I was wary of the idea of eating the pods until I grew my own beans; young vegetables tempt in a way that full-sized specimens often don’t. The recipe is only worth doing when you can get your hands on unblemished beans without the cotton-wool lining to their pods and no longer than a middle finger. If you can catch them at this point in their lives, then you can eat them whole, like mangetout (snow peas). Serve warm, with thick pieces of bread or as a side dish for roast lamb or cold ham.
Recipe information
Yield
enough for 4
Ingredients
Preparation
Step 1
Warm the olive oil in a large pan. Peel and finely chop the onion and add it to the oil. Cut the bacon into bite-sized chunks and stir it into the softening onion. The bacon fat should turn pale gold; the onion should soften without color.
Step 2
Put the fava bean pods into the pan and pour in the water. Bring to a boil, then decrease to a light simmer, and simmer for fifteen to twenty minutes, until the pods have lost their bright color and are meltingly tender.
Step 3
Coarsely chop the fresh mint and stir it into the beans. Serve with a thick wedge of lemon to squeeze over, and torn hunks of crusty bread to mop up some of the golden olive oil dressing.
