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Bean and Creamed Green Gratin with Cornbread Crumble
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Bean and Creamed Green Gratin with Cornbread Crumble

comfort food with layers that are worth all the work

Emily Rose Kahn-Sheahan
Jun 24, 2021
4
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Bean and Creamed Green Gratin with Cornbread Crumble
eatwellenough.substack.com

things you’ll need:

beans - your pick. yellow-eyed beans pictured here and were delicious. can imagine black eyed peas, northern beans, white beans, or any other bean you’d typically use in soups or baked beans. Cooked in the instant pot or stovetop with onion, garlic, carrot, and a bay leaf or however you normally do it.

greens - did a combo of rainbow chard and lacinato kale, but sub whatever greens you like. also onion, cream, red wine vinegar (or apple cider or whatever), chili flake, salt and pepper. (skip the cream for vegan.)

cornbread - made gluten-free from scratch with fine cornmeal, bacon fat, butter, buttermilk, one egg, and a little sugar. sub ghee for vegetarian or use a vegan cornbread recipe that involves aquafaba.

-additional fillers: corn (frozen will do) and swiss cheese*** (or gruyere or whatever is in your cheese drawer that looks good) or whatever else sounds good. tomatoes? poblanos? it’s your food.

lots of ideas went into this one, but the train of thought derived from Chard and sweet corn gratin from Martha Rose Shulman at NYTimes, Chard gratin by Amanda Hesser at Food52, Swiss Chard and Kale Gratin by the magicians at ATK, and Southern Cornbread from Elise Bauer at Simply Recipes.

incidentally gluten-free and vegetarian (if you skip the bacon fat). for vegan, you can leave out the cheese and cream and make vegan cornbread, then you’re good to go. the point is really the greens, beans, and crunchy topper.

***Update: swiss cheese slices melted too firm and created something more like an overcooked noodle top that was not great. Shredded or Monterey jack would be preferred.

Chapter 154

Unless you are that friend who doesn’t like it when their food touches, then you have likely craved a casserole. Sometimes you just want a bunch of stuff baked together and served straight from the baking dish. The casserole is, perhaps, the ultimate comfort food. Hell, even apple crisp is actually a casserole. Shepard’s pie: casserole. Lasagna: casserole. Mac and cheese: arguably a casserole (when baked). As far as you are concerned, anything that is baked in its serving dish is a casserole and is also delicious and you want it.

You see the word “Gratin” in your recipe searching and discover that the internet defines a gratin as something baked with a browned crust, often made of cheese or breadcrumbs, which is a casserole with a crunchy top and sounds delicious.

This casserole/gratin does have a lot of cooking steps. In truth, you could cook each part and then put them in separate serving dishes and then put each bite together on your plate, which is what you would do if you don't like it when food touches, but that’s not you today. You want a crunchy topping and a forkful of touching food layers that all hit your tongue in a perfect symphony of casserolish comfort. If you don’t want to make something with a bunch of steps, maybe just consider a sheet pan full of stuff for dinner and move on.

Beans

Start with the beans, because they may take a minute. You can skip the wait time and use canned beans and no one will judge you, and if someone in your kitchen is judging you then they can have cereal instead.

Cook up your pot of beans (about half a pound or 1 cup of dried beans yields apx 3 cups cooked) the way that you cook your pot of beans: Beans covered in 3 inches of water, a peeled and halved onion, a few carrots, a clove or more of garlic and a bay leaf brought to a boil and then covered and simmered until they are done.

Most beans can be done in an instant pot/pressure cooker in 30-40 minutes on high pressure with natural release.

Cornbread

Preheat the oven to 400. Mix 2 cups of cornmeal with a teaspoon each of salt, baking soda, and sugar (or honey). Whisk together one egg and 1 ¼ cup buttermilk. Combine wet and dry, then stir in 6 Tablespoons of melted butter. On the stovetop, heat up a skillet, add about a tablespoon of bacon fat (or ghee), pour in the batter. Pop the whole skillet in the oven. Check it at 12-15 minutes. It could be as much as twenty. Then, let it cool.

Your beans are probably done, so salt the pot to taste and let them hang out with the cooling cornbread while you strip some greens.

Greens

It is true that swiss chard will make a more attractive casserole since the ribs are all white, but you saw those big happy bundles of rainbow chard and could not resist them. Do not care if the red, orange and yellow stalks make things look a bit muddy. It’s a casserole. Casseroles are not heralded for their beauty, they are all about the substance. You like that about casseroles.

You’ve learned that lacinato (or dinosaur) kale will last longer in the fridge than curly kale or those big bags of pre-washed and cut kale and so you usually grab a few bundles and find some way to use them during the week (see Leftover Soup with New Kale, Kale Salad, and Sausage and White Bean Soup with Kale to name a few).

After thoroughly washing and draining all the various greens (two sizable bundles of rainbow chard, one bundle of kale), strip the leaves from the ribs of your chard and set them aside. Then chop up the stems like you would chop celery. The lacinato kale ribs are a bit more tender than their curly cousins, so just trim the ends, rough chop the rest, and set up a pot of boiling seasoned (that means salt) water for blanching.

Blanch the kale greens until the ribs are still a little crunchy (5-10 minutes). Remove from water to strain and set aside. Blanch the chard (leaves only) in the same water until wilted (4-5 minutes) and add those leaves to the colander full of draining kale. Using the back of a big spoon or your hands, squeeze out most of the moisture. Then, transfer the well-squeezed ball of greens to a cutting board and chop it up for more even casserole distribution.

Next, chop an onion (preferably a sweet onion). Sautee in a pan until just translucent, then add the chopped chard ribs (and salt) and cook until tender. Add blanched and chopped greens along with about a tablespoon of red wine vinegar and toss it all about. Finish with 1 ½ - 2 cups of cream, chili flake, salt and pepper to taste. Set aside.

Assembly

Get out your casserole dish, your trusty pyrex, or whatever dish you intend to use for both baking and presenting this gloriously layered concoction.

Start with a full layer of beans (about 3 cups or 2 drained and rinsed cans) along with most of the bean broth (1 1/2ish cups). If you used canned beans, maybe add a little stock or the seasoned blanching water. Shake in a little dried (or fresh chopped) thyme.

Next, frozen corn straight from the bag. Sprinkle it evenly. Use however much you want. If this was sort of a genius inspiration add-on moment, use the rest of whatever bag you happen to have in the freezer.

Now spoon on those creamed greens and all that delicious pan liquid. Distribute as evenly as possible.

Top it all with grated cheese (or slices because that what you have), transforming your Casserole into a Gratin.

Crumble up half of the, now cool, cornbread and sprinkle crumbs all over the top.

Pop it in the oven, at like 350/375, until the cheese is melted, the cornbread is crunchy toasty and the sides are bubbling a bit (20-30 minutes). Let it rest while you set the table and dream of the perfect forkful.

When it hits the plate, it may not look pretty but after the first perfect forkful of creamy beans, sweet corn, earthy greens with that slight vinegar tang, all rounded out with the melted cheese and perfect toasty cornbread crunch… nothing will matter but the next bite.


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