Garlicky white beans and spinach with fried eggs
Creamy beans in garlicky olive oil with spinach and burst tomatoes, crowned with crispy-edged eggs you’ll want to photograph.
- 25 min total
- 25 min hands-on
- Follow-a-recipe easy
- Serves 2
- About $4.82 a serving
- 750 calories
- Vegetarian
- Gluten-free
- Dairy-free
Dolly says: Read the steps once before you start. Everything goes smoother after that.
Ingredients
For 2 servings.
- 4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
- 1 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
- 2 cans cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
- ½ cup vegetable broth
- 4 cups baby spinach
- ½ lemon, juiced
- 4 large eggs
From your pantry
- 3 tbsp olive oil, divided
- ¼ tsp red pepper flakes
- ½ tsp salt
- ¼ tsp black pepper
Each serving has about 750 calories, 42 g protein, 78 g carbs and 32 g fat, and costs about $4.82 at typical US grocery prices. Both are estimates from what the recipe uses.
Missing something?
- No vegetable broth? Chicken broth works.
- No baby spinach? Kale or arugula works.
- No lemons? Limes work.
Steps
Tap an underlined word for a quick explanation.
the garlic, the tomatoes, and and the beans before you turn on the stove.
Thinly slice. Thinly slicing means cutting slices about an eighth of an inch thick, roughly two coins stacked. Thin slices cook in seconds and soften fast, which quick dishes need.
How you’ll know: A slice bends a little when you hold it by one edge, and slow, steady cuts beat fast ones.
Halve. Halving means cutting something into two equal pieces. Even halves cook at the same speed, so one doesn’t dry out while the other finishes.
How you’ll know: The two pieces look like mirror images of each other.
Drain. Draining means pouring off liquid, like tipping pasta into a colander or spooning extra fat out of the pan. Pour hot grease into a can or jar, not the sink, where it hardens and clogs the pipes.
How you’ll know: Only a few drips are left, and the food isn’t sitting in a puddle.
Rinse. Rinsing means running cold water over rice or canned beans in a strainer while you swish them around. It washes off loose starch and can liquid, so rice cooks up fluffy and beans taste clean.
How you’ll know: The water running out goes from cloudy to mostly clear; it doesn’t have to be perfect.
Heat 2 tbsp of the oil in a large nonstick over medium heat, add the garlic and pepper flakes, and cook for 1 to 2 minutes, and pale .
Skillet. A skillet is a frying pan: wide and flat with low, sloped sides. The shape lets steam escape, so food browns instead of stewing.
How you’ll know: It’s the pan you’d fry an egg in, and a 10 or 12 inch one handles most recipes.
Fragrant. Fragrant means cooking until you can clearly smell it, usually garlic or spices, often in about 30 seconds. That’s the moment the flavor is ready, just before it can burn.
How you’ll know: You can smell it from a step back, and garlic is pale gold, not brown.
Golden brown. Golden brown is the color of good toast, somewhere between yellow and light brown. It means the outside is cooked and crisp but not burnt.
How you’ll know: It looks like toast and smells toasty; dark brown with a bitter smell means it went too far.
Medium heatTimer: 1 min 30 sec
Dolly’s tip: Pull it the moment it’s pale gold. Brown garlic tastes bitter.Add the tomatoes and cook for 3 minutes, until they and start to burst.
Softened. For vegetables it means cooked until they bend and lose their crunch; for butter, left out until it dents easily. Soft onions taste sweet, and soft butter mixes in smoothly.
How you’ll know: Onions squash easily against the pan with your spoon, and butter dents under a finger without looking greasy.
Medium heatTimer: 3 min
in the beans, broth and salt, , and cook for 4 minutes, mashing a few beans with your spoon to the liquid.
Stir. Stirring means moving food around with a spoon or spatula so it cooks evenly and doesn’t stick. Unless the recipe says constantly, every so often is plenty, and it gives food time to brown.
How you’ll know: When you drag the spoon across the bottom, nothing is sticking or scorching.
Simmer. Simmering means keeping a liquid just below a boil, with small bubbles rising gently. It cooks food evenly and lets a sauce thicken without scorching on the bottom.
How you’ll know: Small, lazy bubbles break the surface every second or so, and nothing is churning.
Thicken. Thickening means cooking a sauce or soup until it’s less runny, by simmering it down or adding something like cornstarch. A thicker sauce clings to food instead of pooling on the plate.
How you’ll know: It coats the back of a spoon, and a line drawn through it with your finger holds its shape.
Medium heatTimer: 4 min
Add the spinach a handful at a time and until it , then squeeze in the lemon juice.
Stir. Stirring means moving food around with a spoon or spatula so it cooks evenly and doesn’t stick. Unless the recipe says constantly, every so often is plenty, and it gives food time to brown.
How you’ll know: When you drag the spoon across the bottom, nothing is sticking or scorching.
Wilt. Wilting means cooking leafy greens just until they go soft and collapse. Greens shrink a lot, so a big pile of spinach becomes a small handful, and that’s normal.
How you’ll know: The leaves turn soft and deep green and slump into the pan, usually within a minute or two.
Medium heatTimer: 1 min
Taste, add the pepper and more salt if it needs it, and spoon the beans into two shallow bowls.
Carefully wipe out the with a folded paper towel, add the last tablespoon of oil, and heat it over medium-high heat until it .
Skillet. A skillet is a frying pan: wide and flat with low, sloped sides. The shape lets steam escape, so food browns instead of stewing.
How you’ll know: It’s the pan you’d fry an egg in, and a 10 or 12 inch one handles most recipes.
Shimmering oil. Oil shimmers when it’s hot enough to cook: its surface looks rippled and wavy, like heat over a road. That’s your cue to add the food, just before the oil would start to smoke.
How you’ll know: The oil looks wavy and runs thin like water when you tilt the pan, with no smoke yet.
Medium-high heat
Crack the eggs into the pan and fry for 2 to 3 minutes, until the edges are and and the whites are fully set.
Brown. Browning means cooking until the outside turns brown, which is where a lot of savory flavor comes from. Give food room and time without stirring, or it steams and stays gray.
How you’ll know: The food looks brown rather than gray, and the kitchen smells toasty and savory.
Crispy. Crispy means the outside is dry, firm and crunchy. It comes from high heat, a little oil and room in the pan, because crowded food steams and goes soft.
How you’ll know: It sounds crunchy when you tap or bite it, and it doesn’t flop when you lift it.
Medium-high heatTimer: 2 min 30 sec
Dolly’s tip: Crack each egg into a cup first, then slide it in. No shell in the pan and no broken yolks.Food safety: For the safest eggs, cook until the whites are fully set and the yolks begin to thicken. Dishes made with eggs are done at 160°F.
Slide two eggs onto each bowl of beans and finish with a crack of black pepper.
Plan this in Dollop, and get the grocery list
Dollop puts this dinner on a night that suits your week, lists only what you still need to buy, and walks you through each step while you cook.
