Homemade Green Bean Casserole
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Homemade Green Bean Casserole
Just say no to canned cream of mushroom soup and canned green beans! This Homemade Green Bean Casserole is next level delicious.
For years I thought I didn’t like Green Bean Casserole. I’d only ever had it with canned green beans and canned cream of mushroom soup. I can’t explain it completely but I’ve always just had a strong aversion to canned green beans – they are so mushy! Canned cream of mushroom soup also just has a chemical flavor, which takes over the amazing flavor and power of mushrooms. When cooked into a dish mushrooms provide such a high level of nutty, woodsy, aromatic flavor.
The best part is, you can leave the mushrooms whole (for people like me that love mushrooms) or chop them fine and cook them down in the soup (for people like my husband who don’t like the texture of mushrooms).
Either way, the flavor of this homemade cream of mushroom soup is at the next level. It’s creamy and thick with the most delicious butter-y mushroom flavor.
Here are my tips for getting this casserole just right:
- Use fresh green beans, and cut the ends off of them first, then cut them into 1 inch pieces. If the pieces are too long it makes it really hard to serve and eat.
- Reduce the mushrooms down until they are very soft. The more you cook the mushrooms down in the butter, the more of that mushroom flavor you’ll get in the soup.
- Fried onions: I’ve tried several brands of crispy fried onions, and even though I usually don’t have much name brand preference when cooking, the French’s ones really are the best. They have the most salt and the lightest batter of 3 kinds I tested (Trader Joe’s and a generic grocery store brand).
If you need a side dish for Thanksgiving or the Holiday Season in general, this one is an upleveled crowd pleaser. The little changes of swapping out canned soup for homemade and canned green beans for fresh ones really are game changers.
Homemade Green Bean Casserole
Ingredients
Green Beans
- 1 lb. fresh green beans (ends trimmed off, cut into 1 inch pieces)
- water, for steaming
Cream of Mushroom Soup
- 1/2 lb. mushrooms (crimini are my favorite for this dish)
- 1/2 cup butter, unsalted (1 stick)
- 3 tablespoons minced garlic
- 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1½ teaspoons salt
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper
- 3 cups half and half
- 1/2 cup chicken broth
- 1/4 cup flour
Topping
- 2 cups crispy fried onions
Instructions
Green Beans
- Steam the chopped green beans in a pan filled with about 2 inches of water. (You can also use a steamer basket).Steam green beans for 6-8 minutes, or until soft but not overcooked. You want them to still be green.
- Strain green beans and set aside .
- Preheat oven to 350°F.
Cream of Mushroom Soup
- Heat butter in a large skillet or heavy-bottomed pan over medium-high heat, until sizzling.
- Then add in the mushrooms (they will cook down quite a bit, so you don't need to chop them if you don't mind mushroom pieces in your casserole, however if you have people eating the casserole that don't want pieces of whole mushroom, you can dice them into small pieces).
- Cover the mushrooms and sauté in the butter until reduced by a little more than half – the more you reduce them, the nuttier the flavor will be.
- Once mushrooms have cooked down, add minced garlic and the salt, pepper, onion powder, and garlic powder.Cook for 2 more minutes, stirring and being careful not to burn the garlic.
- Next, add the chicken broth and the flour, and stir together to form a roux. As soon as the flour is dissolved, add in the half and half, and continue to whisk until smooth.
- Continue cooking down and stirring until mixture bubbles, thickens, and reduces by about half.
- Once reduced, remove from heat. Pour over cooked green beans and stir until all the green beans are coated well.
- Pour into a baking dish roughly 9×9" or 9×13" in size.
- Bake in preheated oven for 20 minutes.
- Remove from oven and add fried onions to the top of the beans. Return to oven and bake for 10-12 more minutes until crispy onions are slightly browned.
- Remove from oven and serve immediately.
- (You can prepare this dish ahead of time and refrigerate in the casserole dish with the beans mixed in with the cream of mushroom soup in the casserole dish, covered, for 1-2 days. When you remove from the fridge, bake in a 350°F oven without the crispy onions for 30 minutes. Then remove from oven, top with crispy onions and bake for 10-12 more minutes until crispy onions are slightly browned.)
- Enjoy
Click here to see my other Thanksgiving recipes. And tag me me @plumstreetcollective on Instagram if you get a chance to make this Homemade Green Bean Casserole. Thanks for stopping by!
Good morning! Could you clarify for me the amount of garlic in this recipe please? Do you use fresh, dried minced, or garlic powder? Thanks!!
It’s minced garlic! Thanks for the note – I’ll update that to clarify!