It's Chickpeas Again (with Molly Wizenberg)

Make it tonight: Beans and Greens

I don’t know what it says about me that so many of my friends have amazing chickpea recipes to share, but let’s not overthink it. Because up next is the amazing

Molly Wizenberg

(Molly Wizenberg-Choi, if you’re on Instagram, where you can follow the hottest, queerest couple in the world with along their amazing offspring).

I mean, come ON with this face!

I “met” Molly—and by “met” I mean “read online and felt like I knew”—back when she wrote her long-running recipe blog Orangette. In fact, the first recipe I made of hers was this dead-easy, mad-delicious Chickpea Salad with Lemon and Parmesan, which I felt sure she was going to share with me for this Substack mash-up! (She did not.)

And then I somehow had the balls to ask her to blurb my parenting memoir, Catastrophic Happiness, which she so graciously did. And Molly’s own memoir, The Fixed Stars, came out, and it was (is) amazing.

And she interviewed me about my marriage and the sticker chart I use to get writing done and who knows what else because Molly’s mind is like a fairy’s workshop where every single thing that passes through is glossed with her lively, curious, sparkling, and generous magic.

Stickers by Debbie Fong. Buy her AMAZING new book!

Anyhoo! Chickpeas. For dinner. Again. Molly says this:

The recipe I've sent you is what we call Beans and Greens, but a more descriptive title might be Braised Escarole with Chickpeas. It's a riff on an Orangette recipe from 2015, which was itself a riff on a Molly Stevens recipe from All About Braising, one of those cookbooks where everything is delicious. I looked up the book's publication year just now, and it came out in 2004, TWENTY YEARS AGO!, which means that I've probably been making some version of this recipe for close to two decades. Everyone who eats it loves it, even though it looks and sounds kind of mundane. 

This is not meant to be a humblebrag, though maybe it is, but anyway, for many years, it was my daughter's favorite food. When she had her first slumber party, maybe for her sixth birthday or something, she requested that I make it for the kids' dinner. I was like, "Oh love, um, I don't know if your friends will like it quite as much as you do...." Until that point, I think I'd actually managed to keep her in the dark about the notion that kids aren't supposed to like vegetables. Good news, though: while we opted for pizza that night instead, June's enthusiasm for beans and greens has never flagged.

Ha ha ha! Classic! Ben once lobbied to bring crackers with lox (?) for his preschool birthday snack, and I felt the same way. Also, I love All About Braising too! Molly Stevens was braising cabbage long before braised cabbage was even a twinkle in a hipster restaurateur’s eye.

Molly W. adds this note, and I will add an implied abashed-grimace emoji because Whole Foods canned chickpeas are my go-to on account of they are actually cooked enough. Still, I take her point:

A word about canned chickpeas: do NOT use the ones you find at a co-op or Whole Foods or similar. They're always lacking in salt! I like Goya, Bush's, Progresso, S&W -- the mainstream brands. 

I think maybe you either love a meal in these weird colors like your dinner is trying to camouflage itself on a desert mission or you don’t. Guess which camp I’m in.

This recipe is so easy and so profoundly, nourishingly good. Somehow the flavors are just totally clean: the escarole melts sweetly into the garlicky beans in its glorious, khaki way, and then everything is brightened up at the end with a big jolt of lemon and made savory with cheese. The only thing I had to buy to make this was the escarole.

The sum total of ingredients. ETA: Molly things this is frisee not escarole, and I assume she’s right. It seemed pretty similar as a cooked green?

Though I confess that I sliced it apart and into the sink without reading the recipe first.

And Molly turns out to have this brilliant way of cutting and washing it, which was then lost to me. It reminded me of when we first got the (excellent) game Dominion, and Michael said, incorrectly, “I assume it starts with shuffling all the cards together!” And then we spent the next 10 hours re-sorting all ninety trillion cards back into their many separate piles.

A spoon is the right tool for the job here.

Okay. Here’s the recipe. You’ll love it.

Beans and Greens, or Braised Escarole with Chickpeas

Adapted from All About Braising, by Molly Stevens

Yield: ~4 servings

1 head of escarole (about 1 lb, though smaller or larger is fine)

¼ cup (60 ml) olive oil, plus more for finishing

3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced

Pinch of red pepper flakes

Kosher salt (I use Diamond Crystal)

2 (15-ounce) cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed

1 cup chicken broth (I make mine from Better than Bouillon [as do I])

1 lemon [Cath wonders about adding some of the grated zest. Thoughts?]

Parmesan, for finishing

First, prep the escarole. 

Cut the head in half lengthwise, from the root end to the leaf tips. Working with one half at a time, slice the escarole crosswise into roughly 1-inch strips. Discard the little rooty bit at the end. 

Scoop the sliced escarole into a salad spinner or large bowl, and add cold water to cover generously. Use your hands to swish the leaves around. Then let it sit like that, undisturbed, for a few minutes: this will allow any particles of dirt to fall to the bottom of the bowl. Lift the basket from the salad spinner (or lift handfuls of escarole from the bowl into a colander), drain the water, and give the bowl a quick rinse. Replace the basket (or put the escarole from the colander back into the bowl), and repeat the washing, swishing, and soaking. Escarole can tend to be dirty/sandy, so it’s important to wash it well. When it feels and looks clean, give it a quick spin or dry it a little with a dish towel. Don’t worry if the leaves are still a bit wet – that’s fine.  

Begin the braise:

Combine the oil, garlic, and red pepper flakes in a Dutch oven (or pot of similar size with a lid). Place over medium heat. Warm just until the garlic is fragrant and barely golden around the edges, about 2 minutes. Do not allow the garlic to brown, or you’ll have to start over. [insert whatever the emoji is for a hot bossy femme] 

Add the washed escarole a handful at a time, stirring and allowing it to wilt before adding the next handful. Add a generous pinch of salt with each handful. 

When all the escarole has wilted, add the chickpeas and the broth. Stir to incorporate, and bring to a gentle simmer. Then cover and cook, adjusting the heat to maintain a slow simmer, for about 20 minutes. 

It’s done when the escarole is very tender and the broth has reduced a bit. Squeeze in the juice of ½ a lemon, stir, and give it a taste. Add more lemon juice, salt, and pepper if you like. (I usually use a whole lemon’s worth of juice, and sometimes more.)

To serve:

Serve with a drizzle of good olive oil and grated Parmesan on top. Don’t forget to have some crusty bread on hand for sopping up any juices.

Thank you, Molly!