looking for a specific string bean recipe

[siduri]

I was making those large flat string beans last night, the ones i believe are called Italian beans - they're light green and cook up bright green, are about half an inch wide and a longer than the regular ones.  It made me crave a dish my friend's mother made back in the 70s or late 60s. 

I remember it has some white sauce, which was not bechamel, it was much lighter, and i think may have been buttermilk - though it could have been sour cream or cream.  I don;t know what else there was in it, but it tasted like more than just buttermilk and beans.  \

Does anybody have such a recipe?  I don't know where she got it, maybe from a magazine or a cooking show (back then there was just julia child, the galloping gourmet and joyce chen I think).

Would love to find it.  

thanks 

 

[chefedb]

There is a dish here a lot of people make around the Holidays here, it is something like it only they add french fried canned onions and then bake like a casserole, some add cheese.

 

[kyheirloomer]

In the U.S., Siduri, fwiw that type of bean is called "Romano."

As for the other, I agree with Ed. It sounds like the ubiquitous green bean casserole. If so, the sauce you remember came out of a can, starting life as cream of (I believe) mushroom. Cream of something, anyway.

 

[siduri]

No, no, no!  NOT green bean casserole.  The dish was light and fresh, there were no canned things in it, and the main reason she made it for me is she knew i hated overcooked beans.  It used blanched romano beans (thanks ky) and something light and simple on it, that had a slight tang, very slight, so i thought maybe buttermilk.   Definitely not even bechamel.  The appearance was of the beans being barely masked in a white sauce, not covered in it like bechamel.  (How is that spelled, anyway? here they spell it like that).

It was heavenly. 

I believe there was something more to it than just plain buttermilk or sour cream poured on the beans, because she spoke of a "recipe", and in our families, hers and mine, one used a "recipe" only for a more complex dish than that.  Also she made everything from scratch.  I was maybe 14 or so, so not really yet into cooking enough to ask her for it. 

 

[kyheirloomer]

Siduri, I just googled "green beans and cream," and, among the many hits, was this one:
If not exactly what you were describing it sounds awfully close.

 

[siduri]

thanks so much, KY, i did a search, but was looking for buttermilk and romano beans.  But i bet it was something like this.  ]

I'll try it soon, there are lots of beans out there these days at the markets.