June 11, 2014

Haricot Bean Soup: Hot or Chilled

This month we are wandering our backyards and green spaces for inspiration, not only for recipes but to share our appreciation for home grown food.

We asked a good friend and fellow gardener Erin to share how our community garden outreach program makes the efficiency of small scale gardening a no-brainer.

“The vegetable donation program at Merchant Park Community Garden serves the Women Infants and Children Program in Irving Park. The state program provides services to pregnant and breastfeeding women and their children, ages 0-5 years. We have been donating to the neighborhood program for the last three years, last year we donated 350 pounds of vegetables.”

– Erin Fuller, WIC & Composting Committee Chair for Merchant Park Community Garden

So what did those 350 lbs of vegetables consist of?

There is strong empirical evidence to date that food scarcity is linked to specific developmental consequences for children, and that these consequences may be both nutritional and non-nutritional. So, in our urban patch of green we aspire to not only feeding ourselves economically but the excess produce allows our garden to support a wider social mission, to share our fresh harvests with others in the hope that we can augment better outcomes for all.

The program set up to harvest from our garden plots for WIC works in a number of ways and gardeners can choose to:

directly volunteer to help pick, weigh and/or deliver vegetables
designate a certain amount of vegetables to donate from their individual plots, periodically or while on vacation
donate extra vegetables from their plots at the discression of the “picker”

The Dietitian & Director of our local branch of WIC summarised that – “the WIC program moms have reported that they and their children have tried vegetables such as beets, zucchini and heirloom tomatoes that they have never had before. In addition, the vegetables always go fast, within a day, and the participants inquire about their delivery.”

I am working on monthly recipes for the moms who choose our fresh produce, in three languages, to make the seasonal vegetables part of a meal.

Here at the zen of slow cooking, we love dried beans and the increasing variety of heirlooms grown around the US. For a very affordable, protein and nutrient packed slow cooker meal we can marry some of those dried beans with our early summer crops of greens.

I recently brought back from France some Haricot Tarbais, the original dried white runner beans directly from the area from which they get their name. This recipe is an adaptation from an official recipe from the haricot-tarbais.com website.

Prep Time 10 minutes
Cooking Time overnight soak plus 4 hours
Servings 6

Ingredients

8 oz haricot or navy beans
8 oz leeks trimmed (or 2 cups chopped onion)
1 tbsp minced garlic
32 oz/ 1 litre stock
1 cup water
1/2 tsp each of salt and pepper
optional: 2 cups of kale, arugula or other greens added at the end of cooking before blending
olive oil & a squeeze of lemon juice to serve
1/3 cup toasted breadcrumbs

Pick through the dried beans, removing any dirt and small stones, and rinse well. Place them into a large bowl and cover with plenty of cold water. Leave them to soak overnight.

Drain and rinse the beans. Put them into your slow cooker.

Put the chopped leeks & garlic into your slow cooker.

Stir in the broth, water, salt and pepper. Cover and cook on HIGH for 4-5 hours.

Once cooked, remove the lid and add the greens if using. Puree the beans using an immersion blender. Serve hot or chilled, drizzle with good olive oil and lemon juice and top with crispy breadcrumbs or bacon.