Beloved and enjoy themselves

Author Notes: This is a Jordanian recipe - one of my favorites. It's meant to be eaten over rice, which generally means white rice. Many people (including me) put plain whole-milk yogurt on the side. Amazing.


We were a bit skeptical of this traditional Jordanian dish - especially for summer - but boy were we wrong. This is one of those recipes, like pot au feu, that seem to defy the laws of cooking by coaxing an intensely flavorful sauce from water rather than broth or wine. Here, beef and beans soften into lushness, enveloped by a silky gravy of tomatoes, garlic, coriander and cumin. We used cheap stew meat, which still required almost two hours of cooking, and sturdier-than-average green beans, which held up nicely even after nearly double the recommended cooking time. We followed Susan's advice and ate the stew with a dollop of yogurt on the side, and we encourage you to as well.

Serves 6-8

1 pound stew beef
1 pound green beans
1 pound tomatoes - can be in a can
2 cloves of garlic
salt
pepper
coriander
cumin

Rub the beef with salt and pepper, place in a covered skillet, and cover with water. Stew it until it is brown.
Remove the ends from the green beans. Cut them into 1 1/2 inch pieces.
When the beef is finished, remove one cup of the broth and reserve it. Put the green beans in alongside it, and stew them until they are cooked to your taste.
Chop tomatoes and food-process with the beef broth and crushed garlic until smooth. Add this mixture to the green beans and beef. Salt and pepper generously, and add about 2 teaspoons each of cumin and coriander. Let it simmer for about an hour. For the most delicious flavor, let it sit on the stove for a while after that hour and reheat later.