These brothy beans are pressure cooked with onions and garlic, forming a lovely aromatic base to use with the flavors you desire. Below you’ll find sweet potato and harissa beans, beans with tadka, and my favorite, miso mushrooms and greens on toast.
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Karma is the breeze in my hair on the weekend, a relaxing thought, and my beans. Did Taylor Swift write Karma about beans? No, but it’s going to be my personal bean anthem from now on. Because I can’t think of anything that gives you greater return on investment than beans.
You soak your beans, it’s good karma. You get the effort you put in, but more. First of all, beans are affordable, which debunks the misconception that eating plant-based is expensive because you can have a several days of dinner for a few dollars. You just throw things in a pot and that’s pretty much it. These brothy beans are a current favorite of mine. I was intrigued by the hype around Alison Roman’s brothy beans, so I tried them but they were a bit difficult to simmer on the stove. It might have been the beans I was using. But they did inspire me to make my own!
Just pressure cook any dry white beans with onions, shallots, and garlic. The cool part is these are just flavored with aromatics, salt and pepper, a bay leaf, and a pinch of chili flakes, so you can make different variations. I’ve made a different variation every day this week and I’m not bored of my beans yet, but people in my life might be bored of hearing me talk about them.
How to Make These Brothy Beans
Soak!
To soak or not to soak: a highly contested point. The consensus seems to be that you don’t have to soak if your beans are relatively new, but I had beans that were a year old and they were taking longer than 90 minutes to simmer on the stove. For these beans, pressure cooking was so much easier and just as flavorful.
Soaking with salt overnight helps the beans cook faster and makes them easier to digest.
Aromatics
Onions, garlics, and optionally, shallots. I liked having sliced onions in there, but you can also quarter onions and then fish them out easily later once they have flavored the broth. The garlic is also meant to go in whole. You can fish out the garlic head later! Squeeze out the garlic at that point for extra flavor.
Pressure Cook
I have an Instant Pot, so I pressure cooked on high pressure for 40 minutes. Bean cooking times will vary depending on how long you soaked for, how old your beans are, etc. so you know your beans best!
Brothy Beans, 3 Ways
If I’m feeling a Mediterranean vibe, we do sweet potatoes, harissa, and za’atar. For Indian, a little tadka of mustard seeds, cumin seeds, red chili, and hing (asafetida). My favorite is miso mushrooms and greens on nicely olive-oiled toast. Yesterday I tried beans and greens with gochujang (Korean chili paste) and doenjang (fermented soybean paste) and I loved them with chili crisp on top. Just grab a flavor you’re into, grab your beans, and keep your side of the street clean.
Brothy Beans
Ingredients
- 1 cup dry cannellini beans, soaked overnight *any white bean works
- 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1 white onion, sliced
- 1 shallot, sliced
- 1 head of garlic, halved crosswise
- 4 cups water
- ½ tsp salt
- ¼ tsp black pepper
- 1 bay leaf *optional
- ½ tsp red chili flakes *optional
Instructions
- Soak your beans overnight with two inches of water and a teaspoon of salt.
- In an Instant Pot or pressure cooker, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add onions, shallots, and garlic. Cook and stir occasionally until golden and slightly caramelized. If it sticks to the bottom, create a well in the center and deglaze the pot with water.
- Add the beans and water. Add salt, pepper, a bay leaf, and chili flakes, if using. In an Instant Pot, pressure cook on high pressure for 40 minutes. Allow for natural pressure release. Adjust for salt!
- Now the fun part! Different variations of beans:1. Sweet potato, harissa, and za'atar. Prepare sweet potato any way you'd like and add them to the beans. Top with harissa and za'atar. 2. Tadka: Heat ½ tbsp oil in a pan. For 1 serving, add ½ tsp mustard seeds, ½ tsp cumin seeds, ¼ tsp red chili flakes, and a pinch of hing. Pour over the beans. 3. Miso mushrooms and greens: Cook mushrooms and mixed greens (kale, spinach, chard, etc.) in some olive oil. Add miso and a splash of water to break down the miso so it spreads throughout the greens. Add beans. Serve on top of toast.
