White Trash Cooking Recipe 3 (FRESH)

I am a lawyer so I generally don't read the large print. Meaningless usually. So I totally neglected to notice this recipe was titled BUTTER BEANS (FRESH). That is a large print title with all caps and parentheses. You can see how I would gloss over the (FRESH) part.

Also, much like those who dismiss evolution, it never occurred to me that there was any precursor to the dried butter bean. One day God said, "let there be dried butter bean" and here we are. But as a I did a little reading and educated myself, I realized that the recipe at issue here could not be for dried beans. That's when I checked the title: BUTTER BEANS (FRESH).

Although I am trying to keep this real, I have to confess that I flubbed this with dried beans. So I soaked overnight - and was also slightly tempted to do that 2nd grade butter bean project where you wet a paper towel and press it against a clear plastic glass and then stick a butter bean between the glass and paper towel and in a week or so you have a sprout. But I didn't. I just soaked and then began the regular recipe . . .

This is going to blow your mind - because it comes from nowhere - but you start by frying some pork product. Being over fatback, I just used ham, as the recipe permitted. In fact, let it be noted, the recipe did not even suggest that fatback be used.

Now, I have a recipe for butter beans - aka lima beans. You mix limas, sour cream and onion soup mix and then top it with Rice Krispies. Brilliant. So I was very, very sceptical here that these beans could outdo that, or that they would have any flavor at all. All you do here is brown the pork product and cook the beans with salt and pepper.

Do you know what? They were awesome. They were like comfort food - the mac and cheese of the legume world. My husband and I stood there and ate them right out of the pot. Mmmmmmm. These I will make again. My son? Wouldn't touch them. So, again, two out of three thumbs up.

(P.S. What word follows fresh? Exciting right? I dare you to be a child of the 80's and not know that it goes, "She's fresh, exciting!")