delicious. Anyway, a word of warning about tattoos in foreign languages: they don’t always mean what you think! A few years ago I was at the grocery store here in Austin and this Asian lady pointed at me in the produce section and said “mung bean!”. I ignored her. I ran into her later on the bread aisle and she did it again. So I had to ask her what she was talking about. She said, “your tattoo says ‘mung bean’”. I replied, “isn’t it ‘green’ and ‘bean’”? She told me technically yes but when combined they read as mung bean. Perfect. ha ha. I actually think that my husband and I are such goofballs that it makes even MORE sense that our novelty tattoos got one over on us. Now I know why the dudes at the Chinese foot massage place always look at me so weird!

I’ve got one more green bean tidbit. When my husband and I got married in Houston in 2000 we had a pretty formal wedding at an old Episcopal Church downtown and then had a rockin’ reception at a now defunct roadhouse called Blanco’s. (You know the kind, chicken wire on the ceiling and lots of taxidermy. A friend sent me a photo of a stuffed monkey smoking a cigarette that was hanging on the wall. Anyone else have this in their wedding album?!) We knew we wanted a live band because our people are dancers. When trying to settle on genre we threw out lots of ideas but ultimately decided on Zydeco. It’s impossible to have a bad time with a Zydeco band. The music is infectious and appeals to all demographics. We booked The Zydeco Dots and they were a huge success, the dance floor was packed all night. Come to find out a few years later, the word “Zydeco” means “green beans” or “snap beans”. It gets its name from a colloquial Creole French expression “Les haricots ne sont pas salés” meaning “the snap beans aren’t salty” or idiomatically for “the times are hard.” How is that for kismet?!!!

I realized I’ve strayed far, far away from good ole Dale Reed, but I’ll circle back. My husband and I use this app called Paired and it’s really great! It’s kind of like poor man’s couples’ therapy. You each answer a daily question and can only see the other’s answer when it’s completed. Some of the questions are silly, some are intense (!), but it gets the conversation going. I recommend it. Anyway, on International Women’s Day (Why only one day? Don’t get me started.) the question was “Name a woman who has positively impacted your relationship.” Chris’ answer? “Your mom.”

GREEN BEANS PROVENCAL

1 lb fresh green beans – trimmed

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 large onion – chopped coarsely

4 cloves garlic – finely chopped

4 large tomatoes, peeled, seeded – coarsely chopped

1/2 cup dry white wine

1/2 cup pitted Nicoise olives, or Kalamata

1 Tablespoon fresh lemon juice

2 Tablespoons coarse black pepper – start w 2 tsp.

Bring saucepan of water to a boil, add beans, simmer until crisp-tender, about 3 min. Drain, rinse under cold water, drain again.

Heat oil in large skillet over medium heat and add onion and garlic. Cook 5 minutes.

Add tomatoes and wine. Cook 20 minutes.

Toss in olives and beans. Heat 3 minutes. Sprinkle with lemon juice and pepper. Serve immediately.

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