How well do you remember holidays from your childhood? I can't really remember specifics, like if we had green bean casserole on our table, but I am thinking the answer is probably a hard no. This would explain why it took me until fairly recently at book club Thanksgiving dinners to try and fall in love with green bean casserole.
Cream of mushroom soup in green bean casserole
Green bean casserole of course, is made with a cream of mushroom soup base, and I detest the texture of mushrooms. Slippery, spongy, and with those gross weird gill things, mushrooms and I have never gotten along. But the flavor is something I still find myself enjoying, so my latest mission is to find ways to enjoy mushrooms without the texture problem. That means mushroom stock, and food processing mushrooms to hide in mushroom risotto for example.
With the cream of mushroom, onion, and garlic soup base I make, I used the immersion blender to make those mushrooms into nothing more than flavorful liquid — an excellent choice. The cream of mushroom, onion, and garlic soup adds a deeper flavor profile to green bean casserole than a canned cream of mushroom soup, or even homemade cream of mushroom soup. And of course, since the cook is in control, if you don't like mushroom texture too, you can join me in pulverizing away the mushroom chunks that inevitably find their way into the green bean casserole.
I'm certain you'll win converts with this green bean casserole recipe, which other than the canned soup, is pretty much based on the classic French's green bean casserole recipe but adjusted for the homemade soup aspect.
Green Bean Casserole with Homemade Cream of Soup
Equipment
- 9x9 casserole dish
Ingredients
- 12-15 ounces fresh green beans with the ends trimmed
- 16 ounces cream of mushroom, onion, and garlic soup
- 1 ⅓ cups crispy fried onions divided
- salt and black pepper to taste
- cooking spray
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 350 F.
- Use the cooking spray to coat the inside of your 9x9 casserole dish.
- Add the soup to the casserole dish. Top with black pepper.
- Mix in the green beans and try to mostly coat the green beans in the soup.
- Separately, mix in half of the fried onions (⅔ cup). Stir around to distribute.
- Bake for 30 minutes.
- Remove the dish from the oven and evenly sprinkle the remaining ⅔ cup fried onions.
- You can bake it for another 5 minutes here, but it can also be served without this step.
So what do you say, does this make you more likely to try green bean casserole if you've been avoiding it because of the mushroom aspect?
Need more Thanksgiving vegetable sides?
