Fava beans with a little jamón

I've seen fruit vendors in the U.S. selling their seconds for half price but Murcia is the first place I've noticed the vegetables offered in distinct grades too.  After trying out a local recipe for fava beans in my first week here I was reminded that a) just because a recipe is traditional doesn't guarantee that it's going to taste good and b) when it comes to fresh fava beans, pretty much anything beyond fat and salt is gilding the lilly.

Made this..

I peeled my way through lots of favas in Sicily and I'm still amazed each time I whittle a mountain of them down into a tiny dish of delicate, slippery little beans that look like they could easily hold their own in a whimsical Fantasia number.  After needing both hands to transport the tough pods to the trash and then a spoonful or two to sprinkle them into the pan, those things are vegetal gold.  But as soon as the mess of tomatoes and onions hit the skillet for my first favas in Spain, it was no longer evident that the dish had anything to do with them.  That all got turned into a soup the next day (by way of a little broth, a hard boiled egg yolk to thicken the mix and an immersion blender to whip it even further beyond recognition from the original dish), so this time I had no plans to doctor them up.

I circled the market a few times scoping out the fava scene and when I came upon a stand selling them for half the going rate I had a feeling it was too good to be true.  The scraggly sign read 1€ and was placed just off center between two huge piles of beans.  When I got closer I realized that one heap looked pretty good, like the favas I got (literally off the back of a truck) in Balestrate and the other looked sort of like an air-brushed version of the same with smooth, unblemished skin and not an age spot in sight. When I asked the vendor if there was a difference in price he looked over the top of his glasses in a friendly librarian sort of way and gesturing between the two piles I imagined him saying "is a high speed computer database worth more than a dusty card catalog system? Of course it is."  Having already shelled out two euro for ajo tierno that morning I wasn't about to part ways with two more.  I knew half a kilo wouldn't yield much, but it wasn't bulk I was going for.

With that

That night I saddled up to the counter at home and got into bean peeling position. I opened the first one and besides the flawless favas, even the bright green pod itself was tender. The underside of the shell was so downy it could have easily eeked out the courderoy patch in the tactile awareness book I "read" with the 2 year old Spanish triplets  I look after on Fridays.

I pulled myself together after realizing my roommates weren't quite as excited about just how soft a young bean pod could be and kept shelling.  From there it was a pretty straight shot from the pan to the plate with a little jamón fat, ajo tierno and sunny side up egg fried along the way.  As I was finishing up dinner Yolanda asked why I hadn't cut off a good hunk of bread to soak up the yolk, but  I decided against a lengthy explanation.  Yes, perhaps that was because I was too tired to try saying it all in Spanish but remembering her low enthusiasm level for the pillowy shell I reasoned with myself "ah, she just wouldn't understand."

Fava beans with jamón 

Yield: Side dish for 1
Ingredients
1/2 kilo of fava beans in their pods
The strips of fat torn from 3-5 thin slices of jamón serrano (Whenever I eat a piece of serrano throughout the week I just tear off the fat and keep it in the fridge to use for recipes.  Often there are little bits of jamón that come off with the fat, and that's perfect)
Extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon of finely chopped onion or green onion
Salt

-Remove the fava beans from their pods and skin each bean
-Heat the serrano fat in a pan until it has rendered and any little bits of meat have crisped up
-Add just a bit of extra virgin olive oil
-Add in the favas and cook, stirring occasionally  for a few minutes, just until tender
-Taste and season with a touch of salt if the beans need it
-Great served with a sunny side up egg that's also cooked in rendered serrano fat and a little olive oil

The cooking times for the fava beans can vary a lot.  The favas I used in Sicily needed several more minutes in the pan, but these ones were so tender and fresh that just eating them raw with a little olive oil, salt and crusty bread would have been delicious too.