Green beans - what are they?

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mr-cecil
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A dumb question. What type of bean are the green beans that you normally by in the supermarket?

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Depends, fresh or frozen?
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mr-cecil
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Something like these:
http://www.tesco.com/groceries/product/ ... =275397114

They are about as thin as a pencil.
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Pa Snip
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Ive seen French beans referred to as 'green beans' probably because someone was jittery about labelling them as 'French' in these days of 'correctness'.

From Wikipedia
Green beans, also known as string beans, or snap beans in the northeastern and western United States, are the unripe fruit and protective pods of various cultivars of the common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris).

They are distinguished from the many differing varieties of beans primarily grown for their dried seeds in that green beans are harvested and consumed with their enclosing pods, typically before the seeds inside have fully matured. This practice is analogous to the harvesting of unripened snow pea pods or sugar snap peas of the pea family of plants. Popular green bean cultivars have been selected especially for the fleshiness, flavor, or sweetness of their pods.

Haricots verts, French for "green beans" (also known as French beans, French green beans, French filet beans, or fine beans (British English)) is a variety of green beans that is longer, thinner, crisper, and more tender than "standard" green beans.

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Geoff
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I think the best way to get these is to grow climbing Cobra. In a tunnel we get a massive yield from 12 plants that I sow in pots in heat week 11 (w/c 14th March). They don't do well outside for us as they don't like wind and I guess Scarborough would be similar. There are dwarf varieties that are good but I always find them messy and slug prone.
mr-cecil
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Thanks.
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dan3008
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mr-cecil wrote:Something like these:
--edited-- removed your tesco link, as I can only have 1 url per post apparently... --edit done--

They are about as thin as a pencil.


well they're not broad beans :wink: lol Yes, they are French beans. Have a look around different seed catalogues, and you'll find you can get them in quite a few different varieties... but my favourate are the purple and yellow pole beans from real seeds... although, I only grow one variety most years to make it easy to save seeds :)
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PLUMPUDDING
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There are some excellent climbing French beans which are very productive stringless and freeze well. I grow several different varieties and save seeds from them every year. I sow them in 5 inch pots in the greenhouse in mid to late April and plant them out in the garden in June after the last frost (might risk a bit earlier if you don't get late frosts). I can let you have some to try if you pm me your address.

They usually don't cross with one another, so stay true to type. They aren't all thin round podded ones, some varieties have flat pods, but they are all nice and tender. If you want the thin round ones I've got some called Cordoba that a friend sent me from Belgium and they are dwarf French beans that I grow in the greenhouse.,
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dan3008
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PLUMPUDDING wrote:They usually don't cross with one another, so stay true to type.


wish I'd known that sooner... guess next year I'll be planting both purple and yellow then :)
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Johnboy
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Hi Dan,
Both French climbing and French dwarf bean varieties are self fertile and fertility has taken place generally before any bees or insects get a chance to interfere.
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Primrose
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I have grown climbing purple, yellow and green French beans and found them all more reliable than runner beans because they are self fertile so the flowers turn into beans even when the weather is unreliable and there are few insects around to pollinate the flowers. The purple beans turn green when cooked. The yellow ones maintain their colour. My favourite variety is the green Cobra, which freezes excellently.

I think French beans freeze better then runner beans actually because they remain firmer. Last year I also grew a few dwarf French beans, including a yellow variety called Sonesta. The problem with dwarf beans is that the lower ones on the plant tend to drop down to reach the soil and are consequently prone to slug damage. . There is also a yellow wax variety whose name I forget.
mr-cecil
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I tried 'Cobra' as suggested. I have more beans that I could possibly imagine. They seem good to me!
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Geoff
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Glad they worked out for you, are they outside?
mr-cecil
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They are in a polytunnel. I started picking them about 3 weeks ago.
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I always have more luck with the dwarf beans than the climbing ones - they don't like the wind at all & I find fill out the seeds in the pods quicker, but that may be stress from the wind.

I get the odd one that the snails have found, but the biggest hassle is they get splashed with mud so instead of a quick rinse, they need a proper clean. I was thinking of sowing through membrane, but slugs & sails like living under it a bit too much so would defeat the purpose. I popped in another row of seeds today, another fingers crossed sowing with my 10p seeds.

Westi
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