Tuesday, 28 November 2017

How To Cook Fava Beans

By Carl Hill


Fava is a really good source of fiber, proteins and several vitamins and minerals, such as potassium and magnesium, but it also tastes great and can be used in various delicious recipes. The beans have interesting flavor, especially when they are used fresh from the pod, and they look really nice, brightly green and shiny. If you would like to try them, you first need to know how to cook fava beans.

They can be used fresh, and they come in large green pods you have to remove them from first. Every pod contains up to five lovely, large, bright green beans. Once you remove them from their pods, let them boil in lots of water for 30 to 60 seconds, and then quickly drain this water and replace it wit ice cold one, to stop the cooking immediately.

They have waxy and hard shell that has to be peeled of first. It looks like it will take a lot of time, but it is actually quite easy and the shell will simply fall of under your fingers. Shiny and lovely green, once peeled they will find place in various salads and other dishes, and can also be additionally cooked or steamed to become softer.

You will also find dried fava, large and small. Both should be soaked first, usually over the night or even 24 hours. After that, they should be drained and rinsed, as well as peeled. Some recipes require unpeeled small dried beans, but they might cause digestion problems if unpeeled, and it's always a good idea to peel them anyway.

If you don't have enough time for this procedure, there is another way. This time you should place them in some pot, covered with enough water, and let them boil for several minutes. Put the lid on and remove from the stove. Let them soak there for one hour, drain and rinse, and start peeling them.

When you finish peeling them, it's time to place them all in a pot with salted water, to simmer until they become soft enough, but you don't want them to become mushy. This takes for about 45 minutes or so. After that, they can be used for preparing various dishes or for replacing some ingredients in dishes you usually prepare, for example peas.

Fresh green ones are great for making spreads, as an addition to various salads and side dishes, rice, potato puree or pasta dressings. Both dried and fresh fava have very nice flavor, high nutritional value and are great sources of fiber. You will also find them in cans, already peeled or not, as well as deep frozen.

If you have larger quantities, it's best to keep them frozen, previously cooked and peeled. Dried ones may stay as they are, stored in boxes. Anyway, maybe it would be better to cook and peel them first, and to keep them frozen. It takes quiet a long time to do this, and it would be much easier to have them already prepared, when you get in a mood for making some specialties.




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