Milk-Simmered Green Beans

Green beans are a Southern staple. They make appearances in summer salads, holiday casseroles, jars of pickles, and skillets full of bacon. Instead of employing the usual creamy soup base, ham hocks, or lard as the fat agent, these beans benefit from the luxurious texture of a milk and butter bath. But, they are extracted before they become mushy—instead, this recipe delivers tender green beans with just the bits of milk clinging to them and tons of flavor that lets them stand on their own.

My great-grandmother taught me this recipe after an afternoon of snapping beans on her front porch, and it’s now in regular rotation.

This is my most requested recipe, and I always tell friends it’s great when beans are at their freshest in season, but even in the winter, you can buy those bags of pre-snapped beans at the grocery store and the milk, butter, and salt bath transforms them.

This recipe is not good for canned green beans though as their texture is already too soft to handle the extra cook time. But if you freeze batches when harvested, just thaw and drain and they work well with this recipe.