Faves a la Catalana

Faves a la Catalana are Catalonia's spring fava bean stew, made with young beans, botifarra negra, cansalada, a little vi ranci, and the clean lift of mint. This is not a big winter bean pot like an Asturian fabada. It is a covered, green, spring stew, rich from pork but still fresh, and the favas must stay tender and whole.

The method that decides it is ofegar, to smother. You build a slow sofregit, the Catalan onion base, until the onion goes soft and sweet and the tomato loses its raw edge, then you add the favas with only enough liquid to help them cook. Keep the lid on and the heat low. Boil them hard and the skins toughen, the beans split, and the pot turns dull.

If you can find fresh young favas in spring, buy them. If not, frozen fava beans are the honest substitute and a Catalan cook far from home would use them without shame. No hace falta haber pisado España. They cook faster and taste a little less grassy, so add them still frozen and begin checking after twelve minutes. For botifarra negra, use morcilla de cebolla or a good unsmoked blood sausage, but tuck it in at the end or it will fall apart.

Finish with mint after the meat has warmed through, not at the beginning, because its job is to wake the stew, not vanish into it. Let the cazuela rest ten minutes and serve with bread for the juices. In my Margin, this one says only: no tengas prisa con el fuego, don't hurry the heat.