Tag Archives: pork and beans

food history, french cuisine, recipes

French Pork and Beans: Cassoulet

1000 Foods (pgs. 70 – 71)

            As mentioned previously, despite its stuffy reputation, French cuisine has many unfussy, homestyle dishes. At one point, many of these were regional, country-style fare. Writers like Elizabeth David and especially Julia Child helped popularize them worldwide and make them “respectable.” Today, the likes of quiche, coq au vin, and cassoulet can be found at Michelin-starred restaurants alongside more traditional haute cuisine. Naturally, this means haute cuisine prices for dishes with often affordable ingredients.

            Often, cassoulet does contain pricier ingredients like mutton, game birds, or duck confit, but it doesn’t have to. The only necessities are pork, beans, a heavy vessel for a long, slow bake, and a topping of breadcrumbs to form a “crust.” Native to southern France, cassoulet was originally a peasant dish. The cook would toss in whatever meats were available, with white beans to add filler and soak up the flavor. The cassoulet would be taken to the baker, who, in the days before modern kitchens, often had the only oven in town. For a small fee, the baker would bake the mixture for a few hours. Typically, when the cook returned to pick it up, they would buy a loaf of bread to go with it.

            The exact recipe for cassoulet varied, no doubt based on personal preferences, what was available, and the economic resources to the family eating it. There are three main variations, all named after towns in southern France: Castelnaudry, Carcassonne, and Toulousain. Often Castelnaudry is pork-based, Carcassonne focuses on mutton and game fowl, and Toulousain on duck confit, or duck preserved in its own fat, but these are not hard and fast rules. If the last sounds strange for a peasant dish, preserving duck and other fowl like goose in its own fat was once a necessity, widespread in the region. More recently, it became trendy.

            To stay in the spirit of what was once a humble dish, I stuck with pork, partly because of cost, partly because I didn’t want to search high and low for mutton and duck confit. And getting up early to hunt game birds just wasn’t going to happen. For the meats, I thawed out some pork butt from the freezer, brushed the extra salt off a few slices of homemade pancetta/salt pork, and picked up a pack of smoked ham shanks and hot Italian sausage meat from the grocery. To distribute it more evenly but keep it distinct, I formed loose sausage meat into meatballs rather than using whole sausages.

Ready for the oven

            Part of the reason for making cassoulet was to try out my new toy from Christmas – a Dutch oven. What’s great about it is that, because it can go directly from the stove to the oven, the contents don’t need to be transferred from one pan to another. After browning the meat, being careful not to break the meatballs, I added a chopped onion, six minced garlic cloves, three bay leaves, three actual cloves, some pepper, a pound of soaked navy beans, a cup of water, and a quart of low-sodium beef broth. Everything got a topping of plain bread crumbs, then went into the oven at 325 for about three hours.

My new toy, being put to good use

            The cassoulet was definitely good, but I still need to perfect the recipe. The only real issue was that it was very salty, even though I didn’t add any extra. The only reason I can think of is the homemade pancetta that I used in place of salt pork. Does it need to be rinsed or even soaked before use? I’m not sure, but with the pork butt and sausage there is plenty of fat, and from the smoked ham shanks the cured pork flavor, making the pancetta unnecessary. A minor problem was that the breadcrumbs tended to sink, thickening the liquid rather than forming a crust. The cassoulet was still nice and crispy on top, but there is work to be done before I have a postable recipe. But with two and a half months of winter ahead, there is plenty of time to experiment. To hear about those experiments, remember to subscribe for free.

Do I deserve a Michelin star? I think I do.
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Cook’s Tour of Italy Menu 85 (Pgs. 265 – 266): Pork, Cabbage and Bean Casserole

Region: South Mainland/Islands (Sardinia)

            Finally, we travel to the last region in the book, the southernmost part of the mainland, Sicily, and Sardinia. Like Sicily, Sardinia has been invaded and conquered over and over for the last few thousand years. The earliest inhabitants built huge stone structures called nuraghe that still dot the landscape today. For centuries it was a battleground between Etruscans, Greeks, and Phoenicians/Carthaginians, all vying for locations to set up strategic trading ports. Romans later joined in the fray, followed by Vandals, Byzantines, Arabs, Pisans, and Genoese. From the 15th to 18th Century the island was controlled by the Kingdom of Aragon and its successor, unified Spain. The Spanish were followed by the Kingdom of Sardinia-Piedmont, which eventually unified Italy. All of these peoples left their mark on the culture and food, creating a unique region “not a bit like the rest of Italy.” (Text, pg. 241)

            Interestingly, despite their strategic location, the native Sardinians were not major seafarers. While there has always been trading and fishing along the coast, the hills and mountains have historically been at least as important. Pastoralists raised sheep, goats and pigs, fattening the latter on acorns. Perhaps more carnivorous than neighboring cuisines, traditional Sardinian fare includes roasted meat, cured pork, and sheep and goats’ milk cheeses alongside the usual bread, pasta and vegetables.

            To that end, we have a Sardinian one-pot stew/casserole, with pork, fava beans, cabbage and fennel. Traditionally pigs’ feet were used, but this recipe uses Italian sausage and spareribs. The meat flavors the bean and vegetable “fillers,” with extra flavor coming from a sprinkle of Pecorino Romano cheese. Presumably this is to be served with bread.

            I ran into two problems with the recipe. First, the pot was not big enough. Once the meat, beans, tomatoes and liquid were in, there was not enough room for the cabbage and fennel. I had to add it a bit at a time, waiting for previous additions to cook down a bit before adding more. The other issue was with the texture of the cabbage and beans. Soaked fava beans and cabbage are supposed to be added at the same time. As a result, the cabbage was really overcooked by the time any of the beans were cooked. Further complicating things, the beans weren’t all done at the same time. For some reason, there were fully-cooked, soft beans right next to distinctly crunchy ones.

            Still, as long as the diner picks around any undercooked beans, the dish is generally enjoyable. I would make a few changes, however. First, the broth would benefit from a bit of garlic, since it was somewhat bland. And as mentioned before, the cabbage doesn’t need anywhere near as long of a cooking time. Personally, I would only add it about half an hour before the casserole is finished. Finally, I would substitute great northern beans or something similar for the favas, as they are a lot more consistent and easier to find.

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Cook’s Tour of Italy Menu 27 (Pgs. 91 – 92): Piedmontese Pork and Beans

            It seems like every cuisine that includes pork has some form of pork and beans, often using cured meat. Think of ham and bean soup, baked beans flavored with bacon, and the like. The pork and fat add flavor to the relatively neutral beans, which in turn stretch the meat while providing protein of their own. The particular type of pork, type of beans, flavorings and thickness all vary, but the basic idea is the same. In this dish, native to the mountainous Piedmont region of Northern Italy, we have pork shoulder and fat, great northern beans, root vegetables and herbs, seasoned with a basic salt and pepper.

            The text notes that this fairly rich dish is traditionally associated with Carnival. Until the 1960s, Catholic fasting rules dictated abstaining from meat for the entirely of Lent, not just the Fridays. Thus, you have traditions like Carnival and Mardi Gras, the last chance to eat meat and rich foods before Lent. In the past, when meat was more expensive relative to income, many people couldn’t afford to celebrate with a roast or other similar centerpiece, but a rich bean dish with substantial quantities of pork and fat was a viable option.

            Ideally, this recipe would use a Dutch oven or stove-safe casserole dish. Since I did not have either of these, I browned the meat and combined the ingredients in a pot on the stove, then transferred the contents to a ceramic casserole dish to bake. A small amount of the mixture didn’t fit, so I put it into a smaller ceramic dish with a cover. After a few hours, everything was finished. It just needed to stand for a few minutes to cool and thicken.

            This was fabulous. The pork was meltingly tender and its flavor, along with that of the herbs, infused throughout the beans. For anyone who wants to eat less meat, whether for health or ecological reasons or both, but doesn’t want to give it up entirely, a dish like this is an excellent choice. Beans are rich in vitamins and minerals and, like a few other plants, restore nitrogen to the soil they are grown in, naturally boosting its fertility. What’s not to love?

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