Ingredients

• 2 tbsp peanut oil, divided
• 1 pound green beans (or Chinese longbeans, if you can find them), trimmed into 2- or 3-inch lengths
• 4-5 cloves garlic, minced
• 4 green onions, white and light green parts only, thinly sliced (save the green parts and chop them for garnish, if desired)
• 4-5 white mushrooms, diced
• 5 tbsp garlic-chili paste
• 5 tbsp low-sodium soy sauce
• Szechuan pepper, freshly ground (optional)

Directions

Put a wok on a high flame, and add one 1 tbsp peanut oil.  Add green beans, and stir fry for 8-10 minutes, until green beans are starting to brown and are crisp-tender.  Remove green beans from wok and set aside.

Add 1 tbsp peanut oil to the wok.  Add in the garlic and onions, and stir-fry for a few seconds until aromatic.  Add in the mushrooms and stir-fry for 1-2 minutes, until mushrooms have released some of their liquid.  Add in the garlic-chili paste and soy sauce and stir-fry for a minute.  Add the green beans back to the wok, and stir through until thoroughly coated in the sauce.

Serve with steamed rice, and optionally garnish with scallions and Szechuan pepper.

Notes

Chinese long beans are the green bean called for in this dish, but I don’t limit myself to those beans.  The second any variety of green bean shows up at the farmers’ market, I make this.  Thinner fillet-style green bean varieties work best in place of the Chinese long beans, although fatter ones are fine.  They’ll take longer to cook, and you might need a bit more oil to help them along.

This is another easy weeknight dinner.  Like the black bean beef that I have listed elsewhere, I start off by rinsing the rice and getting it started in the rice cooker.  While it’s cooking, I prep the rest of the ingredients, and then start the stir-frying.  It usually ends up that the rice finishes when the beans are about half-done, which is close enough to perfect that I’m happy with it.  All told, it takes about an hour to complete.

We have this as a vegan main course, so it’s usually a generous main dish for two, with enough left over for a lunch or two later in the week.