Baked Gigantes Beans Food

BAKED GIGANTES BEANS

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.
• In a small oven safe dish or casserole, combine beans with tomato sauce, parsley, and oregano, crushing the oregano in your palm before you sprinkle it into the beans. Drizzle beans with a touch of extra-virgin oil and season with salt and pepper, to taste. Combine ingredients with a final toss.
• Place in oven and bake 12 minutes or until sauce is bubbling and beans are heated through.

GIGANTES (GREEK GIANT BAKED BEANS)

Steps:

• Cook the pre-soaked beans in a pressure cooker, with enough water to cover by one inch, for 20 minutes and allow to sit, undisturbed, for 2-3 hours before proceeding with recipe.
• Tip the beans into a large baking pan.
• Add all of the remaining ingredients, except the dill, and stir well to distribute.
• Pour over enough hot water to cover beans by 1".
• Place pan in oven and set oven to 400°F.
• Bake for 2 hours. Check, if you like your beans more tender, cook them a half hour longer.
• Stir dill in for last 15 minutes of baking.
• There will still be plenty of juices in the pan, but these will be absorbed by the beans and thicken as the beans cool.
• Like nearly all bean recipes, these only improve the next day, and the day after next.
• In Greece, these beans would constitute the main, 'vegetarian' meal and would not include the bacon, which is my own addition. We often eat meatless, especially when we're fasting. With or without the bacon or sausage, this is good eating, especially with a big chunk of sharp feta cheese on the side to nibble on between bites of beans and slurps of sauce and some good, honest, crusty bread to clean your plate up with. :-).

FASSOLIA GIGANTES PLAKI (GIANT BEANS BAKED IN THE OVEN)

Steps:

• Pick the beans clean from stones and grit and soak them in cold water overnight.
• Drain and rinse them in a colander, put into a large saucepan or a pressure cooker, cover with plenty of cold water and boil them until they are cooked but still a little hard.
• This type of bean cooks quickly, so be aware until you get used to them.
• They take hardly 2 minutes in a pressure cooker and about 30-40 minutes otherwise.
• If they get overcooked, they get mushy and soggy and they do not taste at their best.
• This first step then is also the most important in this recipe.
• Drain the beans through a colander and keep aside.
• In the same saucepan, heat the olive oil and fry the onions, the garlic and the dried herbs, until they start turning pale golden.
• Add the tomatoes with all the juice from the cans or, if fresh tomatoes are used, add 150 ml water.
• Then add the tomato puree and sugar, break up the mixture with a fork, season with salt and pepper, cover and cook for 30 minutes or until the sauce thickens.
• Mix the parsley into the tomato sauce, add the beans and mix well.
• Spread the beans in an oven dish.
• Sprinkle a little oregano and black pepper on the top and cook in a pre-heated oven at 350 grades F/ 80 grades C, for 30 minutes, without stirring, until they look slightly crisp on top and quite dry.
• Alternatively, add the beans to the tomato sauce, mix well, cover and simmer for 10-15 minutes.