Old-Fashioned Pole Beans

This is how your grandma cooked green beans in the South, and there’s a reason the method stuck around. Fresh pole beans simmered in ham hock broth until they’re soft, silky, and infused with smoky pork flavor from edge to edge.

The ham hock goes into the water a full hour before the beans, and that’s the step that makes everything work. That long simmer renders the fat, breaks down the collagen, and creates a rich, smoky broth that the beans cook in rather than plain water. By the time the beans go in, they’re joining a pot liquor that’s already packed with flavor.

Thirty minutes of simmering takes the beans well past the crisp-tender stage, and that’s intentional. Old-fashioned Southern pole beans are meant to be soft and yielding, not snappy. They soak up that porky broth and become something entirely different from a quick-blanched green bean.

Chef Tips

• String the beans before cooking. Pole beans often have tough fibrous strings along the seam that snap beans don’t. Run a knife along the edge or pull them off by hand.
• Don’t rush the ham hock. That full hour of simmering before the beans is what builds the broth. Cutting it short means watery, bland beans.
• Save the pot liquor. That smoky broth left in the pot is gold for soaking up with cornbread or using as a base for other dishes.
• A smoked ham hock gives the best flavor. If you can only find fresh, add a splash of liquid smoke to compensate.

Variations

• With new potatoes: Add small red potatoes to the pot when the beans go in for a one-pot Southern supper.
• Bacon version: No ham hock? Render a few strips of thick-cut bacon in the pot first, then build the broth in the bacon fat.