Pan-Fried Green Beans
Recipe Friday
When I research Pegeen Fitzgerald, I never quite know where a recipe will take me. Flipping through her 1968 cookbook, Meatless Cooking: Pegeen’s Vegetarian Recipes, I landed on page 25 — a simple recipe for Pan-Fried Green Beans. It was the ingredient list that stopped me: right there between the salt and the slivered almonds was MSG.
I knew a little about MSG — monosodium glutamate — but not enough. One search led to another, and before long I had fallen into a rabbit hole of food science, cultural history, and decades of controversy. It's a bigger story than a pan of green beans can hold — so I will tuck it away in my writer's notebook for another day.
But for now, the green beans deserve their moment. It is a quick, unfussy recipe — exactly Pegeen’s style. I have adapted it for a regular stovetop skillet, since most of us no longer keep an electric skillet on the counter.
Pan-Fried Green Beans
From Meatless Cooking: Pegeen’s Vegetarian Recipes, page 25
Pegeen's original:
2 tablespoons peanut oil
1-pound green beans, cut in 1-inch pieces
1 teaspoon salt
Dash of MSG
1/4 cup water
2 tablespoons slivered almonds
1. Heat electric skillet to 350 degrees. Add oil and beans, salt and MSG. Stir well and add the water.
2. Cover skillet and cook until tender-crips, about 10 minutes. Garnish with almonds.
Stovetop adaptation:
Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the peanut oil, then the green beans, salt, and MSG. Stir well to coat, then add the water. Cover and cook until tender-crisp, about 10 minutes. Garnish with slivered almonds.
Note - if you don’t use MSG, you can leave it out.
