2023 Little Easy Bean Network - Beans Beyond The Colors Of A Rainbow

[heirloomgal]

I have had the same thing happen with tossed out beans; I was planning on making some soymilk and bought some run of the mill bulk soybeans for the job. They'd probably been sitting in the bin a long time as they aren't popular. I soaked them overnight, got very busy thereafter and totally forgot about them. By the time I threw them out I don't even know how long they sat in that water (which also had a thin sheet of ice across the top because the fridge was old and got way too cold). Pitched them in the yard ( I was living way in the bush then) and could not believe my eyes when all these soybean plants sprouted everywhere! Old, waterlogged, nearly frozen and they STILL sprouted! Legume power !

 

[Pulsegleaner]

That makes sense not to mix them with other seed, and I would also be curious to see the bean lawn.

I have had the same thing happen with tossed out beans; I was planning on making some soymilk and bought some run of the mill bulk soybeans for the job. They'd probably been sitting in the bin a long time as they aren't popular. I soaked them overnight, got very busy thereafter and totally forgot about them. By the time I threw them out I don't even know how long they sat in that water (which also had a thin sheet of ice across the top because the fridge was old and got way too cold). Pitched them in the yard ( I was living way in the bush then) and could not believe my eyes when all these soybean plants sprouted everywhere! Old, waterlogged, nearly frozen and they STILL sprouted! Legume power !

Would surprise me too. Usually, for me, soybeans start to ferment and rot the moment they get too much water in them (that's why I usually DON'T start them indoors in peat plugs, even if it would be feasible based on seed number, the humidity tends to kill them.)

But they have grown outside a few times from tossed seed. That's how I found out some of the black soybeans I was getting in bulk in Chinatown were pole types rather than bush types (I thought pole type soybeans either didn't exist or were restricted to the kinds people planted for animal fodder. I knew WILD soybeans were a vine, but thought bush type had been locked in totally with domestication). It's also how I found out they come in multiple flower colors.

 

[heirloomgal]

Speaking of soybeans....

I'll admit right now - my name is heirloomgal and I'm a tofu addict. In the salad, the spring rolls, the rice, even alone sauteed in Frank's Hot Sauce. Can never get enough.

 

[Pulsegleaner]

Speaking of soybeans....

I'll admit right now - my name is heirloomgal and I'm a tofu addict. In the salad, the spring rolls, the rice, even alone sauteed in Frank's Hot Sauce. Can never get enough.

Sorry I didn't know you then when I had that soy line that make such good milk/tofu. If you liked the taste enough, maybe you wouldn't have minded the stuff was green! (green cotyledon soybeans).

 

[flowerbug]

Speaking of soybeans.... I'll admit right now - my name is heirloomgal and I'm a tofu addict. In the salad, the spring rolls, the rice, even alone sauteed in Frank's Hot Sauce. Can never get enough.

at one time i was making my own soymilk and grew a lot of soybeans, but one year i overdid it and ended up with 44lbs of extras. then i got tired of that and stopped, but i did try to make my own tofu (and it turned out ok, but not as good as the supermarket kind i was used to having). that was a one-time shot.

then i had a pillowcase full of soybeans to use up, eventually they all got fed to the worms during the mid-winter when other rations tended to be not quite enough to keep 17 buckets going.

those soybean seeds came from the health-food store and were labelled as organic. it was a nice mix of different varieties. i'd tried to grow them from some gleaned from the south field one season but those were an oil or animal feed based variety and also were the GMO kinds and i didn't really want those to eat myself, but it was worth a try to grow them. they didn't work well at all and then i got the organic seeds instead which did work great.

 

[Pulsegleaner]

those soybean seeds came from the health-food store and were labelled as organic. it was a nice mix of different varieties. i'd tried to grow them from some gleaned from the south field one season but those were an oil or animal feed based variety and also were the GMO kinds and i didn't really want those to eat myself, but it was worth a try to grow them. they didn't work well at all and then i got the organic seeds instead which did work great.

Sort of the same m.o. I use for when I'm growing mine. In the Chinese markets, there tend to be two general types of black soybeans, which I think of as the greater and the lesser ones (the greater are larger and have a less shiny seedcoat). I'm always looking for the lesser, since, compared to the greater, the lesser is a mix of a lot more types of soybeans that vary in size, shape, color once in a while (bags of lesser are more likely to have the odd seed with red speckles, or one whose seed coat is green* or brown,) flower color and growing habit.

Of course as with everything else, the lesser are being phased out in favor of the greater, so finding them gets harder and harder.

 

[heirloomgal]

I'm late to the game with growing my own soybeans, but I'm happy to finally arrive. You guys have so much more experience than me! Is it just me though, or is tofu hard to digest? I love the stuff but I do find when I eat it that I'm not hungry for a looong while after. From a digestibility perspective I find soybeans quite different than P.vulgaris which are very easy to digest comparatively, I don't even get wind in my sails when I eat those. DH boycotts all the tofu in my dishes, well, at least most of the time, doesn't think it's a good food to eat. I can see he has a hard time resisting it in the Chinese stir fries though.

Also, the Ecuadorean Cranberry beans arrived!

 

[heirloomgal]

Bean update. I managed to get 194 pots of beans planted today!

I feel so great to have that much done, because being the 10th today I'm ten days late. But I still feel confident that all will be okay because of how amazingly well my beans dried last year when cut down and dried under cover. The direct seeded ones were the very last to dry down for sure, but they still made it so I figure I still have a 20 day jump on the season. I've got them planted in trays indoors with a fan blowing over them; I've actually made 2 improvements to my bean start technique this year. One, I used the fan over the trays and two I watered the pots much less this time. I think that will be a benefit since they don't need to be sopping wet to sprout.

My gosh @Bluejay77 , this was the first really close look I've had at the beans you sent me, I hadn't taken them out of the packets yet. They are such gorgeous beans, I am just so blown away by how incredible your collection is. Those 'Kitoba' beans are a truly sublime shade of lavender, just wonderful. Holding them in your hand is such a different experience than just looking at a photo. The 'Lucie' bean is shockingly marvelous too. I feel bean rich!!

I still have more pots to do tomorrow, but it's a start. The weather is looking real good so I'm hopeful. I do plan to sprinkle coffee grinds around the small plants when I finally set them out, to further discourage pest visitors. I'm all ready for bean-a-palooza!

 

[Zeedman]

Speaking of soybeans....

I'll admit right now - my name is heirloomgal and I'm a tofu addict. In the salad, the spring rolls, the rice, even alone sauteed in Frank's Hot Sauce. Can never get enough.

Hmmm... never thought about using green (as in not yet dry) soybeans for making soy milk. I think I've watched some of her videos before with DW; traditional farm-to-table methods, very instructive.

The good weather has given me the opportunity to fix my greenhouse today & to hopefully do a little tilling before rain returns; but I am actually behind in other things. I need to do germination testing of all my old soybeans again, to identify those most in need of TLC before planting time... and to start backup transplants of all the soybeans I'll be growing regardless. There is no longer room in the schedule for do-overs.

 

[flowerbug]

I'm late to the game with growing my own soybeans, but I'm happy to finally arrive. You guys have so much more experience than me! Is it just me though, or is tofu hard to digest? I love the stuff but I do find when I eat it that I'm not hungry for a looong while after. From a digestibility perspective I find soybeans quite different than P.vulgaris which are very easy to digest comparatively, I don't even get wind in my sails when I eat those. DH boycotts all the tofu in my dishes, well, at least most of the time, doesn't think it's a good food to eat. I can see he has a hard time resisting it in the Chinese stir fries though.

i never had any problems with digesting it that i noticed. my digestive system seems to be happy with almost anything other than paprika and tons of black pepper. beans and soybeans are good and the extra bulk and fiber is welcome it makes me feel full longer.

Also, the Ecuadorean Cranberry beans arrived!

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wow! beautiful beans, i wonder if those would fit the Red Bolita description @Bluejay77 ?