Slow-Baked Beans With Kale Recipe (2024)

I have been making this recipe for years. It's fabulous and very flexible. Start by sauteing whatever you have on hand -- onions, peppers, etc. Then throw in chicken or veggie broth, any kind of beans, and veggies that like to be steamed. Add spices (fresh or dried), garlic, canned tomatoes, greens, and cover. Slide into 300F for min 2 hours. Add liquid if needed. When done, top with 2 duck legs, sausage or whatever. Add walnut crumb/Parmesan cheese. It's always delicious!

Fantastic recipe - made it twice in one week! If you're short on time, canned beans work just as well; put in the oven at 350 for just one hour. Also, it heightens the flavour of the dish to substitute the tomato paste and water for canned chopped tomatoes. And instead of 3 cups of water, use 3 cups of veggie stock. This recipe is very versatile. Tonight, we omitted the breadcrumbs and instead served it on pasta (orecchiette), sprinkled with Italian cheese (Grana Padano, Pecorino Romano).

use as much kale as you want. It will cook down and take up minimal space in the final dish. So I use two big bunches (more than 1.5 lbs), because we like kale and it's super healthy.

This was really tasty. I added 4 slices of chopped (raw) bacon to the onion/carrot/celery sautee, used a can of crushed tomatoes instead of the paste/water combo and included sherry and some home made chicken stock to replace the water. It sat in the fridge for a few days, then I topped it with the bread crumbs and baked until golden.

Made this last weekend...and other than also skipping the kale blanching step, I followed the recipe exactly, including using dried limas. The dish is delicious. It's a bit much for a side dish, however...I used the leftovers as a Meatless Monday meal (made some polenta to go along with it).

The age of beans makes a significant difference in length of cooking time. I've had fresh beans cook in 30 minutes while using old ones of the same type never get soft even after 2 hours of cooking.
I find it best to shop at places that have a quick turnover of dried beans.

Very good, and I endorse skipping the step to blanch the kale.

I made this as more of a soup/stew, adding one more cup of liquid (broth) than called for. I used Rancho Gordo 'Royal Corona' beans, which are GIGANTIC and took a bit longer to cook fully. Did not use the breadcrumb topping, and added a splash of good balsamic vinegar at the end. A hit!

EDIT: So, this actually turned out pretty well. The beans are not butter-soft, but the tomato sauce and kale acquired a really nice, deep, jammy sweet-savoriness. Not flavorless AT ALL, as some people have found. The key may be in slow-baking it for a reeeeeally long time. The dish gets even better after a day or two. Quite delicious when sprinkled with some za'atar, lemon juice, and sea salt.

I would use a dutch oven (like the other person who replied). The dish that is pictured is misleading, I think. You need something with a fitted cover to cook beans in the oven. If you made the beans ahead, you could put them into a ceramic casserole (like pictured) and top with bread crumbs and reheat, but you couldn't cook them initially in a dish like that.

In the interest of time I used 1.5 cans of cannellini beans, subbed diced canned tomatoes for the tomato paste and water, and cooked at 350 for about an hour. It came out wonderfully. My only suggestion would be to add more garlic (perhaps mix it in with the breadcrumb topping). I did not blanch the kale and it still came out delicious (and somewhat sweet). Loved this recipe!

I absolutely love this recipe. I cook on a tight budget, and can afford only to drool over some of the recipes on this site, but that doesn't mean I am ever OK with fast or processed foods. Love that NYT has a recipe for dried beans that is so easy and flavorable, yet affordable. I add parsely and Parm to the bread crumbs when I can, but even w/out them this is delicious, a winner.

To follow up on my recent comment, why discard the kale stems? I dice finely, saute with the onions. They add a wonderful earthy touch to the finished product.

Made in the Instant Pot after soaking beans for a few hours. 20 minutes on high pressure and extended manual release. Maybe could have used another minute.

I'd like to try this recipe, but the ingredients list isn't clear. It specifies that you can use "white beans" or "dried lima beans". Shouldn't the "white beans" be dried also?

Used pinto beans prepared by salena, no oil in breadcrumbs, andes 6 garlic cloves, two celery stalks

Delicious! I’d turn the heat up to 350/375 when browning the topping. I also think you could easily double the kale. Heads up…this makes a lot. Easily 8 (delicious) servings. If making it for a small group and you don’t want a lot of leftovers, I’d cut in half.

I want to love this recipe and I've made it a number of times, but darn .... the amount of cooking time can very so much the I'm almost OVER IT. Tonight I had pre-soaked the beans, def boiled them before placing in the oven and it still took 5 hours of cooking at a higher temp and there were still some dry beans ... just really annoying. This was with Lima beans. Thinking about switching to white beans, or maybe just using canned beans next time.

We made this for dinner since it looked good, but in fact it’s great! We’ve made it a few times now, once with limas, otherwise with pintos since it’s what we had around. Our son who generally picks greens out of food cleans his plate it’s so good, greens and all.

We finally tried this and it is delicious. Our notes are to allow a really long time for the cooking, we ended up spreading the oven time over 2 days (Rancho Gordo Royal Corona beans, they're huge and they take a long time). We held the tomato paste out until the beans were done (okay, fine, we kind of forgot the tomato paste but we'll use it next time). We increased the oil and doubled the bread crumbs.

Made as is except added a little red wine vinegar and used crispy onions on top instead of the bread crumbs. Yummy baked bean flavor

What a delicious recipe! I blanched the kale, but agree with others that it isn't really necessary. (Unless someone at the table asks me to identify the green, I just don't mention that it is kale!) I soaked the beans overnight but didn't have as much time today as I had anticipated, and so I cooked the beans under 27 minutes of high pressure in the Instant Pot! I also added a parmesan rind to the mix. I finished with the bread crumb/olive oil topping in a 350-degree oven for 15 minutes.

Well this did not turn out as planned. I may have gotten the wrong beans as I live in Greece and the packaging isn’t in English but they looked like giant limas. After more than 5 hours of soaking and 3.5 of cooking these hadn’t softened at all and certainly nowhere near the buttery texture I was hoping for. My slapdash solution was to pick out all the giant beans and add a can of white beans to the sauce and cook for another 45 minutes. It was ok but probably not worth trying again.

This was awesome! I ended up using a full pound of dried Lima beans since I could only get a 1lb bag. The leftovers froze well and it was great for breakfast with toast.

To shorten cooking time, add a pinch of baking soda when you put it into the oven. Baking powder helps the beans soften without breaking apart quicker. Sauted some bacon then added onions etc, added 4 skinned fresh tomatoes, and extra lacinato kale, skipped the breadcrumbs but served with toasted garlic french bread. A winner..... fall & winter rotation!

This recipe should have been a home run for me but it was just OK. I love beans and greens so why didn't this work? I am truly mystified.

I guess quite a few people are ok with beans al dente? my very fresh Rancho Gordo Lima beans ( first brought to a boil then soaked for 2 hours) are still very firm after 3 hours in the oven at 300, and a few hours on the stove. I am very close to straining them out of the pot and boiling them by themselves at this point. Lima beans cook very fast, clearly this has something to do with the tomato acidity, I guess I just haven’t experienced it yet. Should have listened to the other notes.

I followed the instructions and used dried beans I’d gotten to soften beautifully a couple days before. 3 hours at 225, turned up to 300 for another hour, gave up, put this in the fridge. Dumped in an instant pot next day for 20 minutes and then back in the oven at 300 with the breadcrumbs for another 40 minutes. It was fine and the beans did eventually get softer but not worth all that effort for me.

Beautiful winter dish that I served with pork and fennel sausage patties. I made some minor variations: I used 2 cans of Cannellini beans with slightly less tomato paste and fluid. I didn’t have the herb bouquet either, so I just added a ton of dried parsley and thyme to taste along with the single bay leaf. I would skip it the bread crumbs at the end. I cooked it all at 350 for one hour and it was divine.

We didn't blanch the kale which was a mistake. The final dish was extremely bitter.