What goes in
- 500 g dried white beans
- 1 onion, halved
- 4 cloves garlic, flat of the knife
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 strip lemon peel
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- Salt, late
Soaking is optional. Unsoaked beans take roughly forty minutes longer and
hold their shape better, which is usually what you want here.
What to do
- Cover the beans with cold water by three fingers. Bring to a bare simmer and skim once.
- Drop in the onion, garlic, bay and lemon peel. Pour the oil over the top and leave it there.
- Hold at the laziest simmer the burner allows. One bubble every second or two, not a rolling boil.
- After two hours, start tasting. A done bean collapses on the tongue with no chalk in the middle.
- Salt only once they are soft. Salted early they stay stubborn.
- Let them sit off the heat for twenty minutes. The liquid thickens on its own as it cools.