Green Beans with Blue Cheese Breadcrumbs and Bacon Recipe

This dish offers a brilliant balance of bold, salty, and mildly sweet flavors, all tied together with a savory, tangy sauce. It’s a modern take on holiday green beans that nods to the classic casserole but preserves the crisp-tender freshness of the beans. The cheesy breadcrumb topping finishes the dish with a salty crunch.

This green bean dish gets its character from a crisp and savory bread crumble that lands somewhere between breadcrumbs and croutons. The bread pieces are smashed together with blue cheese and toasted until golden. The green beans, cooked briefly in salted water until just tender, are tossed with a bacon-shallot pan sauce that’s brightened with balsamic vinegar and whole-grain mustard. Topped with bacon and more cheese, this is an inviting side that offers contrasting textures and bold flavor. 

How much of this dish can be prepped ahead?

The rich, gastrique-like sauce can be made ahead. You can also cook the bacon and blanch the green beans a day in advance. While it’s best to toast the cheesy breadcrumbs the day of, you can cut up the baguette ahead of time so all that’s left is to toss in the blue cheese and toast them in the oven.

Does it matter which type of blue cheese is used?

Roquefort and Stilton are two types of blue cheese we suggest for this recipe, but the category of this variety is vast and varied in terms of textures (from creamy to dry) and taste (from subtle to strong).

Roquefort, a French sheep’s milk cheese, has a strong, tangy taste with salty notes. The texture is crumbly. Stilton is an English blue cheese. It’s creamy and rich and is less pungent than Roquefort but still offers salty and slightly spicy notes. For those who prefer a very mild blue cheese, consider using Gorgonzola Dolce, which is very creamy with buttery notes. You can also look for American-made classics, like Maytag Blue out of Iowa, Point Reyes Blue from California, and Rogue Creamery’s Oregon Blue. At most finer grocery markets and cheese shops, the cheesemonger will be happy to offer you samples so you can pick the blue cheese that works best for you and your diners.

Notes from the Food & Wine Test Kitchen

• For the glossiest and most flavorful sauce, make certain to drain the beans well before adding them to the skillet. 
• Allow the cheese to come to room temperature for the best results when mixing it with the bread cubes.
• Try this recipe with different vegetables: Boil or roast carrots until they are crisp-tender before tossing them in the sauce and topping with the blue cheese breadcrumbs. Brussels sprouts, steamed or roasted, would also work well in this dish. 

This recipe was developed by Liz Mervosh; the text was written by Cheryl Slocum.