The Magical Fruit

As the sun shines, the snow melts and we approach the end of February, I'm in full-on reflection mode of the past growing season and in great anticipation for the one that is yet to come.  These cold days are comforted still by the rewards of the 2013 garden in the form of frozen and canned veggies, sweet potatoes resting in the basement, and dried beans in the pantry.

This was my first attempt with the whole dried bean thing.  I've always grown beans for fresh consumption and for some reason, never even considered these until last year.  Honestly, I've always over-planted green beans.   I could never keep up, we could never eat enough and the da#n foliage irritated my skin, so the fun of picking was lost on the rashes.  Growing beans for dry use ended up being right up my alley.  It allowed me to be lazy during the growing season which was a big plus.  Put the seeds in the ground, let em grow and then let em die.  Simple as that.  Remove the pods, grab your husband and shell away.

 

This is a slightly tedious step, but you get in a groove.  Turn on a movie, or in our case, watch your favorite college football team on a Saturday afternoon.  This year I will need to try some alternative shelling methods (search for the 'pillow case method') to expedite the process as I've gone a bit overboard with the seed ordering.  Black beans, kidney beans, great northern beans, brown beans, garbanzo beans.  Whoops.  Like any good gardener, I've lost my mind.