Shelling Beans -- Good Mother Stallard, etc.

[applestar]

I'm growing different kinds of shelling beans for drying, but right now Good Mother Stallard beans are the ones being harvested.

Gorgeous shelled beans -- this is just a small basket

more pods waiting to dry a bit more and be shelled

Christmas Lima and Tiger Eye are showing lackluster results so I think all/most of the dried beans from them will be saved for next year's seeds, but I should have plenty of purple podded pole beans and runner beans to harvest as shelled dried beans later even though I am also harvesting them as fresh shelled beans for freezing.

Anyone else growing shelling beans?

[valley]

Good job applestar, they look interesting.

When we returned to the mountains I found that the beans and peas in the greenhouse had kept producing and were hanging dry on the vines. I've gathered them for planting next season.

Richard

[applestar]

I was shelling some more and thinking I can't wait to taste them -- they did poorly last year so I had them in mixed bean dishes but not by themselves, and had saved most of the harvest for seed.

...then it occurred to me that there was no reason to *wait* until they dried then rehydrate them. So I cooked up a trial batch -- 1 cup fresh shelled so probably 1/2 cup dry. Cooked with a little carrot, onion and healthy amount of chopped celery -- I love being able to just step out and pull a carrot and clip a few stalks of celery from the patio-side Kitchen Garden when needed (already had the harvested onions in the house). Sea salt added in the last 20 minutes after the beans were soft enough to stab with a knife.

OH WOW YUM! Delicious just like this. I need to make more for eating with salad. Both DD's liked them and the broth which I had them taste separately. One said she thought these should be in a hearty stew.

I hadn't realized though, that all the maroon markings get dissolved away and the beans turn into solid pink-tan color.

It was hot today, so I didn't venture out, but there should be a bunch more yellowed pods to harvest tomorrow.

[meshmouse]

nice applestar -

Mmmm, beans. I'm a big fan. Yours look great.

I hope this is an appropriate question to ask (I'm sure you know the answer).

Bush beans, OK - understood. Pole beans - same. But runner beans - what's the distinction?

Thanks

[applestar]

Runner beans are climbing beans with bigger pods and beans -- I'm thinking size of kidney beans, though I don't know what kidney bean pods look like.

Here are some pics. Runner beans are the pink and eggplant black ones. For size comparison, the bigger ivory white with mahogany markings are Christmas Limas (there's a Good Mother Stallard in there too -- smaller rounder bean)

Scarlet Runners with the fire engine red flowers are the classic runner beans. But there are other flower colors. The pod cluster overlapping the green Jersey Devil are Sunset runner bean pods from salmon pink flowers. They are even more rough looking with angular ridges than the scarlet runners pictured with the purple podded pole bean pods. But they are both fuzzy and will cling to a T-shirt material.

They can be eaten as green snap beans when immature (but huge), fresh shelling beans, and dry shelling beans.

I think runner beans are more vigorously vining plants than pole beans. I think, too, that they are more cool summer tolerant because I initially read about them in UK , New England, and Pacific Northwest gardening articles. They are also supposed to be perennials where the ground doesn't freeze.