Garlic Confit Green Beans
Fresh green beans slow-roasted in olive oil with whole garlic cloves until the beans are silky and tender and the garlic is sweet, spreadable, and golden.
Prep: 10 min · Cook: 45 min · Total: 55 min · Serves: 4 · Difficulty: Easy · Rating: 4.8/5 (356 reviews)
INSPIRED BY
Confit comes from French country cooking, a technique originally used to preserve meat by cooking it submerged in its own fat. Applied to vegetables, the method is gentler and produces a kind of slow-cooked richness that high-heat roasting cannot replicate. Garlic confit in olive oil has become a staple of restaurant kitchens and increasingly home kitchens for the simple reason that it is delicious and keeps well.
Story
I made garlic confit for the first time by accident. I was trying to make roasted garlic in olive oil and I was running late, so I put the heat lower and covered the pan and went to do other things. Forty minutes later I came back expecting to have ruined it and instead found the most perfect garlic I had ever made: golden, soft enough to spread like butter, sweet in a way that raw or quickly roasted garlic never is. The oil smelled incredible. Green beans came into the picture later. I was making them for Thanksgiving and dreading it because green beans at a holiday table have a reputation, largely deserved, for being the vegetable people politely ignore while they reach for everything else. I decided to try the confit approach on a whim, mostly because I had a lot of garlic oil sitting in my fridge and the timing worked out. My one early mistake was leaving the garlic unpeeled, thinking the skins would protect it. They didn't, not really, and they also made it harder to eat. Peel the cloves and leave them whole. They turn golden and jammy and almost dissolve when you press them onto a piece of bread, which is what I was doing when my brother asked me to stop eating all the garlic from the side dish. The lemon zest at the end is something I added after the third or fourth time making this. Just a teaspoon, grated over everything right before serving. It lifts the whole dish, cuts through the richness of the oil, and adds something bright that the slow oven cooking takes away. It takes three seconds and makes a real difference. This is now one of the dishes I make for Thanksgiving every year. The green beans are no longer the vegetable people ignore.
By Casey
Ingredients
- 1.5 lbs fresh green beans, trimmed
- 1 head garlic, cloves peeled and left whole (about 12 cloves)
- 0.75 cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 4 fresh thyme sprigs
- 0.5 tsp red pepper flakes
- 1 tsp kosher salt
- 1 tsp lemon zest
- 0.5 tsp flaky sea salt, for finishing
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 300 degrees F. Trim the green beans and peel the garlic cloves, leaving them whole.
- In a 9x13-inch baking dish or a medium oven-safe pot, combine the green beans, garlic cloves, thyme sprigs, and red pepper flakes.
- Pour the olive oil over everything, making sure the beans are mostly submerged or at least well-coated. Season with kosher salt and toss to combine.
- Cover tightly with foil and roast for 35 minutes.
- Remove the foil, increase the oven temperature to 400 degrees F, and roast for another 10 minutes until the beans have some color at the edges and the garlic is golden and very tender.
- Transfer to a serving dish, discarding the thyme stems. Finish with lemon zest and flaky sea salt. Serve warm, spooning some of the infused oil over the beans.
Chef Tips
- Save the garlic confit oil. After serving, pour it through a strainer into a jar and refrigerate for up to two weeks. It is extraordinary drizzled on toast, stirred into mashed potatoes, used to finish pasta, or whisked into a vinaigrette. The oil takes on all the flavor of the garlic and thyme and becomes one of the more useful things in your refrigerator.
Cook's Notes
- **Oil temperature:** 300F is key; too high and the garlic fries rather than confits, losing its sweetness.
- **Save the oil:** The infused olive oil keeps refrigerated for 2 weeks and is excellent on toast, in pasta, or in vinaigrettes.
- **Green bean variety:** Haricots verts (French green beans) cook faster and stay more tender; regular green beans need the full time.
- **Make-ahead:** This dish reheats beautifully. Make up to 2 days ahead and gently warm in a skillet or low oven.
- **Common mistake:** Not covering the dish with foil during the confit phase; uncovered, the beans dry out and the garlic can burn.
- **Equipment:** A Dutch oven or tight baking dish holds moisture better than a loose-covered pan.
- **Variation:** Add a strip of lemon peel and a few capers to the oil before roasting for a briny, bright version.