Summer Bounty

It's summer.  Sort of.  The calendar says so though the weather is more iffy.  When I got up today it was 57°. Later it was a sizzling 73°.

But Mother Nature knows.  It's summer and high season for fruits and veggies. Here, dear folks, we're dealing with veggies, specifically Pferdebohnen.  Or Großebohnen.

In English, it's Italian - fava beans. I'd never had them or perhaps never heard of them till I landed on Europe's shores.  They are "just" beans, but quite special.

You get this HUGE bag of beans, shell them, parboil the beans, squeeze out the insides.  That's what you finally eat - the bright green bit in the bowl.  No matter what they charge for the beans in the pod, the end product is relatively expensive - in time and money.

 Oh but they are good!  If you're lucky enough to find them, and after you've done all this stuff in the picture, fry some bacon (or even better, pancetta), boil some fresh potatoes, put the beans in the pan with the bacon fat, add some water, cook them up, toss in the bacon and some chopped parsley if you have it, add cream. Because more fat is good.

Then put the potatoes in the mix and when it's all warm, eat it. Not too fast.

We do this maybe twice during the season, but maybe I can squeeze in another helping this year.  I hear it's good with pasta ....