Smoky Potato, Collard, and Navy Bean Skillet
Diced red potatoes crisped hard in a skillet with smoked paprika, then folded through ribbons of collard greens and navy beans with garlic, lemon, and cider vinegar.
Why You'll Love This Recipe
This is a Tuesday supper built out of things that keep. A bag of potatoes, a bunch of collards, and a can of beans will sit in a kitchen for a week and still make dinner, and I rely on that more often than I admit. It takes about half an hour, and the only technique in it is patience with the potatoes: you dice them, boil them briefly so the insides go fluffy, then crisp them hard in a skillet and leave them alone long enough to build a crust. Everything after that is fast. The greens take three minutes and the beans just need to be warm.
Collards get treated like a vegetable that needs an afternoon, and cut small they simply do not. Strip the stems, stack the leaves, roll them like a cigar, and slice across into thin ribbons, and you have something that goes from squeaky to tender in the time it takes to stir it twice. The stems are worth keeping too. Sliced thin and thrown in with the onion, they cook down sweet and stay a little crunchy. Smoked paprika is what ties the pan together, and it goes in with the oil rather than at the end so the fat carries it into everything.
Nothing here is a side dish that got promoted. The potatoes are crisp on the outside and soft inside, the beans go creamy against them, and the greens keep a faint bitterness that all that smoke needs. Acid at the end is not optional here. Lemon juice and cider vinegar go in off the heat, and they turn what would be a heavy brown skillet into something you keep wanting another forkful of. Any leftovers crisp back up beautifully in a dry pan the next day.
Ingredients
- 1 1/4 lb small red potatoes, cut into 1/2-inch dice
- 1 large bunch collard greens (about 14 oz), stems stripped and leaves rolled and cut into 1/2-inch ribbons
- 1 can (15 oz) navy beans, drained and rinsed well
- 1 small yellow onion, halved and sliced thin
- 5 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
- 2 1/2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 1/2 tsp smoked paprika
- 2 tbsp lemon juice (about 1 lemon)
- 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- 1/4 tsp fine sea salt
- 1/2 tsp coarsely ground black pepper
Instructions
- Boil the potatoes briefly: Put the diced potatoes in a saucepan, cover with cold water by an inch, and bring to a boil. Cook for six to eight minutes from the boil, until a knife slides into a piece with a little resistance still there. Drain them well and let them steam dry in the colander for a minute. Let them dry properly, since a wet potato steams in the skillet and welds itself to the metal instead of crisping.
- Prep the collards while they cook: Strip the leaves off the collard stems by running your hand down each stem. Slice the stems thin and set them aside separately, because they take several minutes longer than the leaves and go into the pan ahead of them. Stack the leaves a few at a time, roll them into a tight cigar, and slice across into half-inch ribbons.
- Crisp the potatoes: Heat the olive oil in a 12-inch cast iron skillet over medium-high until it shimmers. Add the potatoes in one layer with the smoked paprika and the salt, press them flat, and leave them completely alone for five minutes, since a potato only browns where it sits still against hot metal. Toss once and repeat for another three to four minutes, until the edges are dark and the pan smells toasted.
- Add the onion, stems, and garlic: Push the potatoes to one side, add the onion and the sliced collard stems to the open space, and cook for three minutes until they soften and take on color. Add the garlic and cook 30 seconds more, stirring, just until it smells sweet, so that it softens without catching, because burnt garlic would be the loudest thing in a pan this plain.
- Wilt the greens and warm the beans: Pile the collard ribbons into the pan with a tablespoon of water and the black pepper. They will look like far too much for the skillet and will drop by half within a minute. Toss for two to three minutes, until they are glossy and tender with a little chew left, then fold in the navy beans and cook one minute more to heat them through.
- Finish with acid, off the heat: Take the skillet off the burner, add the lemon juice and the cider vinegar, and toss twice so it hits everything. Taste and add a little more vinegar if the pan tastes flat. Serve straight from the skillet while the potatoes still have their crust.
Variations
- Chile heat: Add a quarter teaspoon of cayenne with the smoked paprika so the oil goes properly hot rather than just smoky.
- Blistered tomatoes: Throw a cup of cherry tomatoes into the pan with the garlic and let them burst against the potatoes.
- Fried egg on top: Slide a runny fried egg onto each bowl and let the yolk run down through the greens.
- Mustard and dill: Stir a teaspoon of dijon mustard into the lemon juice before it goes in, and finish with a handful of chopped fresh dill.
- Tahini drizzle: Loosen two tablespoons of tahini with lemon juice and water until it pours, and spoon it over each serving.
Storage & Leftovers
This keeps four days in a sealed container in the refrigerator and is one of the better weekday leftovers I make. The greens hold their color, the beans go a little softer and creamier overnight, and the smoke settles into the potatoes rather than sitting on top of them.
Reheat it in a dry skillet over medium-high for three or four minutes, spread flat and left alone for the first two so the potatoes crisp again. The microwave heats it through fine, but everything softens together and the crust is half of why this dish works.
It freezes for up to two months in flat sealed portions, with one caveat: the potatoes come back mealier than they went in. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator and reheat in a hot pan rather than from frozen. A fresh squeeze of lemon at the end brings the whole thing back.
Notes & Tips
- Dry the potatoes before they hit the oil: A minute in the colander lets the surface steam off. Wet dice sizzle, stick, and steam themselves gray instead of browning.
- Use the widest heavy pan you own: A pound and a quarter of potatoes needs contact with metal. In a small pan they stack up and you get soft cubes instead of crisp ones.
- Keep the collard stems: Sliced thin they cook in the same time as the onion and go sweet and crunchy. Throwing them away costs you the best texture in the pan.
- Bloom the paprika in the oil: Smoked paprika added at the end tastes dusty. In hot fat at the start it turns the whole skillet rust red and the smoke goes everywhere.
- Rinse the beans properly: Thirty seconds under running water until the foam stops. The liquid in the can is starchy and slightly bitter and it flattens the smoke.
- Add the acid off the heat: Lemon and vinegar boiled in a hot pan lose their edge within seconds. Off the burner, they stay sharp and lift everything.
Nutrition & Mindful Eating
- Potatoes, collards, and navy beans are three cheap ingredients doing very different jobs. The potatoes give the skillet its body and its crust, the beans bring the protein and go creamy against them, and the greens carry the calcium and the color.
- Collard greens are the sturdiest of the cooking greens, which is why they can be cut into ribbons and thrown into a hot pan without collapsing, and they are one of the few vegetables that bring a real amount of calcium along with their vitamin K.
- Navy beans are small, mild, and thin-skinned, so they soften into the potatoes rather than sitting apart from them, and they carry soluble fiber that is part of why a bowl of this holds you the way it does.
- Red potatoes keep their waxy structure through boiling and frying, which is what lets them crisp on the outside and stay fluffy inside, and the skin left on is where a good share of their fiber and potassium sits.
- Smoked paprika, garlic, and a late splash of cider vinegar are what you actually taste. The paprika goes into the oil so the smoke reaches everything, the garlic sweetens in half a minute, and the vinegar off the heat keeps a brown skillet from tasting heavy.
- As you eat, look for the darkest potato edges and notice how the vinegar arrives after the smoke does, and let yourself finish one bowl before deciding whether you want another.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I use a different green?
Kale works on the same timing and stays a little firmer. Mustard greens are sharper and want an extra minute. Cabbage cut into ribbons is the mildest choice and goes sweet rather than bitter, which changes the balance, so cut back on the vinegar a touch if you use it.
My potatoes stuck to the pan and fell apart.
Almost always moisture. Let them steam dry in the colander after draining, get the oil properly shimmering before they go in, and then do not touch them for the first five minutes. A crust has to form before a potato will release, and stirring early is what tears them up.
Can I skip the boiling step?
You can, but plan on about eighteen minutes in the skillet with a lid on for the first ten rather than the eight it takes here. The brief boil is what gets the middles fluffy, and it happens while you are cutting the greens, so it costs you nothing in real time.
Are other beans as good?
Cannellini beans are the closest, creamy and mild in the same way. Chickpeas hold their shape more and give the pan a firmer bite. Whatever you use, drain and rinse them well so the starchy liquid from the can does not dull the smoked paprika.