This healthy revision of green bean casserole skips the canned soup and all the fat and sodium that come with it. Our white sauce with sliced fresh mushrooms, sweet onions and low-fat milk makes a creamy, rich casserole.

Makes 6 servings, about 3/4 cup each

ACTIVE TIME: 30 minutes

TOTAL TIME: 45 minutes

EASE OF PREPARATION: Easy

3 tablespoons canola oil, divided
1 medium sweet onion (half diced, half thinly sliced), divided
8 ounces mushrooms, chopped
1 tablespoon onion powder
1 1/4 teaspoons salt, divided
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper
2/3 cup all-purpose flour, divided
1 cup low-fat milk
3 tablespoons dry sherry (see Ingredient Note)
1 pound frozen French-cut green beans (about 4 cups)
1/3 cup reduced-fat sour cream
3 tablespoons buttermilk powder (see Ingredient Note)
1 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1. Preheat oven to 400°F. Coat a 2 1/2-quart baking dish with cooking spray.
2. Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add diced onion and cook, stirring often, until softened and slightly translucent, about 4 minutes. Stir in mushrooms, onion powder, 1 teaspoon salt, thyme and pepper. Cook, stirring often, until the mushroom juices are almost evaporated, 3 to 5 minutes. Sprinkle 1/3 cup flour over the vegetables; stir to coat. Add milk and sherry and bring to a simmer, stirring often. Stir in green beans and return to a simmer. Cook, stirring, until heated through, about 1 minute. Stir in sour cream and buttermilk powder. Transfer to the prepared baking dish.
3. Whisk the remaining 1/3 cup flour, paprika, garlic powder and the remaining 1/4 teaspoon salt in a shallow dish. Add sliced onion; toss to coat. Heat the remaining 2 tablespoons oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add the onion along with any remaining flour mixture and cook, turning once or twice, until golden and crispy, 4 to 5 minutes. Spread the onion topping over the casserole.
4. Bake the casserole until bubbling, about 15 minutes. Let cool for 5 minutes before serving.

NUTRITION INFORMATION: Per serving: 212 calories; 10 g fat (2 g sat, 5 g mono); 10 mg cholesterol; 23 g carbohydrate; 7 g protein; 3 g fiber; 533 mg sodium; 259 mg potassium.
Nutrition bonus: Calcium (16% daily value).
1 1/2 Carbohydrate Servings
Exchanges: 1/2 starch, 1 vegetable, 2 fat

TIP: Ingredient notes:
Don’t use the high-sodium “cooking sherry” sold in many supermarkets. Instead, purchase dry sherry sold with other fortified wines.

Look for buttermilk powder, such as Saco Buttermilk Blend, in the baking section or with the powdered milk in most supermarkets.

This looks and sounds great. I'm definitley going to try this. I might try fresh or canned green beans since I'm not a fan of frozen.

Kathy, Redding, CA

I made this for my family's Thanksgiving and it was very good and everyone loved it. There were a few variations from the recipe that I made. I wasn't able to find dry sherry so I subsituted 3 Tbsp of water and I used whole green beans instead of french cut because that was all they had at the store. (I kind of waited until the last minute to buy the ingredients) Also, the buttermilk powder was kind of hard to find but I finally did find it and it just happened to be the SaCo buttermilk blend that the ingredient note mentions. The only suggestion I would give to people is to make sure you have a very large skillet because it gets really full. I used the biggest skillet I had and even then I had to leave out 2 oz. of green beans because they wouldn't have fit. This could've been because my green beans were whole cut though. Overall, this recipe is excellent. The directions are a little complicated and mashed together so I would suggest measuring things out the night before. By the time you find your place in the recipe's directions and measure out the 3-4 ingredients, the sauce might have burnt. I measured out most of the ingredients the night before and it helped tremendously. Thanks for the recipe!

Micha, Fort Worth, TX

This was awful! Out of 6 people at Thanksgiving dinner, not one person remotely liked it. We put it down the garbage disposal. The texture is not the same and the flavor was definately not the same. The sherry should be left out completely...it added a weird alcohol flavor.

Angela

My daughter in Austin made this and the sweet potato with maple glaze recipes for her first thanksgiving dinner as the cook. She liked how both turned out. She may have used more of the recipes for this site. I've been looking for the green bean casserole without using the usual soup, so she gave me this web site. I could not get too many details, as it was a bigger project than she thought, and she was too pooped to pop, but called to share her sense of accomplishment! I'm glad to know of this web site.

Susan Kangas, Anaheim, CA

GROSS, I made this for Thanksgiving and what a disapointment. The sherry was way too much, yucky! And the onions didn't fry up

Me, Essex, VT

I agree that the sherry is a terrible addition and ruined my green beans the first time I made them, which was unfortunately on Thanksgiving, with guests. I really wonder if 3T is a typo. I made this tonight sans sherry and it was surprisingly tasty. My advice: leave it out.

Rachele, Brooklyn, NY