Din Tai Fung Garlic Green Beans (Copycat)

This Din Tai Fung green beans recipe gets you the thing people actually order it for: skins wrinkled and blistered, centres still snapping, and far more finely minced garlic than seems reasonable. One wok, one plate, and the whole seasoning is salt, white pepper and a pinch of sugar.

It is an inspired copycat rather than the restaurant’s recipe. Din Tai Fung has never published theirs, and ingredients and preparation vary between locations.

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Why You’ll Love These Din Tai Fung Green Beans

Not soft sautéed beans sitting in sauce. The skins pucker and brown in patches while the middles stay bright and crisp, and that contrast is the entire dish.

It is also a five-ingredient side with no sauce to mix and nothing to reduce. Almost all the work is trimming and drying the beans. They hold their own beside a cold, sharp Din Tai Fung cucumber salad, the other vegetable dish people go back for.

Ingredients You’ll Need

Green beans. Fresh and slender, around 450g. Thick or older beans turn leathery before the skins blister, and frozen beans release too much water to wrinkle at all.

Garlic. Six to eight large cloves, minced as finely as you can manage. Chop it rather than crushing it to a paste, so the pieces cling to the beans instead of turning gluey.

Neutral oil. Rice bran, canola, peanut or grapeseed. Olive oil smokes and tastes wrong here.

Salt, white pepper and sugar. White pepper is doing real work, and black pepper is a different flavour rather than a milder one. The sugar is optional. Soy sauce is deliberately absent: it wets the surface and undoes the texture you just built.

How to Make Din Tai Fung Garlic Green Beans

1. Dry the beans properly. Trim, wash, then dry them completely in a clean tea towel. Damp beans steam instead of blistering, and they make hot oil spit.
2. Blister them in batches. Two tablespoons of oil in a large wok over medium-high, then half the beans in as close to one layer as you can manage. Toss every 30 seconds for five to seven minutes, until the skins wrinkle and pick up brown spots. Tip onto a plate and repeat.
3. Cook the garlic on its own. Heat down to medium, last of the oil in, garlic in, and stir 20 to 30 seconds until it smells sweet and has barely taken colour.
4. Toss and serve. Beans back in with the salt, white pepper and sugar, toss 30 to 60 seconds, taste, and get it on the table.

No water, no lid. Both steam the skins soft, which is the one thing this dish cannot come back from.

Tips, Variations and Substitutions

• Salt at the end. Salt pulls moisture to the surface, so beans seasoned early soften as they cook.
• Do not crowd the pan. Too many beans at once drops the temperature and braises them in their own steam. Two batches is the difference between this working and not.
• Serve immediately. They lose their edge within about ten minutes of leaving the pan.
• Deep-fried version. Closer to the restaurant, and messier. Heat neutral oil 4cm deep in a medium saucepan, roughly one litre, to 175°C/350°F. Fry the dry beans in three batches for 60 to 90 seconds each, letting the oil recover between batches. Drain on a rack, then carry on from step 3 with a tablespoon of the frying oil.
• Air-fryer version. Toss the beans with a tablespoon of oil, cook at 200°C/390°F for eight to ten minutes, shaking twice, and cook the garlic separately. This tastes roasted rather than fried, so treat it as its own thing rather than a match for the restaurant texture.

What to Serve With Garlic Green Beans

Hot beans against something cold and sharp is the pairing worth building around, which is why the cucumber salad works beside them. Otherwise: steamed jasmine rice and mapo tofu, vegan dumplings or bao, or this Panda Express eggplant tofu copycat for two restaurant dishes on the table.

Storage and Reheating

Keep leftovers in an airtight container in the fridge for up to three days, best on day one. Reheat in a dry frying pan over medium-high for two to three minutes, or in the air fryer at 190°C/375°F for three to four minutes. The microwave leaves them soft. Do not freeze them, because the middles go mealy on thawing.

Frequently Asked Questions

Are Din Tai Fung’s green beans vegan?

We cannot tell you what is in the restaurant’s current version. Recipes, suppliers and shared cooking surfaces vary between locations and change over time, so ask the restaurant if it matters to you. This copycat is vegan as written.

Do I need to blanch the beans first?

No. Blanching puts moisture back into beans you are about to dry-blister, and slender beans cook through in the time the skins take to wrinkle.

Why are my beans not blistering?

Usually one of three things: damp beans, a pan that was not hot enough, or too many at once.

Why did my garlic turn bitter?

It was in the pan too long, or it went in with the beans. Garlic needs 20 to 30 seconds on its own over medium heat and should come out pale, not brown.

Is this the same as Sichuan dry-fried green beans?

The technique is a relative of it. Sichuan versions usually bring in preserved mustard greens, dried chilli and often pork. This one is stripped back to garlic, salt and white pepper.

Din Tai Fung Garlic Green Beans Recipe

• Prep time: 10 minutes
• Cook time: 15 minutes
• Total time: 25 minutes
• Serves: 4 as a side

Ingredients

• 450g green beans, trimmed and dried completely
• 6 to 8 large garlic cloves (about 2 tablespoons), very finely minced
• 4 tablespoons (60ml) neutral high smoke point oil, such as rice bran, canola or peanut, divided
• 3/4 teaspoon fine salt, plus more to taste
• 1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon caster sugar (optional)

Instructions

1. Trim the stem ends from the beans, wash them, then dry them thoroughly in a clean tea towel. They must be completely dry before they meet hot oil.
2. Mince the garlic very finely and set it by the stove.
3. Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a large wok or frying pan over medium-high until it shimmers. Add half the beans in as close to a single layer as possible.
4. Cook for 5 to 7 minutes, tossing every 30 seconds, until the skins are wrinkled and blistered in brown patches and the beans are still bright green with a snap. Transfer to a plate.
5. Add another 1 and 1/2 tablespoons of oil and repeat with the remaining beans. Transfer to the plate.
6. Reduce the heat to medium. Add the last 1/2 tablespoon of oil and the garlic and stir constantly for 20 to 30 seconds, until fragrant and barely pale gold. Do not let it brown.
7. Return all the beans to the pan with the salt, white pepper and sugar. Toss over medium-high heat for 30 to 60 seconds until evenly coated. Taste, adjust the salt and serve straight away.

Notes

An inspired copycat. Din Tai Fung has not published theirs.

Nutrition figures are left out on purpose. Most of the calories here come from oil, and how much the beans hold depends on the pan, the heat and the batch size, so any number would be a guess.

Serve the beans with Veganiac’s Din Tai Fung cucumber salad for an easy restaurant-inspired vegan spread.

• Din Tai Fung
• Green Beans
• Copycat Recipes
• Vegan Side Dishes
• Garlic