Roasted Fava Beans

With Frank McClelland

In this video made at his kitchen at Apple Street Farm Frank McClelland takes the fava bean, adds some carrots and pearl onions with some seasoning and makes a perfect side dish. You can prepare 20 to 30 minutes before and reheat just before serving. He usually serves this with pheasant, turkey or any game bird, with pasta or by even by itself.

Fava beans are one of the oldest plants under cultivation, and they were eaten in ancient Greece and Rome. They are popular in Mediterranean cuisine, with many summer dishes celebrating the seasonal bean, although they are also dried for winter use. Fava beans should be shelled and peeled before eating. The outer peel on the beans, while technically edible, is very woody in texture. Fava beans are great steamed and served with olive oil, salt, and lemon. They can also be added to soups and pastas or ground into purees.

Frank McClelland’s dish is a sauté of fava beans, carrots and pearl onions in mint and basil with a bit of butter, garlic and shallots. Take fava beans out of the pods, peel outer core and you will end up with a beautiful fava bean ready to blanche in salted boiling water for about 3 to 4 minutes. Do the same with the carrots. After blanching, take a 10 inch sauté pan, add butter and sauté the minced shallots. Let caramelize 1 to 2 minutes, add carrots, coat and add garlic. Add the pearl onions, coat them and then add the fava beans. Finally, add the mint and basil, cover and turn down heat and cook for anywhere from 3 to 7 minutes.

Ingredients

2 cups fresh or frozen fava beans
1 small bunch of baby carrots
2 tablespoons butter
1 clove of shallot, minced
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced
2 cups pearl onions
Fresh mint
Fresh basil
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Instructions

1. Blanch the fava beans in boiling water for 1 minute, then shock them in cold water to
stop the cooking. Peel the fava beans. Do the same with the carrots.
2. Heat a medium-size saucepan over medium heat. Add the butter to the
pan. When the butter is bubbling, add the shallots and cook for 2 minutes.
3. Add the carrots, coat and add garlic. Add the pearl onions, coat and add the fava beans. Add mint, basil, salt, and pepper to the pan and toss. Cover and turn down heat and cook for anywhere from 3 to 7 minutes. Note: Can be made 20 to 30 minutes ahead of time and reheated.

Recipe courtesy of Wine Mondays. © (The Harvard Common Press) by Frank McClelland and Christie Matheson. Reprinted with permission. All rights reserved.

Chef and Proprietor, L’Espalier, Sel de la Terre, Au Soleil, and Apple Street Farm

“…food is best when it’s in its purest form. My job is to enhance that natural flavor to allow the essence of the food to sing.” – Chef Frank McClelland

Chef Frank McClelland’s L'Espalier has been a perennial “best” of America’s restaurants for three decades, earning top accolades from Zagat, Forbes, Food & Wine, Bon Appétit, Frommer’s, Wine Spectator and Condé Nast Traveler as well as nods in international media. L’Espalier is New England’s most decorated independent restaurant with twelve consecutive AAA Five Diamond Awards and twelve consecutive Forbes (Mobil) Four-Star awards.

At the heart of Chef McClelland’s menus of New England flavors with French interpretation is Apple Street Farm, his organic farm in Essex, Massachusetts that is the primary source of heirloom produce and proteins for his restaurants. The James Beard chef and cookbook author, Wine Mondays, views his life as a farmer-restaurateur as being on-trend. By living this life from his youth, he was early to the farm-to-table or “locavore” dining philosophy.

Chef McClelland's love of “field to fork” cooking began while growing up on his grandparents' farm in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. By the age of 25, he had been a chef in two of the most respected Boston kitchens: The Harvest in Cambridge and L'Espalier. In 1984, he became Executive Chef at The Country Inn at Princeton in Western Massachusetts where he established himself as a culinary talent who made time to know local farmers.  It was here that Food & Wine named him one of the country's top 25 new chefs which began the national spotlight on his career.

Frank purchased the restaurant L’Espalier outright and never looked back.

In April 2000, Chef McClelland diversified his organization with Sel de la Terre, a casual bistro with boulangeries steeped in the culinary traditions of Provence, France, with business partner Chef Geoff Gardner. Sel de la Terre opened to rave reviews and was instantly named one of the top 20 new restaurants in America by Esquire. In 2007,Au Soleil Bakery & Catering followed as a full regional catering service.

The time he spent on his family’s farm grounded Chef McClelland in the time-honored traditions of farm-to-table cooking. Today he honors his upbringing at Apple Street Farm by growing fresh herbs, heirloom fruits and vegetables and raising honeybees, egg laying chickens and livestock, which are fed farm fresh produce and whole grains breads from Au Soleil’s overages. He views sustainable agriculture as compatible with providing this region’s most memorable and environmentally friendly dining experiences.

Many of Boston’s best-known restaurants are populated with alumni were mentored under his tutelage.