Recipe Search: Fava Beans

I am excited to grow fava beans this upcoming growing season. The issue is, I don't believe I have ever cooked fava beans!

What do you do with them? They appear to be on the larger size of the bean spectrum and it is totally throwing me off.

Do you have any good recipes? Any ideas for usage?



Thank you in advance.

Thread inspiration is from the big ole Fava Bean thread.

For several years I grew and used favas as a staple when I lived in California (where they thrive overwintered and take advantage of the wetter period of the year there).  I let them dry fully and stored them as a dry bean.  They are tedious in that they really need to be first soaked and then have the tough skin popped off of each bean before cooking.  I got to where I could sit around in the evenings and do this mindlessly while reading, watching a show, or surfing the web (as well as parsing acorns from their shells, another Cali staple food thing!)  But once this is done, they have the advantage of only needing a comparatively brief cooking compared to other dry beans.  I would make them into whatever kind of things I would use other beans for, like refried beans or chili, etc.

Don't ignore the leaves, as a green in a salad even fava leaf pesto. I use the leaves in more meals than the beans. I want to try fermenting or brining the bean like a lupini this year.

I'll second the use of the leaves - I was very surprised how tasty they were just steamed/boiled briefly. Certainly worth a try if your plants look healthy - I just nipped out the top few inches - mainly to restrict the plants height, but they were really nice!

We like the immature pods. Get them young and tender and it's like having green beans out of season. I just tried making falafel for the first time with some dried favas. Thanks to a combination of impatience and not thinking it all the way through, I decided to parboil them for about an hour instead of soaking overnight. Big mistake. They wound up mostly cooked and the texture was all wrong...my first batch of falafel nuggets exploded in the oil and turned straight into foamy sludge. I salvaged the remainder by adding some flour and an egg to bind it all together. Still tasty, but next time I will follow the damn recipe and soak the beans.

I have mostly eaten them green, when they are fully grown (or nearly so) but not starting to dry out. I pod them, dump them in boiling water for about a minute, then in cold water for a few minutes. Then I pop them out of their skins, and they are ready to eat; in curries or similar dishes, soup, omelette, salad - they don't need more cooking, so in a curry or soup I'd add them just before serving. Otherwise they will lose some flavor, color and texture. They can also be stir-fried for a minute or two in olive oil or butter with garlic and/or fresh herbs and salt.

This sounds like a lot of work (and the prepared beans make a small pile compared to the pods and skins they came from!) , but they are super tasty this way when they are picked at the right stage, and it is not actually difficult. I plan to try freezing some after scalding and 'skinning' (?) to extend the season.

I have tried eating them dried, but compared to other dried beans they are not as tasty, and I don't like the skins (chewy and unpleasantly bitter) - so they need to be boiled and 'skinned' which is much more difficult than when they are green. I have tried making hummus from boiled and skinned dry favas, but didn't think it worth the effort.

Considering that they are so tasty when green, and so mediocre when they are fully ripe and dried, I feel it is best to eat as much as possible while they are young, while leaving some promising plants to mature fully so I have seed for next year (and some backup!)

Some people apparently don't mind the skins, which I presume must be partly dependent on personal taste and partly on the variety.

Since they are easy to grow, look nice in the garden, and are very tasty early in summer I really like growing them even if I also have pole beans that are more versatile (are good to eat at all stages), less hassle to cook and possibly more productive pr. area.

The first thing I invariably think of is ful medames which I ate almost as much as pizza and ramen while in college. But also, falafel and doubanjiang (though the last is a real project, not just a dish to cook up). Also, scroll down this list for other exciting options: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vicia_faba#Culinary.

E Nordlie wrote:Some people apparently don't mind the skins, which I presume must be partly dependent on personal taste and partly on the variety.  

I must admit I never bother skin them. We used to dislike them as children because of the taste of the skins (my mum wouldn't have skinned them either!). As an adult I quite like the complexity of the flavour that the skins give. I gather that the green skinned varieties have less bitterness than the grey skinned ones.

I grow a variety that has deep red skins...I haven't tried them for flavour because I wasn't a fan of the tan ones. Maybe I should do a taste test. Skin removal is a lot of work!

Phil Stevens wrote:I grow a variety that has deep red skins..

That sounds lovely! I'm still developing my landrace, and didn't actually taste any of my beans as I want to bulk up my seed stock. They do come in a wide range of colours - and sizes too if you include the field beans, which are rounder and smaller. I'm looking forwards to doing a taste comparison.