Greek inspired green beans

Day 8 of No-Show-Baby-Bell-II-Gate. I crave all things strong in flavour. The more garlic, ginger, chilli, salt and sugar the better. This poor baby might be staying inside for fear of the switch to a diet of bland milk. Or maybe it’s just a laid back baby? Or maybe it knows we still haven’t sorted out the wiring or the blackout blind in the nursery. Or maybe it knows I’m just plain scared of giving birth again and is staying inside to give me longer to come to terms with the inevitable. Who knows.

This recipe was dreamed up after my in-laws gave us a huge glut of green beans. I love green beans but not so much in their virgin form. I toyed with making some green bean relish a la Delia but decided I’ve made enough chutney for Christmas already. No need for any more preserved goods. So I needed to make something strong in flavour and hearty and moreish. Moreish is good when there’s a Sainsbury’s bag full to the brim with beans.

Ingredients:

• green beans, lots of them, washed, topped and tailed and cut into inch long pieces
• 4 cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
• 2 x 400g tins of chopped tomatoes
• 1 x 400g tin filled with tap water
• 3 tbsp sugar
• a pack of feta, crumbled

Preheat the oven to Gas 5. Pop the green beans, garlic, tomatoes, water and sugar into a large saucepan and place on the hob. Simmer for about 20 mins until the mixture starts to reduce down a little. Then check the green beans to make sure they’re starting to tenderise. Transfer to a white oven proof dish and add the crumbled feta to the top then pop in the oven for around 25 minutes on the top shelf. The tomatoey, watery, garlicky mixture should have reduced down in the oven proof dish by now. Mr B and I enjoyed ours with roasted chicken and oregano potatoes. He seemed to like our faux Greek meal which I think is a good result. He went out with a Greek girl once you see, so he should know.

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