Broccoli and cannellini beans with basil and lemon

Rosie Mackean
·3-min read
This cooked salad offers space for experimentation in substituting different nuts, seeds and beans
This cooked salad offers space for experimentation in substituting different nuts, seeds and beans

This dish is more of a salad, but it engages the principle – take one ingredient and think laterally with it. Then you have options, you have intrigue and you’ll have something very tasty too.

Make ahead

You can make the cannellini cream up to 24 hours ahead, but the rest of this dish is best made fresh. It can sit at room temperature, though, for a couple of hours.

Substitutions

If cannellini are not your bean of choice, then feel free to use butter beans or chickpeas (garbanzo beans). Lentils would also work well here too, although you might not want to blitz them as the mix would be a muddy brown. I always have pecans lying around, but top this with whatever nuts or seeds you have – sesame seeds, pumpkin seeds, almonds, hazelnuts and walnuts would all work. Regular broccoli can also be roasted, just cut it into small florets or, if you prefer, you can use asparagus or thinly sliced courgettes.

Scaling

You will need roughly 1 can of beans for 2 people, just blitz half and plate half, plus 100g of broccoli per person. I like to do this as a sharing starter, but double those quantities if you want to serve this as a main meal.

Overview

Prep time

15 mins

Cook time

20 mins

Serves

6

Ingredients

For the broccoli

  • 600g tenderstem broccoli, hard ends trimmed

  • 2 tbsp olive oil

  • 1½ tsp dried chilli flakes (optional)

  • zest of 1 lemon, finely grated

For the basil and cannellini cream

  • 3 x 400g tinned cannellini beans

  • 3 ½ tbsp extra-virgin olive oil

  • Juice of 1 lemon

  • 1 garlic clove, peeled

  • 30g basil leaves

  • 30g toasted pecans

  • Warm bread to serve (optional)

Method

Step 1

Preheat the oven to 220C/200C fan/gas mark 7.

Step 2

Lay the 600g tenderstem broccoli across 2 roasting trays with the 2 tbsp olive oil, 1½ tsp dried chilli flakes and 1 tsp sea salt. 

Roast for 15 minutes – the florets will become scorched and crunchy and the stems will wilt and soften slightly. When they are cooked, mix them with the zest of 1 lemon.

Step 3

Meanwhile, drain 2 of the cans of 400g cannellini beans in a pan with 1 tbsp of extra-virgin olive oil. Add the juice of 1 lemon and some seasoning. Set the pan over a medium heat; you don’t want the beans to cook, you are just simply softening and warming them (cold beans aren’t nice to eat in my opinion).

Step 4

Take the remaining one can of beans and drain most of the liquid, reserving a couple of tablespoons. Pop these beans in a blender with 2½ tbsp of extra-virgin olive oil, the garlic clove, 30g basil leaves, the reserved bean liquid from the can and a pinch of salt.

Step 5

Blitz it all together to make a smooth, bright green cream.

Step 6

To serve, smoosh the cannellini bean and basil cream over your serving plates, then top with the warm, lemony beans and the charred broccoli, making sure to drizzle over all that lovely spicy, lemony oil from the roasting trays.

Step 7

Scatter over your 30g toasted pecans, drizzle with the remaining oil and serve with warm bread.

Good Time Cooking: Show-stopping menus for easy entertaining by Rosie MacKean (Pavilion Books, £26)

Photography by Sam Harris.

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