I will be harvesting the last of my last set of broad beans very soon. Some folks have asked me what exactly a broad bean is. While the bean itself looks somewhat like a Lima Bean (Phaseolus lunatus), it is not--its Latin name is, Vicia faba. Here we call them tuinbonen; however, across the channel in Great Britain they are called, "broad beans". They have many names, depending upon which country one is in, of course. The broad bean is a native to places like North Africa and Israel as well as parts of Asia, and has been used and cultivated for centuries, nay millennia. I can recall when living in Spain, I had seen interesting-looking structures on hillsides called eras. These are circular, levelled areas whose ground surface is paved with flat stones-- like old Roman roads. When seen laterally and from a bit of a distance, one might think that a lookout tower had stood there in ages gone by. At any rate. The Spanish folk allow the broad beans to mature, die and dry in their shells before taking them to the era and spreading them out across its surface. Next they then hitch-up a horse to a wooden plank (on which they stand) and drive the beast round and round in circles until the beans are out of the shells. The stalks and debris is removed and the beans are gathered and stored for later. I suspect that this technique is not used so much anymore, but years ago it was fairly common. I am not going to give a history of the bean and its uses and the beliefs surrounding it, nor will I further allow myself to become swept up and become engulfed with nostalgic reminiscing; rather, I will discuss how I grow and store these tasty beans. First of all I should mention types of broad beans. There are "types" and "varieties"; the difference in these terms will be apparent as we continue. There are two main types of broad bean--The "long pod type", and the "Windsor type". TYPES The Long pod type will typically have 8-11 beans in a pod and they are the most hardy. It is this type that you will want to plant if you wish to plant in the fall to be harvested early the following season. The Windsor type has a shorter pod which will typically hold 5-7 beans. These are meant to be sown in the early spring, as soon as the ground is no longer frozen. Some say that this type is a bit tastier, but I notice little difference, as I harvest my beans young. VARIETIES There are....Pffft!, I don't know how many--lots. I have grown the 'Aquadulce', 'Sutton', 'Masterpiece Green Long Pod', 'Wit kiem' and 'Driemaal wit'. There is an interesting variety called the 'Crimson-flowered broad bean'. This variety has a short habitus, has red flowers and is, to a degree "aphid-resistant" it is reported. I have not tried this one yet, but I may plant a trial bed next year to see if it lives up to its reputation as being "very tasty". There is a special sort of gardner that likes to play with the 'visual'. For those who like to grow their veg as if it were a flower garden, you an try planting this crimson-flowered broad bean along with the 'Ruby Red' Swiss chard. I think that it would indeed make quite a pleasing sight. This and last year I have planted the Aquadulce 'claudia' and later in the spring, the 'Masterpiece Green Long Pod'. I like the 'Aquadulce' because I often plant them in October to be harvested the beginning of June the following year and I plant the 'Masterpiece' in April. I stagger the planting to give me a longer harvesting period. This varies from year to year and I have to wait and see, to know when I want to plant. Sometimes it is "wet finger work", as we say here. --You know, when you stick your finger in your mouth, then take it out and then hold it up in the air to see which way the wind is blowing. Basically I am trying to say that I just have to guess some years. The staggered/longer harvesting period is good, but one must also consider ground preparation for the following year, and/or the follow-up planting of green manure. So you see, this stretching of the harvest period is not without consequences. LOCATION & SOIL Broad beans like deeply dug, well-draining soil. One of the beautiful things about this bean is that it will grow and do well in almost any soil type. One thing that it doesn't like is "to stand with its feet in the water", so to speak. They like being planted in a place that has full sunshine all day. Many varieties will grow to one meter (~one yard) or taller ( I have them get as high as 1½ meters), so a consideration planting location is very important. This is to say, that you do not want to have crops that are shorter in height planted on the north side of the beans, for they will be in the shade. Approximately 1-2 weeks prior to sowing or planting plantlets outside, I sprinkle a minute (and I mean minute) amount of blood meal in the ground where the broad beans are to be planted. --Now, I know that this goes against what we have all learned about beans, namely that because beans fix nitrogen in nodules on their roots from the air to grow with, fertilizing the ground is not necessary. Having said that, my philosophy on this is that since the nodules are formed only once the plant is fairly large, there is a gap between planting and the point when they are big enough to form the nodules. So, I believe that they can use a modest feeding of nitrogen as a sort of kick-start to get them going. PLANTING SEEDS & PLANTLETS I always germinate my broad bean seeds in root trainer cells during the latter half of February, in a mix of garden soil (on the bottom of the cell), seeding soil (in the middle) and vermiculite to cover the seeds with (on top)...at approximate percentages of 80%, 27% and 3% respectively, bottom to top. Once the seeds have germinated and have 1-2 sets of leaves, I begin putting the plantlets outside during the day as long as it isn't freezing hard with a stiff wind. This hardening-off procedure requires one to just use their common sense with respect to the harshness of weather conditions. After ~1½ weeks I begin leaving them outside on the balcony twenty-four hours a day. I keep them at home until I believe that three requirements have been adequately met: (1) Until I feel that they are hardened-off sufficiently, (2) Until the plantlets have 3-4 sets of leaves and (3) When the root ball is large enough to sustain the plants during the meanest of elemental challenges. Other folks, in fact most that I know, plant their beans in the very early spring out in the open ground. No problem there, the beans can germinate in the ground when soil temps are as low as 2°C! That's right, that low. If you look closely in the foto below, you can see that there is frost on the ground, but the plants stand tall, unaffected. You just make drills and plant the beans to a depth of about twice their height, spaced ~20-25 cm apart. I would advise you to offset your beans in the next row so that each bean that you plant would be in line with the 25cm space between beans in that preceding drill (perhaps you can see what I mean in the foto above and below). This gives you a nice, closed patch once the berans have grown up. The drills ought to be ~20cm apart. Now, whether you are sowing your seeds in the open ground or setting your germinated plantlets out in your plot, water them in thoroughly if the weather has been dry. --I bring my beans into puberty at home in root trainers, so when it is time to plant them out, I go to the plot and kneel on a plank and use a tulip bulb planter to make the holes. I then drop the plantlet into the hole and close the soil in around the root ball by watering the edge of the hole with my watering can. The force of the water takes the fine soil into the bottom of the hole and fills in the sides with loose the soil. I add the soil from in the tulip bulb planter and press it firmly. Once all of the plantlets are in the ground, I water them all in generously, unless the soil is already wet. F/U CARE --Security Because the bean plants are standing in the open in the full sun, their height will at some point be a problem, because the wind will splay and flatten your plants if you do not take measures. If you only have one or two rows of beans, then you can make a very simple support system. I take something that would be equivalent to tobacco sticks, bean poles or even strong bamboo sticks and place them at either end of the row and then take strong twine and run it completely around the whole row. The wind may blow, but your plants will stand tall and secure. If you have a square-ish plot then I do the same but sink poles at the four corners and one in the centre, then run the twine all around the perimeter. Here, there are Jackdaws and crows that will gladly strip every bean that I can grow off the plants, so I must throw a net over the whole patch of beans. --Pests The two biggest probs are the bladrandkefer and black aphids. The bladrandkefer (Sitona lineatus): This tiny insect is only 4-5 mm's long and is the colour of soil. It is very difficult to see unless you get right down to soil level. There little creatures chew the edges of your new leaves while they are down close to the ground, giving the leaves a sort of scalloped appearance. It is alarming to see, and you can spray against them with a whole host of things ranging from the organic to conventional poisonous pesticides. The thing is that I have noticed that if you just do nothing, the plants will grow out of the situation and above a certain level, my plants no longer exhibit leaf damage from these insects. Aphids: Here we primarily get a particularly tenacious type, Aphis fabae. I combat this by clipping off the tops of the bean plants, as this insects hones directly in on the juicy and tender new growth. I also spray established colonies with a mixture of water, soap and dash of white spirits. This breaks down in just a few days. Some folks (me included) tend to top the bean plants preventatively when the bean plant had reached almost one meter in height, or when I see the first aphid somewhere in the garden. There may be some fungal agents that can affect this bean plant, but I have never encountered any. Mice and birds are pests if you plant directly into the ground, for they may dig up your seeds. --Maintenance Pinch off any side growth at the bottom of the plant stalk so that the growing and production energy will not be hijacked from your main crop. This extra growth will not live to produce harvestable bean pods (at last not in our latitudes). When dryness occurs, as it inevitably will at some point, be sure to give your plants plenty of water. many bean sorts do not require extra water, but this type does. As a matter of fact I give my plants water regularly even when the conditions are not technically 'droughty'. HARVESTING As I said, I like harvesting the beans youngish. There is nothing wrong with harvesting them when they are large, but they will tend to be mealy. This doesn't bother me, but it does some folks. They even go so far as to remove the outer skin. In this foto you can see the over-sized beans mixed-in with the target sizes and smaller ones. The way that I decide if a pod is ready to pick is by feeling it. If I can feel the bean inside and it feels the right size, then the pod gets picked. Sometimes you can see the bulges in the pod, this can give you the idea that the pod could be ready. The pods on the left housed beans exactly the size I wanted. The pods on the right have oversized beans that you can see on the foto of the container full of beans up above. They are the large, whitish ones. You may come across very short pods with only one or two mature beans inside--there is no reason to wait and hope that the pod will lengthen and more beans will form, for they will not. The determination of how many viable beans a pod will have has to do largely with how properly a flower has been pollinated. The tiny brown bean to the left is an example of one that didn't make it. I like them best when they are this size: After the harvest, I clip the plants off right at the soil level and leave those roots with the nitrogen nodules in situ, it will be good for the crops that follow, such as brassicas or potatos. If you look closely, you can see the small nodules still on the roots. I do not waste my foliage either--either I chop it fine and put it in the compost bin, or I use it to cover worked and prepared soil to protect them from the sun's gamma rays and the harshness of the rain, wind, snow and ice. Addendum: I eat as many fresh broad beans as I possibly can, but the main purpose of this hobby is to freeze-in veggies in quantities that will make grocery shopping for veg, un-necessary for an entire year. I do not blanch broad beans, I simply pop them in the freezer directly. I have a list on the outside of the freezer reflecting the amount of packets of 300g that go in; and, in the adjacent column-- a place to mark off each one removed for cooking. I do this for broad beans, as well as the other veggies that I have harvested and frozen-in. This is helpful to me to keep track of how much I am consuming and have a sort of 'early warning' if I am beginning to run low. Additionally, I can then see the following year how many packets are left over. This will determine how many I will freeze-in next season. I do this because I do not like waste--if I have too much veg, I would rather give that to the Food Bank.
great post thanks sjoerd. currently eating the benefits of my Windsors. and certainly planing to plant more next year. if you remember i tried using toilet rolls for pots, didn't work out well i found the stem was a lot weaker than direct sown plants. so will use cells next year for the first batch. I made the mistake of not using supports which meant the whole lot fell over will know better for next year. i'm planning on a full row next year, would you suggest doing them in rows of three? rather then 2? I'm also going to try and get the in the ground a lot sooner next year pretty much as soon as i can work the ground. out of interest what do you grow with your broad beans?
Thanks, FP! Hello DAN--I'm glad that you had success with your Windsors. You know Dan, I always say that one can't have enough broad beans. I always like to plant "enough" so that I can gorge myself as well as have enough to freeze-in. One of the most common ways here to eat them is with bacon fat mini,mini cubes. You fry them up separately and boil/steam the beans then mix the two together on your plate. Great Scott, those two things sure are delicious! I was disappointed to learn that your stems were a bit weak. I know that the broad beans tend to do that, so when they are still in the root trainers,I brush the plants with my palm a few times, several occasions a day for as long as I am keeping them in the root trainers. This brushing them tends to make their stems a bit tougher. I do this with my tomatos as well before I transplant them. You can make patches as large as you like, I feel. My primary crop is always in a large square with perhaps 90 plants. I find that square plots are more secure from the gusts of wind than a row, but rows can be made secure with twine and poles as well. Getting the beans in the ground as early as possible is the best, I believe. Say Dan...what do you mean when you ask what I grow with my broad beans? I sometimes grow Summer Savory (Satureja hortensis) near to ,or surrounding the broad beans. Summer savory (Satureja hortensis, is said to repel aphids and other pests, additionally, it is harvested, dried and used as a herb additive when cooking the beans. in fact that plant is known here as "bean herb". But, back to your question. Could you clarify that inquiry? Did you mean what do I grow alongside the broad beans or generally what else I grow in my veg gardens? I apologize for being so thick.
oh yeah i hear you on the broad bean and bacon I think i have cooked all our beans this way so far. with regards the growing, just wondering what else you put next to the beans? i'm planning to do peas and possibly carrots next year. with carrots to the south and peas to the north. with the fennel going in after the peas. with the aphids the beans attract just wondered if you grew them seperate or in rows with other plants. thanks for the great advice.
Each year I have different things next to the broad beans if they are in the new garden. In the old veggie garden, I do not have anything next to them usually because it is smallish ans so the squares usually fill a quadrant. Your carrot and pea scenario sounds good. I have tried planting marigolds around the outside of the broad bean patch, however in my climate here, they usually are not very large and flowering before the bean plants are removed. Normally I just grow the broad beans by themselves; however, upon occasion I plant smaller patches in broad beans here and there when I find a vacant corner. Like I said, I can't get enough broadies.
