Gordon Ramsay’s peanut butter green beans are blanched for 2 minutes, then blistered in a hot wok with garlic. Then they’re tossed in a dressing of crunchy peanut butter, soy sauce, rice vinegar and brown sugar. Toasted sesame seeds go on top. They serve 4 and take about 20 minutes.
The recipe is on page 228 of Ultimate Home Cooking (2013). He cooks it with his son Jack in his peanut green beans video on YouTube, seen more than 5 million times. In the book he puts the beans next to sticky chicken wings and Thai rice for what he calls “an absolute feast.”
He made it for the family table, and it works. In the video his daughter Holly, who he jokes is allergic to anything green, eats more green beans in 5 minutes than in the last 10 years, and she says the secret is the peanut butter. He calls it a dish that gets the fussiest eaters into greens.
Gordon Ramsay’s Green Beans with Chili Peanut Dressing
Course: Side DishCuisine: AsianDifficulty: Easy4
10
minutes10
140
kcalGordon Ramsay’s stir-fried green beans with soy and peanut dressing from Ultimate Home Cooking (2013), page 228, the beans from his Southeast Asian dinner video. These ingredients make peanut butter green beans for 4, with garlic, soy and toasted sesame.
Ingredients
- For the beans:
300g (10½ oz) green beans, trimmed
flavorless oil, such as peanut oil, for frying
2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
2 tablespoons sesame seeds, toasted, to serve
- For the peanut dressing:
2 tablespoons crunchy peanut butter, or 3 tablespoons peanuts blitzed in a food processor
1 tablespoon soy sauce
½ tablespoon rice vinegar
½ tablespoon brown sugar
Directions
- Blanch the beans: Cook the beans in boiling salted water for 2 minutes. Drain them and cool them in ice-cold water.
- Make the dressing: Mix the peanut butter, soy sauce, vinegar and sugar in a bowl. If it’s very thick, stir in 1 to 2 tablespoons of hot water, then keep stirring until the sugar dissolves.
- Fry the garlic: Heat a heavy skillet or wok over medium heat, add a dash of oil and cook the garlic for 1 minute, until golden.
- Blister the beans: Add the drained beans and cook for 2 to 3 minutes, until they start to blister on the outside.
- Dress: Turn the heat down, add the peanut dressing and stir well.
- Serve: Tip the beans into a serving bowl and sprinkle with the toasted sesame seeds.
Notes
- The book asks for a flavorless oil "e.g. groundnut," which is the British name for peanut oil, so it matches the dressing.
- Calories are about 140 a serving. The peanut butter, the frying oil and the sesame seeds make up most of them.
FAQs
Where’s the chili in the chili peanut dressing?
In that dinner, the heat is in the dishes around the beans. The chicken wings get chili flakes in their marinade and the Thai rice is cooked in a curry paste made with green chilies.
The bean dressing itself is peanut butter, soy, vinegar and sugar, in the book and the video. If you want it spicy, a pinch of chili flakes in the dressing does the job.
Is the video the same as the book?
Close. On camera he blanches the beans for 2 to 2½ minutes, uses a teaspoon of brown sugar and loosens the thick dressing with a little more soy sauce, while the book uses hot water.
He’s also generous with the sesame seeds at the end, because they give the beans a little crunch.
Can I make it ahead?
Yes, partly. Gordon says you can part-cook the beans in boiling water well in advance, and then they need only about four minutes to finish.
He also says it’s the time to bring out your wok if you have one, because it lets you control the heat more easily than a heavy pan, and the pan needs to be hot enough to blister the beans.
Why crunchy peanut butter?
For texture. He tells Jack in the video that crunchy keeps the dressing nice and chunky.
No jar in the cupboard? The book gives a swap: blitz 3 tablespoons of peanuts in a food processor and use those instead.
What does he serve with it?
His sticky spiced chicken wings and Thai rice with curry paste, both from the same pages of the book. The wings marinate in tamarind paste, palm or brown sugar, fish sauce, garlic, chili and oil, then roast at 350°F (180°C) for 25 to 35 minutes. The tamarind paste is the same jar he uses for his spicy fruit salad at breakfast.
For a cold green bean dish instead, his green bean salad uses the same quick blanch, with a roasted garlic and mustard dressing and almonds.
Zaytouna Studio Team is the kitchen team behind Chef Ramsay Recipes. We cook Gordon Ramsay’s recipes from his cookbooks and videos in a home kitchen and write them up for yours, with US and metric measurements.