Green beans soup

The introduction

So, the other day I wanted to prepare something from green beans. You know , the end of spring and then the summer is a season of green beans, too and it’s kind of necessary to have green bean dishes. Every time I went by some shops and stores, I looked at those green beans and I just wanted to prepare them and eat them, but I was too lazy to buy them and then prepare them, because I was so tired. But then, I decided that I could just buy them and have them at home and prepare them when I was in the mood.

It was that morning, that I had all the ingredients for the green beans recipe and I wanted to prepare some and eat some and it would be just amazing to have green beans as the main dish and, so, I decided to prepare them. And I knew, my parents love that dish and I thought they would be here and so that they could eat them, but I was kind of wrong and when I realized that I was kind of disappointed, but, well, they could be here some other time, maybe the day after and so they could eat some of the dish, as it won’t be over just in one day, because I was not preparing it just for myself and there would be plenty left in a day or so.

So, the ingredients were not much, in fact there were two main vegetables and the others were just herbs and stuff, you know. They just needed some washing and chopping and that was it, you could just put them into a saucepan and let them cook on a slow heat. That would be pretty much it and I was determined to do that. It was kind of good, too, to be preparing something that you had been wanting for such a long time and it was kind of a good feeling to just do something, of course. I was really looking forward to having a good dinner and finally eating those green beans.

Ingredients:

• Green beans, 700 grams to 1 kilogramme
• New potatoes, 300 grams
• Parsley, fresh, 50 grams
• Coriander, fresh, 100 grams
• New green onions, 70 grams
• Onions, 1 small
• Salt to taste
• Coriander, ground, to taste
• Thyme, ground, to taste
• Red pepper, ground, to taste
• Oil, 2 tbs
• Water , 500 ml – 1000 ml

Preparation process

So the preparation process is pretty simple.

First of all, you should take the green beans and cut them into pieces. Well, actually they have these head and tail, you know, that’s what I call them, and you should cut those head and tail and throw them away, of course. You should know, that those 1 kilogramme green beans are not few and they are plenty and it can take some time to cut them all into some pieces and you should have that time for them. Then there’s this thing when you have to cut those beans into small pieces, you know. And the thing is, some people love them cut into smaller pieces and some people just like them into larger pieces. Well, consider this _ on average, those green beans are about 15 centimetres long, right? So, some people just cut them into halves or into thirds and those I call the larger pieces. And they are really large, of course, if you ask me, and I don’t really like them those large, because then you still have to cut them into smaller ones while eating, because you won’t just eat them the whole ones, you know. And the thing is, it’s better if you cut them into smaller pieces, if you want to know the truth, because then you will have a good pretty dish and you won’t have to cut those beans again while eating and stuff like that. So, I think, it’s better if you do that in my way and cut them into smaller pieces and don’t bother cutting them while eating, you know what I mean now. Well, it’s good if someone is helping you while cutting those beans, because that way you will need less time and you won’t get tired or something like that, but if you are doing it alone, it’s not a big deal, too, because it’s not very time-consuming and tiring, as you might have imagined, it’s just a regular thing while preparing a dish, you know. And another thing, you can just take some green beans together and cut them together. Well, there’s this thing, you really don’t cut them, but break them with your hands, that’s what I forgot to mention, so, you can just take 5 or so together and break them together into smaller pieces and that’s really easier than just breaking each one of them one by one.

The other thing is, that you can either have some potatoes in your dish or just prepare the green beans alone. But it’s more delicious when you prepare the dish with potatoes and that’s what I did then, so this recipe contains potatoes, too. And while usually you would use sweet potatoes or yellow ones or white ones, this time, while it’s a new potatoes’ season, I used those fresh new potatoes, which are really delicious, too. Well, they are not that delicious as the sweet potatoes, but they are not less delicious, you know. So, I had bought some new potatoes for my dish, they were small-sized, but not very small, and they were pretty cute, if you ask me. They were all washed and kind of peeled, you know, the new potatoes don’t need to be peeled like the old ones, but they kind of need to be got rid of the outer skin, so they didn’t have that outer skin and that’s what I wanted to tell you. So then I just cut those new potatoes into for small pieces, and, well, you can have them cut into just halves or not have them cut at all, it really depends on you, but if you ask me, it’s better to have them cut into smaller pieces, because they are easier to eat that way when you serve the dish and, besides, their touching surface gets wider and that way they can absorb much of the salt and that taste of herbs and other things and can be more delicious.

So, I just had to wash all those green beans and new potatoes thoroughly and put them into a saucepan. I put the green beans first in the saucepan, then added those cut new potatoes and then was the time of those herbs and water.

Well, I had those herbs prepared until that, if you want to know the truth. I had coriander and parsley and thyme and basil leaves washed and chopped and put them into a bowl. I had also some green onions chopped and placed into a bowl, too. And I had those other onions chopped, too.

Well, in my saucepan after the green beans and cut new potatoes, I had chopped green onions put on them and then I seasoned them with some salt, but be careful about the salt! It’s better if there’s less salt, than if there’s too much of it! So, then I poured some water and some oil into the saucepan and put it on gas. At first, it needed a high heat for the water to be boiled, and then when it boiled, I turned the heat low and let it cook for about an hour. It was slow-cooking, so, it didn’t really need any attention or whatsoever, but it was not that it was all without attentionor something like that, you know.

So, when it was something like 40 minutes boiling, I took those chopped onions and placed them into an oily pan and cooked them on a high heat for a couple of minutes, so that they would get a little brownish and stuff. And then I added them to the saucepan filled with green beans and new potatoes and green onions. Then it was time to add some chopped herbs, too. Well, some people like to add them to the dish when the dish is almost ready, I mean, when the dish is ready and it’s time to turn off the gas, they add those herbs to the dish, let the water boil for a couple of minutes and then they turn off the gas. But I didn’t do that and I added those herbs not at the end of the preparation of the dish, but way before that. So, you should know, that you can decide when you want to add herbs, but remember, that the timing changes the taste somehow and, I guess, it’s better if you add them almost at the end of the preparation process. Or maybe you can add some of them in the process and some of them at the end of the process. That may be better.

Now, it was time for some spices, and, boy, I love spices in my dishes. There are just a few dishes, I guess, where I don’t use spices, for example, in my scrambled eggs, or fried potatoes, or in my pasta and buckwheat and Mchadi, but those things don’t really require spices, and if I want to, I can add some spices even to them, so it’s no big deal, but what I’m saying is, that I use spices in many dishes and I just love them, so I used those spices in my green beans, too. Well, I had these thyme, ground coriander, paprika, red pepper, some yellow flower, some ground mint, some chili added to my green beans dish and I stirred a little and left it with the lid on for some time for the steam to do its job.

So, it was just about time to announce my dish as finished. I just took a tablespoon of it and waited for it to get a little warmer, so that I could taste it and see whether it was worth preparing or not. Because until you serve the dish to yourself or to some other people, first of all, you should just taste it and then decide whether or not the dish is good to be served. And, when I tasted it, it was pretty good and I could just say, that the dish was finished and it was time to eat.

However, I should tell you, that when the dish is ready and it’s finished and everything, it’s just not good to eat the dish at once, because it’s new and everything in there is still like all separated stuff and they are not really mixed up together, still. So, they need some time to become one piece and the tastes to gather together and be as a whole thing. And you should just let the dish be like that for some time and then eat it. Also, this dish is much more delicious the next day, so, don’t get all weird about it and have some of the dish the next day. You won’t regret it! Or, you can prepare the dish the night before, and you can eat the dish in the morning or whatever and, trust me, it will surprise you how delicious it will be!

So then, that was me preparing so long wanted green beans dish. And, you know, you can make this dish either a soup or a kind of a dried dish, it all depends on how much water you will pour in your saucepan. With 500 ml water, it won’t become a soup and it may even need a little more water. And even with 1 litre water it still can be kind of dry, I mean, not very soupy and stuff like that, so you should consider the amount of water you are pouring in your saucepan. Or, you may spill some water out, if you don’t want so much water in your dish, that’s not a problem at all! And if you want more, you can just boil some water in another saucepan or a kettle or whatever and add it to your dish.

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