Roasted Green Beans and Bacon

Even though I am not a vegetarian, I must admit that I love almost every vegetable out there. I guess it stems from being raised to eating vegetables with all my dinners at home. As a child, some of my favorite vegetables were those that most kids absolutely hated, i.e. brussel sprouts, spinach, and broccoli. Well, those were amongst my favorites, along with green beans. Today, I haven't changed. I still love all of them not just because I think they taste great, but because there's so much you can do with them. Boil them, steam them, sauce them, or mix them with other foods. I love it all, especially when I roast them. OMG, you've got to try these roasted green beans. I was just messing around the other day and decided to make green beans and bacon by roasting and I've got to tell you, they came out great. Now it's your turn to try. Here's what we need:

2 lbs of fresh green beans, cut in halves
1 medium yellow onion, diced
18 garlic cloves, whole and peeled
12 large shallots, peeled and cut in halves
1/4 lb bacon, chopped
1 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon ground pepper
1/2 teaspoon of garlic salt
4 tablespoons of olive oil
1 tablespoon of butter
1/4 cup of dry white wine or water

This is very easy to prepare and the flavors really come out from the roasting process. It gives a whole new twist to green beans without cooking off the texture and flavors that boiling or steaming tends to do. Start by preheating your oven to 425.

Place the shallots and garlic on a large baking sheet and pour 1 tablespoon of the olive oil, half the salt and pepper and with your hands, mix the ingredients together so that everything is well coated with the olive oil. Set on middle rack of oven and bake for 20 minutes.

While the shallots and garlic are roasting, take a frying pan and heat 1 tablespoon of the olive oil over medium high heat and saute the bacon until it is golden brown. Remove and set on paper towel to drain. Remove excess oil from pan and over medium high heat, add the diced onions and saute for about 2 minutes and remove from heat. Over medium high heat, add the butter to the pan, allow to melt and then deglaze with the wine or water. Once deglazed, shut heat off and set pan aside.

Now take the shallots and garlic out of the oven and add the green beans along with the rest of the olive oil, salt, pepper, and garlic salt. Mix well so beans are coated. Return to oven and bake for an additional 40 minutes at 400. About half way through, check and toss the beans and return to oven.

Once beans are roasted, remove from the oven and add to the frying pan with the deglazed sauce. Add the onions and the bacon and toss so that everything is well coated with the sauce. Transfer to a serving platter and serve hot. I tell you, this is delicious. You know how roasting brings out the flavors of vegetables and this does the trick with the beans along with the shallots and garlic. If it were me, I'd serve this with a nice sauteed beef steak or broiled lamb. Now I'm hungry again !