How to Make a Cassoulet

Cassoulet is a French slow-cooked bean stew, typically made with a variety of meats. In this case, I used pork and duck. My parents learned how to make this when they lived in France about twenty years ago, and I’ve always wanted to make it again. Being that I’m blessed with living in Chicago and therefore have access to some of the more exotic ingredients the dish calls for, I figured it was high time to give it a shot.


To start out with, I sorted through a vast array of recipes before settling on this one, which was the closest to what I was aiming for. And now, it’s time to cook!

The Ingredients The Ingredients

Let’s start out with the ingredients. Here we have (going clockwise from left) yellow onions, fresh thyme, one ham bone (the darkish lump), duck fat, fresh ham hocks, pork sausage, two packages of duck confit (four legs), fresh pork rind (skin), and white Great Northern beans.
Step One Step One

The first thing you need to do is rinse the beans, then spread them out on a flat surface and pick out any off-color beans and stones (yes, they do get in there). Set the beans aside.
Step Two Step Two

Place the ham hocks in a large pot. Add one onion *quartered), fresh thyme, and salt and pepper.
Step Three Step Three

Cover the ham hocks and other ingredients with water and bring to a boil over high heat.
Step Four Step Four

Simmer party covered for two hours.
Step Five Step Five

Cut the pork rind into squares (these are actually a bit big – 1/2″ squares would have been better).
Step Six Step Six

Place the pork rind, one onion (quartered), and the ham bone in a large, heavy-bottomed pot.
Step Seven Step Seven

Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, until the pork skin is rendered, about 20 minutes.
Step Eight Step Eight

Add the beans to the pot with the ham bone and cover with enough water so it covers everything by 1/2″ (about 8 cups). Season with salt.
Step Nine Step Nine

Bring to a simmer, then reduce heat to low and cook until beans are tender, about 45 minutes. Adjust salt, if necessary.
Step Ten Step Ten

Set the beans aside to cool.
Step Eleven Step Eleven

Heat duck fat in a large skillet over medium-high heat.
Step Twelve Step Twelve

Add sausages to the pan.
Step Thirteen Step Thirteen

Cook until brown on all sides, about ten minutes.
Step Fourteen Step Fourteen

Place garlic, remaining onion, and 1/2 cup water in a blender and purée until smooth (not shown). Add garlic paste to sausages and reduce heat to medium-low. Cook, turning sausages occasionally, for 10 minutes more.
Step Fifteen Step Fifteen

After two hours of cooking, set aside the ham hocks to cool. Once cool, remove the meat from the bones. Discard the bones.
Step Sixteen Step Sixteen

Preheat oven to 350°. Using a slotted spoon, remove and discard ham bone and onion from beans (it is okay if some pieces of onion remain). Using a slotted spoon, transfer about half the beans with pork rind to a heavy wide-mouthed 5-6 qt. cast-iron Dutch oven.
Step Seventeen Step Seventeen

Now assemble the cassoulet in layers. Place the meat from the ham hocks on top of the beans.
Step Eighteen Step Eighteen

Next add the sausages and garlic paste.
Step Nineteen Step Nineteen

Arrange the duck legs on the sausages (the orange bit is duck fat), then add the balance of the beans.
Step Twenty Step Twenty

Add the balance of the beans on top of the duck.
Step Twenty-One Step Twenty-One

Season with nutmeg and add just enough reserved bean cooking liquid to cover the beans (about 3 cups).
Step Twenty-Two Step Twenty-Two

Bake, uncovered, until cassoulet comes to a simmer and a crust begins to form, about 1 hour. (Man, that pizza stone has seen better days…)
Step Twenty-Three Step Twenty-Three

Reduce heat to 250° and cook for 3 hours, checking every hour or so to make sure cassoulet is barely simmering (a little liquid should be bubbling around edges of cassoulet). If cassoulet appears dry, break crust (browned top layer) by gently pushing it down with the back of a spoon, allowing a new layer of beans to rise to the surface. Add just enough reserved bean cooking liquid (or water) to moisten beans.
The Finished Product The Finished Product

Theoretically, you’re supposed to remove the cassoulet from the oven, cool it down, then refrigerate overnight and reheat it to let the flavors mingle better. We weren’t that patient! The final product was absolutely delicious.

Duncan’s Final Notes: As you might have guessed, this is neither an inexpensive nor an easy dish to make. It’s quite time-consuming, but for me, it was very much worth it! It had all of the flavors I remember, and it was extremely delicious! The only thing I would change the next time I make this is to use different pork sausages – the smooth texture of the emulsified sausages I used (think hot dog texture) was at odds with the other textures in the stew. Next time I’ll go with a more conventional ground sausage. The majority of the ingredients can be gotten form any grocery store, but the fresh ham hocks and pork rind might have to come from a butcher shop. The duck confit is probably the toughtest to find – look at gourmet specialty shops in their frozen sections, or if all else fails you can order it by mail (from Amazon, no less!).

8 thoughts on “How to Make a Cassoulet”

  3. plonq

    The picture in step twenty-three looks so good it almost made me choke on my own drool. This looks and sounds extraordinarily good. =9

  7. genet

    Was that actually in your kitchen? Or are those older photos? Because…. those cabinets? not yours. 😉

  8. Anonymous

    next time try italian sausage (sweet) or, if you can get it, merguey (spelling?), a morrocan or algerian lamb sausage. The latter is most widely used in the haute-savoie, provence, perigord areas of france. looks yummy!

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