It wasn’t that long ago that beans and pulses languished in the back of our cupboards and deemed only fit for the most boring and bland vegetarian dishes, no more.

Giant butter beans and queen chickpeas are now at the forefront of any home cook and chefs repertoire of plant based dishes or veggie sides, and the Bold Bean Company founded by Henley local Amelia Christie-Miller are leading the way of championing legumes by writing a recipe book, getting beans back on our tables, in our dishes and most importantly in our tummies!

So hear this! On 3rd August Pavilion Foods in Market Place are hosting an exclusive evening to celebrate the launch of Amelia’s new cook book Bold Beans: Recipes to Get Your Pulse Racing.

Amelia said, “It’s a real thrill to be launching Bold Beans: Recipes to Get Your Pulse Racing into the world, filled with recipes that will excite and transform how people use beans. I see this as a huge milestone for beans, not only are we able to celebrate their versatility in the kitchen, but through the contributions from leading food writers and chefs, this book is representative of  a bean movement that we are starting. Bring it on!”

On the evening you will get to sample numerous recipes from the book as well as hear from Amelia regarding the inspiration behind it, but we couldn’t wait to get ahead of the game with a little insight of how Bold Bean Company came to be.

“I started my life hating beans, they were dusty, dull things I avoided with a vengeance. Then, whilst living abroad in Spain, on a hangover, all I had to eat was a jar of beans in the house. I ate a spoonful of heirloom butter beans straight out of the jar. This was where I had my bean perception changed forever.

I then started my career working with top chefs where I learned more and more about how you could use beans creatively (from chefs), I saw them as something cool, delicious and aspirational. The rocket ship of bean obsession took off when I discovered just how crucial they were in our food future.

As a cook and a food lover, I found them to be the ideal ingredient in taking plant-based cooking to the next level, something I wanted to do more of, but didn’t feel inspired by. Rich in natural protein, they were the lowest carbon meat replacement out there. I learned about how our topsoils had 60 harvests left before they were depleted from industrial farming, and how legume crops were the answer to them – natural fertilisers.

They were the crop which our ancestors survived on for years when meat was harder to come by, they got civilization to where it is today. Why weren’t people as obsessed with beans as I was? I realised I needed to take people back to the place where my bean perception had changed forever and bring those Spanish beans to the UK.”

And so here we are with a nation slowly becoming bean obsessed!

If you want to get in on the bean action at Pavilion Foods on 3rd August, click the button below.

Pavilion Foods accepts the Experience Henley Card. Experience Henley Cardholders get a 20% discount on the Bold Bean Supper Club event and 10% discount on any instore purchases of £50 or more . Click image below for more information about the card.

Image (top): Credit – Milly Fletcher