cannellini aglio e olio

If this were still April Fools Day, I’d tell you that my next cookbook will be about how to doctor up a can of beans. But, like the best April Fools Day jokes, it’s only funny if it could be true. Rest assured, I would never, but it’s definitely crossed my mind. It’s usually at lunchtime on a weekday, which is my single biggest failing as a home cook. Maybe you’re shocked that a person with so many ostensibly quick, five ingredient or fewer, and lunch-specific recipes at my disposal would not enlist them during a workday. Or you might gather that between thinking about breakfasts, lunches, and dinners for a family as well as all of the recipes I might create for this site, books, or columns, when it comes to the relatively low stakes of my own lunch, slacking is inevitable.

That is, unless I spot a can of beans. One of my favorite things to do with beans is to treat them as you would pasta. I don’t do this out of any grievance with pasta/gluten/carbs. I do it because most of our favorite pasta sauces translate so well to other ingredients. From here, I’ve landed on pizza beans, weeknight beans on toast, and this grilled zucchini and white beans with pesto.

But do you know what’s quicker and uses fewer than every single one of them? My lunch yesterday. Not hungry for anything in the fridge, I rummaged a can of beans from the cabinet and decided to pretend they were spaghetti, cooking them aglio e olio-style, i.e. in garlic and oil. Unquestionably simplest classic pasta preparation, aglio e olio hails not from New York (insert your best “all-ul” or Beastie Boys reference here) but Naples. Sliced or minced garlic is lightly sauteed in olive oil, often with dried red chili flakes (technically making it spaghetti aglio, olio e peperoncino), and finely chopped parsley and grated parmesan and pecorino are often added as garnishes, although cheese is verboten in some traditional recipes.

None of this matters on a Monday afternoon, however, when I added all of the above and then chopped artichoke hearts, one can over in the cabinet. The result was a warm, almost creamy bean salad that you can eat with a fork straight from the skillet a bowl, or ladle over a couple slices of baguette, toasted hard. It was so good, I did the only rational thing and ate it for lunch again today. It’s so quick, you can finish the whole dish before the EP is up.

Previously

One year ago: Asparagus and Egg Salad with Walnuts and Mint
Two years ago: Almond Horn Cookies
Three years ago: Eggs-in-Purgatory, Puttanesca-Style and Spring Chicken Salad Toasts
Four years ago: Carrot Graham Layer Cake and Wild Mushroom Pate
Five years ago: Three Bean Chili
Six years ago: Lentil and Chickpea Salad with Feta and Tahini
Seven years ago: Raspberry Coconut Macaroons
Eight years ago: Spaetzle
Nine years ago: Bakewell Tart and Romesco Potatoes
Ten years ago: Chewy Amaretti Cookies
Eleven years ago: Shaker Lemon Pie
Twelve years ago: Mixed Berry Pavlova

And for the other side of the world:
Six Months Ago: Crispy Spinach Pizza
1.5 Years Ago: Quick Pasta and Chickpeas
2.5 Years Ago: Garlic, Wine and Butter Steamed Clams and Baked Alaska
3.5 Years Ago: Broccoli Cheddar Soup and S’more Cupcakes
4.5 Years Ago: Latke Waffles and The Crispy Egg