Cajun Smothered
Black Pot
Green Beans

The Cajuns refer to the cooking technique as "routee," which to the best of translation means "pot-frying." Over the years I've done it with pork, venison, chicken, and a variety of meats, but I'm convinced it lends itself best to the cooking of green beans! This is how all fresh green beans should taste!

In a large cast iron Dutch oven fry down the bacon pieces until they take on a crispy texture and render out most of their drippings. Then with a strainer spoon remove the pieces from the pot and set them aside on a saucer. Immediately, though, replace the pieces with all of the chopped onions and stir fry them until they begin to brown. Once caramelizing has begun, you can drop in the garlic and stir it into the mix (but keep it moving so that it doesn't burn and turn bitter tasting!).

At this point, the green beans go into the pot--all by themselves, no water, no liquid!. To start them cooking, all you do is take a spoon and thoroughly coat them with the hot bacon drippings which are sizzling in the bottom of the pot. But this is not a recipe you can walk away from! You need to stand there for at least the next 5 minutes and stir, stir, and stir some more! It is important that--over a high fire--you raise the temperature of the beans to the "pot-fry" level, which is high enough to actually fry the beans in the slight amount of oil but not hot enough to burn them.

After the allotted sizzling time, toss the bacon bits back into the pot, sprinkle on the seasonings, and mix together the chicken broth and the Kitchen Bouquet. Then, reduce the fire to medium-low. Pour on about a tablespoon of the broth/Kitchen Bouquet mixture. Stir everything together. Put the lid on the pot, and let the beans steam. It's just a matter of continuing to add the liquid a little at a time as needed until the beans are cooked and tender.