Green Beans with a Honey-Sesame Dressing
Barney Kulok’s String Bean Salad
POSTED UNDER
- Asian
INGREDIENTS
- ginger,
- honey,
- sesame oil,
- sesame seed,
- soy sauce,
- string beans,
- tahini
NOTES
This is a savory and potent dressing. It goes well with string beans, but I could imagine using this for soba noodles, roasted broccoli, eggplant …
RECIPE
DIFFICULTY
MODERATE
SERVES
6
PREP TIME
10 MINS
Salad
-
3cupsgreen beans
Dressing
-
1/2CUPTOASTED SESAME SEEDS
-
1/2TBSMIRIN
-
3TBSSOY SAUCE
-
1TBSTUPELO HONEY
-
1TBSTOASTED SESAME OIL
-
1TBSTAHINI
-
1TBSRICE VINEGAR
-
ADDITIONAL BLACK AND WHITE SESAME SEEDS, FOR GARNISH
POSTED UNDER
- Asian
INGREDIENTS
- ginger,
- honey,
- sesame oil,
- sesame seed,
- soy sauce,
- string beans,
- tahini
The first time I had artist Barney Kulok’s cooking was after a night of gallery openings in the Lower East Side. I was famished after so much socializing and pretending to look at art, so Barney offered to cook me dinner. We stopped at Citarella, he got wild salmon and the best salad greens he could find (the man knows his audience). Back at his home in Long Island City, Barney calmly moved about the kitchen, singularly focused, unfazed by the cocktail nuts, cheese, wine or idle gossip. It was one of the most generously made meals I have eaten to date. Impromptu, no-fuss, and prepared with so much pleasure, I didn’t even feel bad that I didn’t do a thing to help.
Barney Kulok is a man of mystery. Just try and find an interview with him online. For a photographer with galleries in New York and Paris and exhibitions all over Europe, it’s unusual to find such a successful artist so stoic. But he was more than willing to open his home, share his spectacular salad (and show me his honey collection, which was incredible), but he himself would take a back seat, allowing his string beans take center stage.
Truth be told, us artist types tend to love the sound of our own voices and to wax poetic about the meaning and intention behind our work. But maybe when your work is really, really good, you don’t need to talk it to death?