Is It Asparagus or Is It A Bean?

July 24, 2014

Usually we don’t have very good luck growing green beans.  We plant them in the spring, the plants come up, and the bean bugs take over soon afterwards.  However, this year our beans are doing great.  I like to attribute it to me quitting my job, which has allowed me to concentrate on growing food, creating craft projects (which I see as a real “need”), and keeping the house clean enough so that the health department doesn’t declare it unfit for human occupation.

Last year we ordered some beans called Asparagus Beans from a company called Southern Exposure Seed Exchange.  (This is a great company, by the way, as they offer many heirloom seeds, which is what Charming and I prefer to grow.  Their seeds are from the same stock as what our ancestors grew in their gardens…long before Monsanto and DuPont started fiddling with the genetic make-up of American seeds.)  As I recall from the description in the catalog, the beans actually originated in Asia and although they look like green beans they are really more closely related to cowpeas.  They are often referred to as “yard long” beans.  Not surprisingly, last year’s crop did not do as well as we’d hoped.  We harvested just enough to save for seed to use for this year. 

Not expecting much from the seeds that we had saved, but not willing to give up on them, we planted them again this spring.  Well, they grew up their trellis in no time and are producing like gangbusters.  Either last year's plants adjusted to our planting environment or our more diligent work on the garden paid off.  I’m not sure how long the beans would get if we left to grow, but I generally pick them when they are less than two feet long.  So far, they have been resistant to bugs with very few spots or blemishes on them.  After picking them, I mix them in with our Kentucky Wonder pole beans and cook them.  We really like the taste of them.  I have frozen about eight 1-pound bags of them and, barring unexpected extreme weather, expect to get at least that much more to freeze.

I’m already saving some of the beans for seed stock for next year.  Not only are these beans good to eat, they are a curiosity for neighbors and family members.  I guess the old adage that, “bigger is better” holds true in the case of these beans.

You can see the beans growing in the middle
and lower left quadrant of this photo.

Here I'm holding six or so of the beans.  They usually
grow nice and straight, with very few imperfections.

This picture really shows how nice the beans are...
straight, almost perfect, and lots of them.

As you can tell by the tape measure, a few of these beans
have reached the 2-foot mark.  Doesn't take many to make a meal.