Slow Cooker Butter Beans with Lemon and Thyme
These slow cooker butter beans are just so melt in the mouth tender, and full of flavour. We eat a lot of chillies and curries, so using fresh herbs and citrus fruit is a good way to ring the changes without sacrificing flavour, or spending a long time in the kitchen. Just what you need when it’s sunny and you have better things to do!
Whilst it is a hot meal, this low fat stew would go great with salad and crusty bread – perfect for minimising time spent over a hot stove. It’s vegan, dairy free and gluten free too, full of healthy fibre and pretty low budget. A win-win situation when you want to save your pennies for ice creams.
Flavour Tips
These slow cooker butter beans were really lemony with a proper flavour punch, and the butterbeans just popped creaminess in your mouth. If you want to try a more subtle flavour use just one lemon.
Similarly for the thyme, I used a small bunch of half a dozen or so short stalks. Using more would result in a pretty intense flavour. If you have food safe string or muslin to secure your thyme with it would be easier to avoid getting thyme stalks left in the food.
I’m sure other root veg would be just as tasty – use whatever you have in the cupboard, or whatever will be spare from your other meals this week. I garnished it with a few raw thyme leaves for decoration.
A warming, summery vegan meal that's low in fat and so easy in the slow cooker.
- 500g Dried Butter Beans (just over 2 cups)
- 2 14 oz/200g cans of chopped tomatoes
- 3 carrots
- 1 small sweet potato
- 1 onion
- 2 lemons (juice of)
- 1 small bunch of thyme
- 600 ml hot vegetable stock, broth or bouillon (2.5 cups)
Soak the beans overnight, or for around 8 hours.
Place the beans in the slow cooker.
Peel the carrots and cut into half slices. Peel the sweet potato and cut into similar sized chunks. Peel and dice the onion. Add to the slow cooker.
Juice the lemons and add the lemons to the tinned tomatoes.
Heat them up, either in a pan, or the microwave. Alternatively, if your slow cooker can be used on the stove top combine the lemon and tomatoes with the other ingredients and heat on the stove 'til bubbling.
Place the thyme stalks in the cooker upright, so they are buried in the stew. Add the stock and cook for 8 hours on low.
Before serving carefully remove the thyme stalks.
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