Yes, You Can Have Cassoulet On a Weeknight with This Easy Recipe! (2024)

FAQs

What do you serve with cassoulet for dinner? ›

You don't need to serve anything else. Perhaps a light salad on the side. But the wine is most important.

Cassoulet, a hearty slow-simmered stew of sausage, confit (typically duck), pork, and white beans, is one of the great hallmarks of French country cuisine. The best versions are cooked for hours until the beans and meat meld into a dish of luxuriant, velvety richness.

It's baked and served in a deep, handmade earthenware vessel called a cassole, with traditional sloping sides.

Shiraz is a bold and spicy red wine that pairs perfectly with the hearty flavours of Cassoulet. This full-bodied wine has rich notes of blackberry, black pepper, and smoky oak, which complement the smoky flavours of the dish superbly.

[kasulɛ ] masculine noun. sausage and bean hotpot. Collins French-English Dictionary © by HarperCollins Publishers.

Cassoulet is divided into three types depending on which meats are used. Prosper Montagne, a famed culinary artist, called these three various cassoulets the “Trinity.” He designated the “Father” as coming from Castelnaudary, the “Son” from Carcassone and the “Holy Ghost” from Toulouse.

Toulouse Saucisse (Toulouse Sausage) is a fresh sausage made in Toulouse, France, in the southwest. It's a classic French pork sausage cooked with white wine and onions. Cassoulet is a fantastic way to use it. The sausage can be cooked in a variety of ways, including boiling, frying, or grilling.

All the ingredients for a good cassoulet can be found in most grocery stores. Purists will argue that you need to find real tarbais beans but I have found white kidney beans work just as well. They will mention that there are 3 versions of true cassoulets (Castelnaudary, Carcassone, and Toulouse).

The first cassoulet is claimed by the city of Castelnaudary, which was under siege by the British during the Hundred Years War. The beleaguered townspeople gathered up the ingredients they could find and made a large stew to nourish and bolster their defenders.

What is the creamiest white bean? ›

Baby Lima Beans. Also called “butterbeans”, Baby Lima beans are small, smooth, and creamy with a rich, buttery texture. They're starchier than other beans and are often used in soups, stews, succotash, and casseroles, or just cooked simply with herbs and spices.

Great Northern and cannellini beans make fine substitutes for the Tarbais, flageolet and lingot beans used in France. Then give yourself over to the rhythm of roasting, sautéing and long, slow simmering.

Part of what makes cassoulet so special is the golden brown crust that forms on top of the stew near the end of the process. But when asked what forms this crust, most home cooks would probably give the wrong answer.

In the Dutch oven, arrange a layer of the bean mixture at the bottom, then the various meat, broth, and wine. End with remaining beans. Cover the top with breadcrumbs and dot with 3 tablespoons duck fat. Bake until beautifully browned and bubbly and most of the liquid has cooked away, about 1 1/2 hours.

No doubt, in the past, cassoulet was often made without much in the way of meat, because at its heart, it's a peasant dish, designed to bulk out relatively cheap cuts with even cheaper beans.

A cassoulet, of course, is something else entirely, and usually refers to that long-simmering stew from southwest France of duck, lamb or pork, and white beans. Confused? Maybe it will help if you roll up your sleeves and bake this cassolette recipe—a luscious gratin of chicken and noodles rife with French flavors.

Convention has it that the cassoulet of Castelnaudary is based largely on pork and pork rind, sausage, and (sometimes) goose; the Carcassonne variety contains leg of mutton and (occasionally) partridge; and the cassoulet of Toulouse includes fresh lard, mutton, local Toulouse sausage, and duck or goose.