Stewed Green Beans with Vegetables (Green Lobio) - Step-by-Step Recipe

Step-by-step recipe

1. Young green beans are usually called bean “pods”. They need a little preparation before cooking.
   
2. Wash the bean pods and soak them in cold water for 1 hour. With a sharp knife, trim the tips and cut the pods into several pieces, each about the length of a matchstick.
   
3. Bring 1 l of water to a boil in a saucepan, add 0.5 tsp of sugar and boil the cut pods until done. Usually 10 minutes is enough. The sugar is there so that the beans lose less of their color as they boil.
   
4. Transfer the boiled green beans to a bowl and set them aside for now.
   
5. Peel and dice the onion. How you cut the onion actually matters less than how much of it there is. Plenty of onion only makes the dish taste better.
   
6. Peel the carrot and cut it into large pieces. You can even slice it into rounds, especially if the carrot is young and sweet.
   
7. The tomatoes should be very ripe, the reddest you can find. Scald the tomatoes with boiling water and rinse them with cold water. Cut the tomatoes in half crosswise. Peel off the skin and remove the seeds. If the tomatoes are not very large, there is no need to cut them any further, just leave them as they are. They will lose their shape during cooking anyway and turn into tomato pulp.
   
8. Any bell pepper will do: yellow, red or green. Remove the seeds and stems and cut it into fairly large slices.
   
9. Chop the cilantro and mix it with garlic crushed in a mortar.
   
10. Finely chop the rest of the herbs into a separate bowl.
11. Heat the vegetable oil in a deep skillet or saute pan. Fry the chopped carrot and onion in it until soft. Season with salt and pepper.
    
12. Add the tomatoes and simmer, covered, for 10 minutes over medium heat. They will release some juice, and moisture will collect under the lid.
    
13. Add the cilantro and garlic to the vegetables and keep simmering for another 5 minutes.
    
14. Next, add the sliced bell pepper.
    
15. Stew everything together for 10 minutes over low heat. The pepper should cook through completely and all the vegetables should become soft.
16. Add the chopped herbs. There should be a lot of them. By the way, it is worth adding a little acidity to the dish: a teaspoon of pomegranate juice, lemon juice or even grape vinegar. But that is optional.
    
17. Add 0.5 tsp of dried savory. Do not confuse it with thyme. They are different spices. Savory is the number one spice in many cuisines of the Caucasus, the Mediterranean and the Balkans.
18. The boiled green beans go into the cooked vegetables at the very end; after adding them, the dish should stew for 10 minutes at most over the lowest heat.
    
19. The green beans stewed with vegetables are ready.
20. Serve right away, without waiting for the dish to cool down.