Lemon Roasted Haricots Verts

Roasted Haricots Verts

That's a fancy way of saying "roasted string beans."

For CCO's birthday this year, my mom signed us up for a cooking class. I was pretty stoked - the last time I took a class, I end up with cool recipes. This one was at the Sur La Table in Pentagon City and the theme was "Date Night in Paris." Again pretty cool. All in all, I liked it. The guy who taught it was pretty neat, gave us some good tips on onion chopping, lemon zesting and other random cooking skills. But I had somewhat expected that the other people in the class would be cooking nuts like me who wanted to try something new. That was not the case. It was a lot of people who had never cooked before. I mean I knew those people existed, but I guess they don't often introduce themselves to me in that fashion. So, for example, I was the only one who had ever made a souffle before. Also, the only person who had ever made my own salad vinaigrette. My kitchen was amazed when I showed everyone the trick where you roll the pastry dough back on the rolling pin to transfer it from the cutting board to the pie dish...

Anyway, it was some pretty great French food and my favorite part of cooking class is you get to eat it all when you're done. Tart au chevre (fancy way of saying "goat cheese tart"), potato galettes (grilled "potato patties"), paillards of beef in port wine sauce. Mmmm. To recreate our fun Friday night, CCO and I remade the green beans to go with our meatloaf.

Eat Rating: Delicious. I am so happy it's spring.
Difficulty: Easy. Needs a zester or grater for the lemon peel.

Adapted from "Date Night in Paris," Sur La Table, 4/17/2009 with Chef Luke Taylor
(The recipe can be halved. But if you do, make sure to reduce the lemon juice or your string beans will be super tart)

2 lb of Haricots Verts (string beans), trimmed
1 onion, peeled and cut into 8 wedges
6 large sprigs of fresh marjoram (LN: you can also use about 1 tsp dried marjoram or fresh oregano)
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 tsp grated lemon peel

Position racks in the oven so one is near the top and the other near the bottom. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Spray a cookie sheet with oil or line with aluminum foil. In a large bowl, combine beans, onion and majoram. Drizzle with the olive oil and toss to coat. Sprinkle with salt and pepper if desired. Lay out in a single layer on the cookie sheet and roast for 15 minutes on top rack. Move the sheet to the bottom rack and roast 10 more minutes. The beans will be ready when they are beginning to brown in spots.

Remove from cookie sheet and return to bowl. Add lemon juice and zest and toss to coat. Serve warm.