FEBRUARY/MARCH 2019 • COOK’S COUNTRY 29SLOW COOKERThe comforting flavors
of this satisfying dish
will take the chill off
any winter night.Herbed Pork Roast
with White Beans and Kale
We set out to keep this dish’s rustic appeal with a lot less work. by Matthew Fairman
Canned versus Dried Beans
When we fi rst started working on
this recipe, we assumed we’d be using
dried beans—sure, they take a long
time to cook, but this is a
slow-cooker recipe. So we
were surprised to fi nd that
we preferred canned beans,
specifi cally our taste test
winner from Goya, to dried
in this recipe.
Canned beans have add-
ed salt, so they taste well
seasoned. The salt in the
can has another benefit:
It mixes with the bean liquid to form a
sort of brine, which helps tenderize the
beans’ skins. Canned beans also typi-
cally contain calcium chloride, whichhelps maintain fi rmness and prevent
the skins from splitting, even in a
long-cooking recipe like this one. When
we tried using dried beans,
we found that over the long
cooking time, they ruptured,
turned mushy, or both.
Does this mean we’re done
with dried beans? Absolutely
not. The best dried beans, es-
pecially those from specialty
producers such as Rancho
Gordo, have a rich, earthy fl a-
vor that canned beans simply
can’t equal. But dried beans take time
and attention in the kitchen, and—as
we found out—can split and get unap-
pealingly mushy if cooked too long.THE CLASSIC TUSCAN com-
bination of rich pork, creamy white
beans, and kale perfumed with garlic,
rosemary, sage, and fennel tastes amaz-
ing, but recipes for this dish often take
more than a day to make. They call
for soaking dried beans, making stock,
sautéing vegetables, and using all man-
ner of pots and pans in the process. I
hoped to fi nd a simpler, more direct
path using the slow cooker.
To start, I chose canned white
beans rather than dried for a couple of
reasons. First, canned beans are already
fully hydrated and need almost no
added liquid for cooking. To achieve
creamy rather than soupy beans, I
wanted very little extra liquid (I knew
that both the pork and the kale would
give up a good deal of moisture in the
cooker). Second, surprisingly, canned
beans often retain their structure bet-
ter than dried in long-cooked dishes
because, like most canned vegetables,
they’re processed with a fi rming agent
(see “Canned versus Dried Beans”).
For the pork, I chose a boneless
pork butt roast. A few tests proved that
leaving the roast whole, rather than
cutting it into chunks, was not only
less work but also made for a sliceable,
more attractive fi nal presentation.
Many recipes call for searing the pork
in a skillet on all sides to build fl avor
and browning before sautéing onion,
carrot, celery, and garlic in the drip-
pings and then moving it all to a Dutch
oven. But I was hoping to skip these
steps and just put everything in the
cooker and hit “on.”
I stirred the raw aromatics and beans
together in the slow cooker along with
a trio of fl avorings: rosemary, sage, and
fennel seeds. I nestled my seasoned
roast atop the whole mix, covered
the cooker, and turned it on (the kale
would come later; it needed only about
a half-hour at the end to soften).
Several hours later, when the roast
was tender, I pulled it out to rest,
stirred the chopped kale into the beans,
and cooked for another 30 minutes.
Surprisingly, this dump-and-stir ver-
sion was darn close to everything I
wanted. The creamy beans had soaked
up the rich, complex fl avor of the
pork and herbs, and the kale provided
a strong vegetable counterpoint. My
only complaint was that the pork
looked a little sad and gray. Instead of
searing the roast on the front end to
solve this problem, I tried coating my
roast with the garlic and herbs that I’d
hitherto been stirring into the beans.
This turned out to be an inspired
strategy. The beans were just right, and
the fi nished roast now had an alluring
garlic-herb crust that made it easier on
the eyes and totally delicious. This dish
had it all: looks, fl avor, and ease.SLOW-COOKER HERBED PORK
WITH WHITE BEANS AND KALE
Serves 6
We prefer the color and texture of Laci-
nato kale here, but you can substitute
curly kale. Note that we use the liquid
from one can of beans, so don’t drain
them all up front. Pork butt is often
labeled Boston butt in the supermarket.3 (15-ounce) cans cannellini beans
(2 cans drained and rinsed,
1 can left undrained)
1 onion, chopped
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
2 celery ribs, chopped
8 garlic cloves (4 sliced thin, 4 minced)
1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil,
plus extra for drizzling
1 tablespoon minced fresh rosemary
1 tablespoon minced fresh sage
2 teaspoons ground fennel seeds
Salt and pepper
1 (2½- to 3-pound) boneless pork butt
roast, trimmed
12 ounces kale, stemmed and cut
into 1-inch pieces
Lemon wedges- Add 2 cans drained beans, 1 can
beans and their liquid, onion, carrots,
celery, and sliced garlic to slow cooker.
Stir to combine. - Combine oil, rosemary, sage, fennel
seeds, 1½ teaspoons salt, 1 teaspoon
pepper, and minced garlic in bowl. Rub
paste all over pork. Nestle pork into
bean mixture in slow cooker. Cover and
cook until pork is tender, 8 to 9 hours
on low or 6 to 7 hours on high. - Transfer pork to carving board and
tent with aluminum foil. Add kale to
bean mixture in slow cooker; cover and
cook on high until kale is tender, about
30 minutes. Season vegetables with salt
and pepper to taste. Slice pork ½ inch
thick. Serve pork with vegetables, driz-
zling individual portions with extra oil
and passing lemon wedges separately.
OUR FAVORITE
Stayed fi rm over the
long cooking time