Grilled broad beans
With a chilli & rosemary salt
15 mins plus heating & drying
Not Too Tricky
serves 4
About the recipe
Grilling broad beans in their pods is a great way to amplify their natural flavour. You’ll end up with gnarly, blackened pods that you can burst open to reveal perfectly steamed, elegant beans inside. Teamed with a super-quick chilli salt, you can’t go wrong.
Ingredients
1 small clove of garlic
½ a fresh red chilli
1 sprig of fresh rosemary
½ lemon
100g sea salt
500g young broad beans, in their pods
olive oil
Top Tip
Get yourself a chimney barbecue starter or barbecue flume to prelight your coals, it's a much quicker and efficient way to get (and keep) your coals hot.
Method
- Prepare the barbecue (see tip).
- Peel the garlic, slice the red chilli and place in a pestle and mortar. Strip in the rosemary leaves and bash to a paste, then finely grate in the lemon zest, add 2 tablespoons of the sea salt and grind together. Add the remaining salt, mixing until combined, then transfer most of the flavoured salt to a lined tray and leave to dry out for at least 2 hours or overnight. Once dry, bash it up into pieces – it’ll keep happily in an airtight jar for up to 1 week.
- Place the broad beans on the barbecue over direct heat and cook for 5 minutes, or until lightly charred, turning halfway, then transfer to a board.
- Drizzle the beans with olive oil, sprinkle with a pinch of the flavoured salt and toss together. Bring to the table and let everyone bust open their own pods – the rosemary and chilli salt will stick to your fingers and perfectly season the beans inside.
Remove the cooking grill and carefully tip in hot coals on either side of the barbecue to create two heat walls – this will give you a hot direct heat on the sides and a cooler indirect heat in the middle. This ensures you will get consistent heat throughout and you will be able to control the temperature and cooking more easily.