Thanksgiving is at our house this year, which was a surprise, but we love to entertain so we are thrilled to do it~I haven’t had Thanksgiving on my radar for years since I haven’t hosted in a long time. I am happily scrambling with recipes and table ideas. My son, Hungry Husband Jr, offered to do the cooking, so we’ve been consulting on the menu~
We, and when I say we, I mean, He did the cooking and I shot a few photos, as we tried this new twist on green beans~
Instead of a creamy casserole, we decided to go a fresher, healthier route~
Clementines, lemon, shallot combine with olive oil to make a flavor filled dressing
He used frozen french cut green beans, because he couldn’t find haricot verts. I prefer the french cut, thinner bean, they look elegant and are easier to eat than the fatter green beans.
Cook the beans briefly until they are just barely done and plunge into ice water to stop the cooking
Combine the drained beans with the citrus dressing in a bowl or large ziplock bag and refrigerate until serving time.
Chop and toast the pecans in a skillet for a few minutes to enhance the flavor
Before serving add clementine sections or orange pieces to beans and sprinkle with pecans and lemon salt [optional]
This is a delicious and refreshing side dish with a heavy meal
It can be prepared the day before
And it won’t take up any room in your oven! It can be pulled out of the refrigerator several hours before serving too.
This is definitely going on our Thanksgiving menu!
The recipe is adapted from Green Beans with Citrus and Pecans, Southern Living November 2013
Here’s the recipe:
GREEN BEANS CLEMENTINE with Lemon and Pecans
Ingredients
- 2 lbs haricot verts or french string beans
- 1 shallot minced
- 1 T clementine zest
- 1/3 cup fresh lemon juice [1-2 fresh lemons]
- 1/3 cup fresh orange or clementine juice [1-2 clementines or oranges]
- 1/4 cup honey
- 3/4 cup olive oil
- 2-4 clementines zested, peeled and sectioned
- 1/2 cup pecans
- lemon salt* [optional]
Instructions
- Blanche beans in boiling water for several minutes until just bright green and done.
- Plunge into ice water to stop cooking process, you don’t want them to get overdone and mushy.
- Make dressing with olive oil, citrus juices, honey and zest, whisking to combine.
- Toast pecans in a dry skillet for a few minutes, watching carefully, just to bring out their flavor.
- Toss beans in a large bowl or ziplock bag with dressing. Refrigerate up to 24 hours. Turn into a serving bowl and sprinkle with toasted pecans and lemon salt. 8 servings
*Lemon Salt is a fun seasoning to have on hand to add some flavor zing to vegetables, fish, salads, and pasta. I ordered mine on line at amazon.com
If you would like to see 2 of my other favorite green bean casserole recipes just click on their green names below
Sophisticated Green Bean Casserole This one gets it’s sophistcation from buttery almonds
Thanks so much for your visit!
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I will be sharing on these great blogs: