Simple wax beans recipe with wax, or yellow green beans, chopped mint, olive oil, and salt. Delicious combination of mint with the beans.
Every weekend during the summer, if we are lucky, there will be a good supply of wax beans at the farmers market.
These golden yellow (and sometimes purple) versions of green beans are harvested young, and are sweet and tender.
Here is a simple way to prepare them, with the subtle flavor of a mint infusion.
Wax Beans with Mint Recipe
- Prep time: 10 minutes
- Cook time: 15 minutes
- Infuse oil time: 1 hour
- Yield: Serves 3-4
Ingredients
- 1/2 pound wax beans
- Several mint leaves
- 2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- Salt
Method
1 Infuse olive oil with mint: A little bit ahead of time, crush a few mint leaves (reserve some for garnish) with a mortar and pestle. Put the crushed mint leaves into a small jar and add a couple tablespoons of high quality olive oil to cover.
Let sit for at least an hour if you can. The longer the mint is in the olive oil, the better the infusion.
2 Prep the wax beans: Prepare the beans by cutting off and discarding the tips and ends. Snap the beans in half, if necessary, to have pieces about 2 inches in length.
3 Steam the beans: 15 minutes before serving bring an inch of water in a saucepan to a boil. Place the beans in a steamer basket in the saucepan. Cover and cook, until tender, about 10-15 minutes. Check for doneness after about 8 minutes or so. If a fork easily goes through them, they’re done.
4 Drizzle with mint infused oil: Remove beans from pan and place them into a serving bowl. Use a strainer to drizzle the mint-infused olive oil over the beans.
5 Sprinkle with salt: Sprinkle salt over the beans to taste. (Fleur de sel would work really well with this dish.)
Chop up a few more mint leaves to add as garnish.
