Re: [gardeners] harvesting dry beans

Margaret Lauterbach (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Fri, 18 Sep 1998 07:03:35 -0600 

At 08:28 AM 9/17/98 +0000, you wrote:
>Margaret Lauterbach <gardeners@globalgarden.com> wrote:
>
>> Has anyone grown beans for harvest as dry beans? 
>
>When I lived in the long-season south I let them dry on the vine.  Up 
>here, the crop I planted early got to dry on the vine but the crop I 
>planted late dried in the basement.  I didn't plant the seed this 
>year but the bulb witch did.  She got good germination.  As long as 
>the pods are mature I don't think it much matters.
>
>Margaret, did you know that there's a place in Idaho that has a huge 
>number of heirloom beans for sale?  I have to track down the name of 
>the place -- Sunset mentioned it in an issue earlier this year and I 
>threw out my old Sunsets while cleaning house.  (See, I knew there 
>was a reason not to clean house.)  As I recall they were somewhere 
>near Boise.  
>
>They sell beans for consumption and it occured to me that the smart 
>thing to do might be to buy a 1/2 pound of some of the beans I'm 
>interested in just to taste them and then decide if I want to grow 
>them.
>
>I don't know if you are aware of this but they are growing more and 
>more garbanzo beans on the Palouse these days.  I've been mighty 
>tempted to try them myself, mostly because I read about how 
>incredibly delicious they are when cooked as fresh shell beans.
>
>Liz
>
Thanks for the information, but I must have thrown out that Sunset too.  I
hope the rest of the day turns out better than the first of it, because
it's starting out like shit.  A friend sent me an electronic birthday card
that damned near crashed my system.  It did get my heart started, and I
haven't calmed down yet.  It's still too dark to clean the greenhouse
because I can't see the cobwebs yet, and I can't get started on peach jam
because Chuck is still here.  When he leaves it's like a tornado through my
tiny kitchen.  I've finished my column, forgot to single space it before I
saved it, and that's a big muggin' mess if I have to try to re-save it, but
I won't know if it'll cause problems this way until after the newspaper
office opens about 95 minutes from now.  

I'm not generally in the market for heirloom beans because I love my
Contenders, but I did pick some of the heirloom beans that had been sent to
me and cooked them with the Contenders and they're outstanding in flavor.
I will grow them again.  First of all, I guess I'll have to find some
mature pods to save (I don't think frost will hold off long enough for
drying on the vine.  Margaret