Olivia Piepmeier

Garlicky Beans & Toast

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Thursday, February 2, 2023
Categories: pantry main beans
Watercolor illustration of the recipe. It's looking from above at a slice of bread. There's a slightly beige outlining the main whiter-but-still-beige blob that's supposed to represent beans. There are suggestions of the shape of beans and some flecks of green herbs.

inspired by New York Times Cooking

Ingredients

  • 2 tablespoons butter
  • The cloves of 4 heads of garlic, skins removed and each clove halved horizontally
  • 2 cups whole milk (though it wouldn’t be the end of the world with 2%)
  • 3 cups/2 15 oz. cans chickpeas (original suggests including their liquid, I haven’t found it makes a difference either way)
  • 3 cups/2 15 oz. cans white beans, drained (of course, you know what I do)
  • Aromatic herbs that you can remove later - a couple sprigs of thyme or rosemary, or a few leaves of sage or bay
  • 1/4 teaspoon bold, peppery spice - nutmeg, allspice, or garam masala
  • Red pepper flakes
  • Salt & pepper
  • Crusty bread or hearty sandwich bread, toasted

Directions

  1. In a medium saucepan, melt the butter over medium-high heat.
  2. Add the garlic cloves and get a good sear on them, 1 to 2 minutes.
  3. Add the everything else except bread and stir to combine.
  4. When the mixture begins to bubble around the edges of the pan (you don’t want it to come to a full boil), reduce the heat to low and let it simmer, stirring occasionally, until it has thickened and tastes great to you, about 15 minutes.
  5. Remove the big aromatic herbs and discard.
  6. Remove the garlic cloves - they should be rather obvious - and set aside until cool enough to handle.
  7. Mash cloves on toast per taste.
  8. Top with beans.

Thoughts

Things on tooooassst. Other than fishing out the garlic, this is a very straightforward dish that’s perfect for cold weather consumption. This is doubled from the original because I love leftovers. I made this before a winter storm, considering the power might go out and it would be easy to warm up on the (gas) stove and it was a total win. Very satisfying after a day of winter weather stress. It’s another dish that is simply too good to look good.