For more information on the Tongue of Fire bush beans and the Orca bush beans see the 2020 post. 

Now for this year’s beans.

Dragon Tongue Bush Bean

Seed started:

Size:

24-30 inches tall by 12-24 inches wide

Location:

Full sun

Matures in:

55-60 days

Native to:

First cultivated in the Netherlands in the 18th and 19th century this Dutch wax bean then spread to France and England, and from there, the New World. 

AKA Dragon Langerie and Merveille de Piemente

Why did I Choose it?

Beautiful and I really enjoyed the Tongue of Fire beans last year. 

From: Seeds of Imbolc

Uses?

We ate the Tongue of Fire as fresh snap beans in garlicky tomato sauce on pasta. We also pickled them and let quite a few dry to cook in chicken stock for winter beans. 

Specifics:

These bush beans are a compact and stocky plant with abundant purple-violet flowers followed by flat 6 or 7 inch creamy yellow pods with purple stripes that appear and increase as they mature. 

Plant so that sunlight can reach all of the beans because this makes the colours much more intense. I noticed this last year with my Tongue of Fire beans, the more sunshine they got the more red stripes there were. 

These are considered to be one of the best dual purpose varieties available. 

They are crisp, stringless and amazingly juicy when eaten young and fresh. Harvest when the flat beans turn from lime green to creamy yellow with bright purple stripes.

They lose their purple stripes when cooked. Not recommended for freezing.

Make sure you eat or cook them promptly after picking or they will turn rubbery and lose their snap. 

If dried beans are desired, let the pods fully mature. Seeds are purplish brown with blue stripes.

Personal Notes: 

We really enjoyed the Tongue of Fire beans last year so we’re looking forward to these. Some people say that Dragon Tongue tastes better. We’ll have to do a taste test this summer in the garden. 

Broad Bean sp? (Possibly Windsor)

Seed started:

Size:

36-48 inches tall by the same wide

Location:

Full sun

Matures in:

75-85 days 

Or if sown in the fall, 6 months 

Native to:

Native to north Africa and southwest Asia

Windsor is an heirloom English variety

Why did I Choose it?

Seed swap

Uses?

Eaten fresh or dried, cooked; and the young, tender leaves can be eaten fresh or cooked like spinach. 

Specifics:

Broad beans are one of the world’s most ancient and widespread food crops.

Windsor broad bean seeds are superb for family gardens as a food crop, or nitrogen-fixer, and are easy for small children to handle because they are a large seed.

If you’re using it as a nitrogen-fixer: plant seeds in the fall, harvest in the spring, and follow it up with nitrogen loving crops like Brassicas, lettuce, or spinach. 

If used as a food crop: The seeds that Windsor produces are large and delicious, unlike the small-seeded fava often offered as a cover crop. The pods are light green and contain 6-7 large pale green seeds each, which shell easily.  Fresh or dried, all broad beans must be cooked before eating in order to rid them of potentially toxic alkaloids. The young, tender leaves can also be eaten either raw, or cooked like spinach. 

Personal Notes: 

I didn’t sow these in the fall and only received 6 seeds from the seed swap so I think I'll plant them and get more seeds from them and try them as a cover crop. Apparently the greens are enjoyed by the chickens so it could be a good source of roughage for them in the winter if I dry it. It may prove a good winter cover crop for certain areas of the garden while providing food for us in the dried beans and the chickens in the dried greens. Three uses are always better than just one. 

Next up: Sunflowers