Light and easy Green beans with eggs are tasty, healthy, and gluten-free. It’s a perfect recipe when you need to have a quick dinner on the table in 15 minutes.
When I started cooking I didn’t make easy and simple dishes, instead I went right for the most complicated recipes. For baking I wasn’t making simple loaf cakes or muffins. I wasn’t even making two layer frosted cakes. No, I was making complicated concoctions with mousses, curds, meringue layers, and tempered chocolate. Those cakes took a few days to assemble.
I still remember the first time I decided to make a multi-course fancy dinner for my ex-boyfriend. I did not make an easy salad as an appetizer, some simple roast main, and dessert. I made chicken liver two ways for appetizer with homemade crackers, and individual cheesecakes for dessert. That dinner traumatized me so much, that I don’t even remember what I made for the main course. It was my first time cooking chicken liver. It was also my first time making cheesecake.
Knowing this, it makes sense why I did not actually cook much even though I loved cooking and preferred take-out for lunch and dinner. Making those complicated dishes took too much energy and time. It was easy to rely on sandwiches and fast food.
It took many years to stop the pattern. To not automatically choose a recipe with the most ingredients and the longest cooking time to try. And when I paused and thought and started to cook simple, things changed. I no longer felt rushed and tired and busy to cook. I felt relaxed. I found the rhythm in chopping, and dicing, and mixing, and cooking. I found that I don’t have to rely on cookbooks. I realized that I know the food that I like and I don’t need to blindly follow the recipes. Instead, I can use cookbooks, and blogs, and websites as inspiration to come up with food that I like.
Now I don’t feel guilty or ashamed making simple foods. Two ingredient or three ingredient recipe could be as good as a complicated recipe involving many steps in ingredients. I feel confident in my cooking and I now go back to my childhood for inspiration quite often.
This recipe is one of those childhood memories. My mom made light and easy green beans with eggs quite regularly when I was little. I am pretty sure she used frozen beans as we’ve never had fresh ones in the stores. It was quick and easy. Tasty and healthy. I was on the subway last week coming home, tired and with no energy to go to a supermarket. I tried to do a mental audit of what we had in the fridge and remembered that there was a big bag of green beans waiting to be used.
Technically it’s just scrambled eggs with green beans, but I never eat it for breakfast. For me it’s a dinner recipe, but it doesn’t mean that you can’t have it in the morning or for lunch. I cook beans in salted water until they are cooked to my liking, which is soft. But they can be cooked to have some crispiness too, it just depends on personal taste. Once the beans are cooked and drained, I add them to a big pan and pour a mixture of eggs and milk over them. I then cook it on medium heat stirring the egg and mixing the beans, until the eggs are cooked. Serve with lots of freshly ground pepper. Light and easy green beans with eggs are healthy and delicious, also gluten-free, not to mention quick and very affordable. For another kind of light and healthy eggy dinner check my Ricotta and Brie Scrambled Eggs recipe.
Light and easy green beans with eggs
Ingredients
- 300 g green beans
- 4 large eggs
- 1/2 cup milk
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- Salt, pepper to taste
Instructions
- Trim the ends of the beans.
- Cut the beans into thirds.
- Cook in boiling water until the desired doneness.
- Drain the beans.
- While the beans are cooking, whisk together eggs and milk in a large bowl. Season with salt.
- When the beans are well drained, heat olive oil in a medium skillet.
- Add beans to the skillet and cook for a minute.
- Add the egg-milk mixture and cook constantly stirring with a spatula for about 3-5 minutes or until egg curds are fully cooked.
- Serve with lots of freshly ground black pepper.
Mention or tag @Imagelicious
WholeYum says
This looks great and it’s perfect for a quick meal!
Ksenia @ At the Immigrant's Table says
This is EXACTLY the sort of meal I cook on most weeknights. For some reason, I actually prefer eggs for dinner, and it usually is the sort of last-resort meal that my fridge is capable of producing. But more than the meal, i could relate to your memory of learning to cook… I think so many of us made our first steps in cooking among the pages of complicated Martha Stewart-like magazines, dreaming up cream-and-meringue towers and the kind of meals that take days to assemble… exactly what turned you off cooking in the first place! In any case, Julia, I am so glad you got over that initial phase and ended up exactly where you are – and where you likely should be 🙂
Imagelicious says
Ksenia – I am glad I am not the only one like this. "Crazy" to start my cooking career with impossibly complicated recipes. It wasn’t even Martha Stewart magazines for me (although they too played a role), it was Russian cooking internet and forums. Somehow I fell in with the crowd of people who all cooked the most elaborate and complicated dishes and I wanted to be a part of that community, so I tried to keep up. I am glad I discovered my own pace and voice now. And I am glad you did that too!
Lily @GastroSenses says
Simple healthy meal– love breakfast ideas like this!
Imagelicious says
Thanks, Lily! For me it’s dinner though 🙂
Evelyne Cultureatz says
I have also been falling into an easier and simpler recipe selection mode. It is great! And I have been enjoying more and more eggs for dinners so thanks for a great recipe.
Imagelicious says
Thanks, Evelyne. I feel that eggs are underrated. They are so easy, healthy (well, if you don’t over do it, but that is the case for everything) and affordable too. Well, and delicious, of course!