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Good Eats :: Bean Stalker (11x10)
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Episode Information |
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| Title: | Bean Stalker |
| Episode #: | 11x10 |
| Production Number: | EA1109 |
| Original Airdate: | Wednesday November 07th, 2007 |
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Episode Summary |
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When Alton’s friend Chuck delivers the third bushel of green beans for that week, Alton’s at a loss. He has made every recipe he knows that contains green beans – twice. Chuck suggests a recipe his mother used to make, featuring green beans, mushroom soup and toasted onions. Alton, of course, recognizes this immediately and accepts Chuck’s latest offering. He can, he believes, employ sound science, the right ingredients and some tried and true techniques to turn the old fashioned dish (created in 1955 as part of a Campbell’s Soup marketing push) into Good Eats’ own Best Ever Green Bean Casserole.
| | There are no foreign summaries for this episode: Contribute | | English Recap Available: View Here |
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Guest Stars |
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Episode Notes |
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Cards- Phillip Miller, an 18th century gardener, is credited with advocating cooking and eating green beans in their pods.
- The string was first bred out of the bean by New York breeder Calvin Keeney in 1894.
- Dorcas Reilly was inducted into the Inventors Hall of Fame for the original green bean casserole recipe she developed in 1955.
- Greek Oracles believed that eating beans would cloud their vision.
- During the Middle Ages physicians prescribed onions to alleviate headaches, snakebites and hair loss.
- Legend has it that Pythagoras was killed by his enemies when he refused to escape through a bean field.
- If you don’t have a cast iron skillet you can use any vessel that goes from stovetop to oven.
| The episode title, Bean Stalker, is a combinatorial pun based on the idea of bean stalks (the plants on which green beans grow) and the modern concept of the “stalker,” an obsessed individual who pursues some object of his twisted affections relentlessly. In this case it could refer to Alton’s quest to build a better Green Bean Casserole. It also alludes to the story of Jack and the Beanstalk, references to which are woven throughout the plot.
| Locations: Whole Foods Market (Atlanta, Georgia)
| Haricot vert is simply French for “green bean” but the name has come to refer to a specific variety of bean that is longer and thinner than standard “pole beans.”
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Episode Quotes |
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Chuck: Hey, Mr. B. I brought you some more beans.
Alton: Yeah... this is the third bushel this week. You know, I’ve cooked every green bean recipe I have... twice.
Chuck: There must be something you can do with them. Hey! My mom, she used to make this great dish with green beans and mushrooms, and then she put onions on top.
Alton: You mean... green bean casserole?
Chuck: Yeah! Exactly! Although – you know – I doubt she’d give up the recipe. She’s pretty tight with her creations.
Alton: I’ll bet she is. Well, I’ll see if I can’t figure that one out myself. Thanks a lot!
| Alton: I suppose that with some sound science, the right ingredients, and a tried and true technique or two, even green bean casserole could be... (Good Eats theme plays)
| Alton: Modern green beans have been bred with a little extra fiber in them to help them survive shipping and handling, but they still don’t bear up in the refrigerator too well because their metabolism keeps ticking even after picking.
| Alton: Huggy Bear just called, and... he wants his hat back.
| Chuck: You might even say that I... stole a pot of gold from a giant...
| Alton: I was lucky enough to purchase some plans for my homemade panko machine on the Internet. What you need is you get yourself a very, very fine mesh metal screen, and you’ve got your patented batter here, and you just roll that out, all over your screen, like this so you’ve got plenty of coverage. There we go, that looks good. Now, all we have to do is apply the correct amount of current. (Laughing maniacally, Alton throws a switch. Sparks fly and lighting zips between electrodes. There is a sudden brilliant flare and when it dims, the machine is clearly ruined. Soot covers everything and Alton coughs slightly.) And that... is why you should always buy your Japanese style breadcrumbs...
| Alton: We are ready to cut two medium onions wafer thin. Although I could do this with a knife, if I felt like it, I’d rather use a mandoline. (An off-camera helper offers Alton a mandolin.) The show’s starting to run a little thick on gags, don’t you think??
| Alton: (discussing the use of the mandoline) Do yourself a favor and always use the hand guard. A lot of chefs throw these away, which is why they have nicknames like “Stubs” and “Bleedy.”
| Alton: Chuck, are you okay?
Chuck: Yeah, fine, I’m just out for a leisurely climb... stroll! Who said anything about climbing?
Alton: Calm down! Hey, look, I’ve got a green bean casserole just like your mom used to make.
Chuck: What? What? Oh, side dish – right – you’re going to need a main course. Here! (Chuck puts a covered cage labeled ‘Goldie’ on the table.)
Alton: What is this? A chicken?
Chuck: No, it’s a hen. Take it! I’m going to be out of town for a few days. You can take all the beans you want! You’re gonna need this! (Chuck hands Alton an axe.)
Alton: (suspiciously) Why???
Chuck: Peace out! (He leaves.)
| Alton: Does something about this scenario seem oddly... familiar?
Giant’s Voice: Fee... fi... fo... fum!
Alton: Yes, indeed, it does...
Giant’s Voice: I smell a... green bean casserole?!?
| Alton: (after losing his casserole to a giant) Well, today didn’t exactly work out the way I thought it would, but, uh, as they say of fairy tales they also say of green beans: all’s well that ends good... eats, that is!
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Episode Goofs |
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Alton refers to the early Campbell’s Soup incarnation as the Thomas Campbell Preserve Company. In fact, it was actually the “Joseph A. Campbell Preserve Company” after one of its founders.
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Cultural References |
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Alton says his Aunt’s green bean casserole featured gravy out of an H.P. Lovecraft story. Howard Phillips Lovecraft (1890 – 1937) wrote mostly cosmic horror stories featuring very alien forms of life from strange universes. His Cthulhu possesses an appearance so horrific that its proximity destroys a man’s sanity; it lives beneath the Pacific Ocean in the sunken city of R’lyeh, which conforms to a non-Euclidean geometry. Lovecraft’s horror has inspired the works of successors such as Stephen King and the word “Lovecraftian” has come to mean alien and horrible.
| Alton finally refuses his Aunt’s horrible casserole on Geneva Convention grounds. The Geneva Accords are an international treaty that sets forth, among other things, how captor nations must handle prisoners of war. Among its provisions are forbiddances against cruel treatment, poor food, overwork, and similar mistreatment. The idea is that everyone treats prisoners humanely against their future repatriation. Some nations and many organizations are either not signatories, or do not abide by the terms of the treaty, a controversial subject in the modern world. Alton’s refusal on Geneva Convention grounds suggests he regarded eating the casserole as inhumane treatment!
| Alton, noticing Chuck’s new bizarre get up, tells his friend that Huggy Bear wants his hat back. Alton’s referring to a character from 1970s buddy cop show Starsky & Hutch. Huggy Bear (Antonio Fargas) was a supporting character, an informer and petty criminal who occasionally provided the title characters with intelligence and every once in awhile tactical support. Huggy Bear’s attire set him apart from most other characters; it was distinctive and he was proud of it.
| When Chuck comments that “you might even say I stole a pot of gold from a giant” he is alluding to the tale of Jack and the Beanstalk. Jack, a poor widow’s son, traded the family’s cow for some magic beans. His angry mother threw these “worthless beans” out the window where they grew into an immense beanstalk that reached into the clouds. Climbing, Jack discovered the lair of a giant. Several trips back and forth later, Jack had stolen gold, a magic hen, and a magic flute from the enraged giant, who tried to follow him down the beanstalk, only to meet his end when Jack arrived at the ground first and chopped down the plant, sending the giant plummeting. There are references to this tale throughout the episode, right up to the end when Alton loses his casserole to the enraged giant.
| Alton once again refers to cutting something “wafer thin” using the snooty accent of the maitre d’ (John Cleese) from Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life. The maitre d’ hoped to induce grotesquely fat Mr. Creosote (Terry Jones) to eat a chocolate wafer for dessert, after he’d already eaten most everything in the restaurant and disgusted both staff and other diners. Mr. Creosote, finally full, begged off but the maitre d’ eventually persuaded him, with results best left to the imagination. That the maitre d’ knew or guessed the outcome in advance is suggested by his scurrying for cover after Mr. Creosote accepted the candy.
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Analysis |
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This is one of Alton’s single recipe shows, which means that it goes into more detail about the selection and preparation of ingredients that certain other episodes. That’s worthwhile for beginning cooks but more experienced hands may find it tedious. The show’s initial airing around Thanksgiving meant that Good Eats enthusiasts could learn how to prepare a popular holiday dish just in time. Alton’s focus is on technique and knowledge, this topic permitted him to nicely exploit those goals towards the modernization of a classic dish. Campbell’s created the original green bean casserole to sell cream of mushroom soup; might they be less than enthusiastic at a version of their dish that contains no soup at all?
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Featured Songs |
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Episode References |
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