Lizzy welcomes you to the garden

Lizzy welcomes you to the garden
The blog for the UCSB Garden

Monday, August 2, 2021

Runner beans (warning)

 I have a strong stomach. Yesterday I ate some undercooked fresh runner beans and a couple hours later did some pretty serious projectile vomiting!! Backstory. Winter beans I have figured out pretty well. Favas I can eat fresh raw, fresh cooked later in the season, and cooked dried throughout the year. Garbanzos I eat fresh raw or cooked dried. Summer beans I'm still figuring out. Green beans raw or cooked seem fine. I've grown a number of varieties of beans to dry and cook later. I wanted to try cooked fresh beans as it seems that picking the plant when they are mature but far from dry will encourage the plant to produce more. But I made a really big mistake, I didn't cook them much, kinda like how I treat favas when they are only just beginning to toughen up. This was the only time I've puked because of eating something that wasn't spoiled. It was gnarly. I remember reading somewhere that there was an issue with runner beans so I approached them slowly. Small raw green pods seemed ok. It's my understanding now that fresh beans you have to boil for 10 min in order to render the phytohaemagglutinin inactive. Only 6 beans did it to me! The flowers are pretty and the beans are pretty, whether I can ever stomach them again is an open question.

 I'd like to turn this smile upside down


There's a rule in nature that colorful things are often poisonous....