Truckin' on the Western Branch

Bruce Speers’ Butterbeans by Nancy Wren Bruce enjoyed surprising friends with a container of homemade vegetable soup from time to time. He would just appear on your doorstep and hand you a quart of his famous soup. Sometimes he shared fresh garden vegetables he had frozen in the summer. I tasted some butterbeans he brought to my mother in the dead of winter. They were delicious! They tasted fresh-picked! My mother suggested that I call Bruce and ask how he had cooked them. I did and Bruce told me it was not how he had cooked them, but it was the way they had been frozen that made the difference. He told me to come over and he would share his “recipe” for freezing butterbeans. So, I spent a morning watching him and taking notes.

If you want the freshest tasting butterbeans ever, six–12 months after they’ve been picked, here’s Bruce’s never-fail recipe!

Wash butterbeans quickly but thoroughly. Blanch in boiling water for 2–3 minutes. Begin timing when water reboils. Plunge into ice water and leave in for 2–3 minutes. Remove and spread single layers of the butterbeans on paper towels that have been spread on cloth tea towels. Gently pat the beans with additional paper towels. Once they are dry, place in plastic freezer bags or freezer containers. Remove air from bags. Freeze immediately. You will have the freshest tasting butterbeans imaginable throughout the winter months.

Image by Sheally

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