Cassoulet
Cassoulet is a peasant dish pretending to be complicated. The secret is not in the ingredients but in breaking the crust: during the long bake you push the top back into the beans three times, so a new golden skin forms each time. That is where the depth of flavour comes from.
Your own work in that: 0 min.
- Soaking the beans 480 min
- Cooking the beans 75 min
- Browning the meats 25 min
- Layering 15 min
- Baking 150 min
Step by step
0 / 7 doneSoak the beans overnight
Cover the beans with cold water and leave for 8 hours. Soaked, they cook noticeably faster and — more importantly — evenly. Cooked from dry, the skins split more often and some beans collapse before the rest soften.
Ingredients: 500 g white beans · 2500 ml water · 1 pcs onion · 4 pcs cloves · 1 pcs carrot · 2 pcs bay leaves · 2 tsp thyme · 2 tsp salt
Cook the beans unsalted
Drain the soaking water, cover with fresh, add the clove-studded onion, carrot, bay and thyme. Simmer at a barely trembling heat for 60–75 minutes until tender but still holding their shape. Salt only at the end. Drain, keeping the cooking liquid, and remove the onion, carrot and bay leaves.
Ingredients: 500 g white beans · 2500 ml water · 1 pcs onion · 4 pcs cloves · 1 pcs carrot · 2 pcs bay leaves · 2 tsp thyme · 2 tsp salt
TipSalting at the end lets you judge the seasoning: the cooking liquid still goes into the dish and reduces in the oven, and the sausage and bacon add salt of their own. Season as you switch the heat off.
The surface should barely tremble — boiling breaks the beans.Brown the meats in turn
Cook the duck legs skin side down for 8 minutes in a dry pan until the fat renders and the skin is golden. Lift them out and in the rendered fat brown the sausage, pork and bacon — 4 minutes each. Altogether this takes about 25 minutes.
Ingredients: 4 pcs duck legs · 400 g sausage · 400 g pork shoulder · 150 g bacon
TipDuck fat is an ingredient here, not waste. Keep it — everything else fries in it.
The duck skin renders the fat everything else cooks in.Build the flavour base
In the same fat cook the crushed garlic and tomato paste for 2 minutes. Pour in the stock, scrape the base and mix with the drained beans. Taste and add salt if needed — beans take a lot of salt and without it the dish is bland.
Ingredients: 6 cloves garlic · 2 tbsp tomato paste · 500 ml stock · 60 g breadcrumbs · ½ bunch parsley
Layer it up
Spread half the beans in a wide earthenware dish, arrange the meats in a single layer and cover with the rest of the beans. Add cooking liquid until it comes just below the surface of the beans — not over them.
Ingredients: 500 g white beans · 2500 ml water · 1 pcs onion · 4 pcs cloves · 1 pcs carrot · 2 pcs bay leaves · 2 tsp thyme · 2 tsp salt
Meat in the middle, beans above and below — that is how it holds moisture.Bake and break the crust
Scatter over the breadcrumbs and bake at 150 °C for 2.5 hours, uncovered. Three times during baking — at 60, 100 and 130 minutes — push the crust back into the beans with a spoon and add a little liquid. A new one forms each time.
Ingredients: 6 cloves garlic · 2 tbsp tomato paste · 500 ml stock · 60 g breadcrumbs · ½ bunch parsley
TipThis is not decorative. Every broken crust gives the beans its caramelised flavour, and that is what builds cassoulet's depth.
Three crusts instead of one — that is the whole craft.Rest before serving
Leave the dish for 20 minutes out of the oven. The beans absorb the remaining liquid and it stops being soup. Scatter parsley and serve straight from the dish.
Ingredients: 6 cloves garlic · 2 tbsp tomato paste · 500 ml stock · 60 g breadcrumbs · ½ bunch parsley
Before you start
Split it over two days
Cook the beans and brown the meats the day before. On day two only the assembly and baking remain — still three hours.
Without duck
Swap the legs for pork ribs or a pork knuckle boiled beforehand. Add 3 tablespoons of lard, since you lose the duck fat.
The dish matters
Wide and shallow gives a large crust surface. Narrow and deep turns cassoulet into a bean stew.
