teach me about green beans

[Callieslamb]

Green beans are one vegetable Dh will eat. I grow them every year and haven't had a store-canned bean pass my lips for 10 years or more. I love to grow them. I love how bush beans cover the ground and are useful as a mulch. I like the ease of picking pole beans. However, as I look though catalogs and read threads here - it is apparent that I don't know much about beans.When I think of runner beans, I think of tough, stringy beans - but I have never eaten or grown one in my life. Many people here favor them so obviously, I am missing something with them.

So here are some questions someone might know the answer to -

How do you know if the bean you grow will make a good soup bean?
Is there a difference in a dry bean and one you would use for soup?
Is there a type of bean you wouldn't use as a dried bean?
What's a shelly bean?
I assume that most beans can be used for snaps but what's the difference between and how would you use and is there a difference in how you grow --
greasy beans
creasy beans
cut shorts
runners
half - runners
butter beans
and any others you can think of

I feel like I am missing out of some of the fun of gradening. Many thanks!

[oneokie]

Originally Posted by Callieslamb

Green beans are one vegetable Dh will eat. I grow them every year and haven't had a store-canned bean pass my lips for 10 years or more. I love to grow them. I love how bush beans cover the ground and are useful as a mulch. I like the ease of picking pole beans. However, as I look though catalogs and read threads here - it is apparent that I don't know much about beans.When I think of runner beans, I think of tough, stringy beans - but I have never eaten or grown one in my life. Many people here favor them so obviously, I am missing something with them.

So here are some questions someone might know the answer to -

How do you know if the bean you grow will make a good soup bean? no idea
Is there a difference in a dry bean and one you would use for soup? no idea
Is there a type of bean you wouldn't use as a dried bean? no
What's a shelly bean? [I]one that is too mature for snaps[/I/
I assume that most beans can be used for snaps but what's the difference between and how would you use and is there a difference in how you grow --
greasy beans no idea
creasy beans no idea
cut shorts just short snaps?
runners snaps or dry
half - runners snaps or dry
butter beans dry
and any others you can think of

I feel like I am missing out of some of the fun of gradening. Many thanks!

just my humble opinion

[oneokie]

Originally Posted by Callieslamb

Green beans are one vegetable Dh will eat. I grow them every year and haven't had a store-canned bean pass my lips for 10 years or more. I love to grow them. I love how bush beans cover the ground and are useful as a mulch. I like the ease of picking pole beans. However, as I look though catalogs and read threads here - it is apparent that I don't know much about beans.When I think of runner beans, I think of tough, stringy beans - but I have never eaten or grown one in my life. Many people here favor them so obviously, I am missing something with them.

So here are some questions someone might know the answer to -

How do you know if the bean you grow will make a good soup bean? no idea
Is there a difference in a dry bean and one you would use for soup? no idea
Is there a type of bean you wouldn't use as a dried bean? no
What's a shelly bean? one that is too mature for snaps
I assume that most beans can be used for snaps but what's the difference between and how would you use and is there a difference in how you grow --
greasy beans no idea
creasy beans no idea
cut shorts just short snaps?
runners snaps or dry
half - runners snaps or dry
butter beans dry
and any others you can think of

I feel like I am missing out of some of the fun of gradening. Many thanks!

just my humble opinion

[Paquebot]

Originally Posted by Callieslamb

So here are some questions someone might know the answer to -

How do you know if the bean you grow will make a good soup bean?

Grow a variety which is commonly grown as a dry bean.

Is there a difference in a dry bean and one you would use for soup?

Dry beans and soup beans are the same thing.

Is there a type of bean you wouldn't use as a dried bean?

Many snap beans will never get soft no matter how long they are cooked.

What's a shelly bean?

It's a bean which has reached maximum green size and not yet begun to shrink and dry.

I assume that most beans can be used for snaps but what's the difference between and how would you use and is there a difference in how you grow --
greasy beans
creasy beans
cut shorts
runners
half - runners
butter beans

The pods of varieties listed solely as dry beans are usually not palatable except when very small. Multi-purpose varieties can be used either way. Runners and half-runners may be either type and often do better sprawling rather than climbing. Cutshorts are multi-purpose beans which are somewhat flat on the ends as if packed too tight in the pods. Butter beans are limas and an entirely different family.

If you want a more detailed explanation, go to:

www.heirlooms.org/terminology.html

Martin

[geo in mi]

Thanks, Martin for that very interesting link to bean terminology. If you don't mind, I will post that to the "fireside" sticky above. It's worth saving and reading many more times. In fact, the whole website is worth looking at.

geo

[Callieslamb]

I was on that sticky the other day and it's what prompted my questions. I'd really like -to get some of their beans to try. I really wish they had included days-to-harvest since they are a southern company.

Can you use creasy and greasy's for dry? I'd love some triple purpose beans. When my snaps get too large, I let them go for dry beans or seeds. I don't want to devote garden space to beans all season if they won't be edible. Of if they are so short I only get a few beans in each pod. I tried some cut-short beans from Baker Creek one year. They weren't worth all the work for either snaps or dry, since I only got 2 pieces per snapped bean. If I'm gonna snap something, I like it at least 7 inches or longer.

[frankva]

Originally Posted by geo in mi

Thanks, Martin for that very interesting link to bean terminology. If you don't mind, I will post that to the "fireside" sticky above. It's worth saving and reading many more times. In fact, the whole website is worth looking at.

geo

I agree.

If I were to try multiple varieties for multiple purposes I would look for a specific use rather than multi use.

Then I would look for All America Winners.

I might miss some great varieties, but it would be a starting point.

[Paquebot]

Originally Posted by Callieslamb

I was on that sticky the other day and it's what prompted my questions. I'd really like -to get some of their beans to try. I really wish they had included days-to-harvest since they are a southern company.

Other than some pole limas and certain potato beans, all beans can be grown in Michigan. Even those will give you a decent harvest.

Can you use creasy and greasy's for dry? I'd love some triple purpose beans. When my snaps get too large, I let them go for dry beans or seeds. I don't want to devote garden space to beans all season if they won't be edible. Of if they are so short I only get a few beans in each pod. I tried some cut-short beans from Baker Creek one year. They weren't worth all the work for either snaps or dry, since I only got 2 pieces per snapped bean. If I'm gonna snap something, I like it at least 7 inches or longer.

Don't worry about creasy as I've never seen one. Greasy is multi-purpose but excel as a dry bean. Production varies considerably among the many varieties.

Don't know what the Baker Creek description was of their cutshort but the pods of most are less than 4". You got exactly what would be expected of a cutshort variety. For nutrition, those 4" pods may hold as much as an 8" pod since there are no big gaps between the beans.

Martin

[geo in mi]

Yet another plug for Carol Deppe. She devotes a chapter to beans in her book, "The Resilient Gardener" and goes into seed-saving in another which I have yet to read. If you are looking at beans as a way to have food staples, long term storage, and ability to save seeds, her books may be good ones to look at.

geo

[Callieslamb]

So the nutrition in the bean is in the beans - not the pod. that makes sense now that I stop to think about it. I see why people would continue to grow and use them. Are the cut shorts better shelled or dried then?

I haven't seen Ms Deppe's book yet. I wish my library would get more up-to-date books in so I can look at them before I buy them. So many gardening books are just a good read, not a reference book.