When Deb and I moved to Pasadena for me to begin work at The Huntington (October, 1984), one of the earliest couples to adopt us was Marge and Sherm Telleen. Throughout our 36 years at The Huntington, Marge and Sherm would remain steadfast friends and supporters. You’d never meet a more casually welcoming and generous pair, hosting us at their Anzeborrego home for an incredible weekend, inviting us to dinners at their San Marino home, and sharing their family members as friends, even volunteers.
At one dinner, early in our time at Huntington, Marge served a meal she had made often, especially for meetings of the local school board. She called it, therefore, School Board Cassoulet.
The dish has a lot to recommend itself. It’s hearty and savory, suggesting itself for winter months. You can prep it a day before, even making extra which freezes well. It isn’t costly; served with rice and a salad, this is a complete meal. The final steps involve baking in the oven for quite a while, which makes it perfect for serving to guests – no last minute cooking.
Unlike French Cassoulet, this is based on Red Kidney Beans – not fresh ones you cook, but canned beans. Believe it or not, canned Kidney Beans are entirely different from those you boil or pressure cook from soaked dry seed. There’s a firmness and sweetness to the canned beans I’ve never been able to duplicate by cooking my own.
For a large batch, you’ll want to purchase the No. 2 cans of Kidney Beans, available at Smart & FInal (West Coast) and warehouse kinds of stores. I never find the large cans in regional grocery stores here in Florida.
Below you’ll find Marge’s recipe with alterations (shortcuts and availability substitutions I’ve made over the years.) It’s a flexible dish that depends on a long simmer in the oven to meld flavors.
School Board Cassoulet, from Marge Telleen
Ingredients:
- 45 oz. canned red kidney beans, drained and rinsed (or 2 ½ cups dry red kidney beans, cooked – but not the same)
- 6 tbs butter & a bit of olive oil
- 3 medium onions
- 1 large green bell, chopped (I usually leave this out because I will use bottled marinara rather than the tomato paste)
- 1 clove garlic, minced
- 3 pounds mild sausage (Marge used Italian, I use the Kielbasa that’s available in most stores)
- 2 cups dry red wine
- 3 tbs tomato paste (I usually have an open jar of Marinara in the fridge, and will substitute this for the paste)
- 1 bay leaf
- 3 whole cloves (I often forget this, and it isn’t missed)
- salt and pepper to taste
Start with a large, heavy skillet. Melt butter in the olive oil and add thinly sliced onions (and green pepper if you use this – we don’t because so many foods are made with green peppers anymore that we skip that flavor in this). Stir in garlic, cook for 5 minutes or so. Add the Marinara, stir and set aside.
In the same or another skillet, cook the sliced sausage until browned. Move the sausage to a large kettle and add the wine, bay leaf (cloves, if used) and enough broth and water to cover the sausage well. Simmer this while you open, drain, and rinse the canned beans. After a bit of time simmering, remove the bay leaf and cloves, and set to the side.
Now you have some decisions to make. You’ll want a dutch over large enough to hold all the ingredients, which will be layered. And, you’ll want a roasting pan or tray to place under the dutch oven – the contents will boil over and make a mess.
Begin the layering with beans, which then get a dose of salt and pepper. Now layer in half the cooked sausage. Top that with another third of the beans (with salt and pepper), then the remaining sausage and finally the remaining beans. There should be just enough room at the top to cover the mixture with the cooked onions.
This seems a bit speculative, but I usually keep an extra can of beans to wash and add if the mix is too shallow. Also, you don’t want to short change the onions, but any extra can take on another life in some dish later.
Pour in the heated wine, broth, and water mixture. It should come nearly to the brim. Bake at 300 F for an hour, and at a slightly lower temperature (275) for another hour. This gives plenty of time to prepare rice and a salad, etc.
The dinner is great with James Beard’s quick Italian bread – perhaps the simplest yeast bread you’ll ever make. With instant rise yeast, it’s about an hour from start to finish. I will include that recipe in with Breads.
Link to this Page: https://botanyincontext.com/school-board-cassoulet/