Veggie Spotlight: Snap Beans

Farm Update

Fred examines a green bean before
picking it.

Hi everyone!  It's been another hot and dry week at the farm, which has been a little rough on the veggies.  We've been irrigating nonstop, which is helping, but as always a good rain would be very welcome.  One exciting thing though is that our tomatoes are ripening up nicely, and we should have an excellent crop of them!  We might be bringing some of them for the CSA this week, although they'll still be fairly limited.  We've been experiencing some deer damage once again.  They've been especially detrimental to our corn and carrots, so Fred is continuing his attempts to scare them off every night.  We're also going to try to get our deer fence much more quickly than we originally planned.  But in other good news, we had our annual organic inspection on Friday, and it went really well.  We're also putting in another large planting of carrots this weekend, so that we'll have plenty of nice carrots for the fall.  We're almost at the halfway point of the CSA season, so now is the time when we are fully into preparation for the end of the season.  It happens every year; I start to see the back-to-school stuff at the store and I realize that another farm season will start to wane shortly.  Even though the weather is hot and the days are long, November starts to appear in my mind, and I start feeling compelled to dry basil, freeze stray green beans and cabbage, and start preparing for a time of less abundance.  In case you're interested in doing the same thing, we have plenty of green beans for freezing.  You can get them in five- or ten-pound bags, and they'll be $9 for five pounds.  Just let me know!

What to Expect in Your Share this Week

Here are the options in each veggie station this week!  If you have a half share, you'll choose one from each category, and if you have a full share, you'll choose two.

• Snap beans
• Carrots, beets, or basil
• Potatoes or lettuce
• Kale, Swiss chard, or cabbage
• Sweet peppers or garlic
• Cucumber, zucchini, or kohlrabi
• Surprise veggie

If you have your share delivered to your home or workplace, or if you pick up at our East Lansing drop-off, here are your options for this week.  If you have a half share, choose one, and if you have a full share, choose two.

Share A:                                      Share B:

Snap beans                                  Snap beans
Carrots                                         Beets
Potatoes                                       Lettuce
Kale                                             Cabbage
Sweet peppers                             Garlic
Cucumber                                    Zucchini
Surprise veggie                           Surprise veggie

If you have a preference for share A or share B, just let me know by noonish the day before your delivery day, and I'll make sure you get your preferred share.  If you don't have a preference, I'll just choose for you. :-)

Veggie Spotlight:  Snap Beans

Perhaps one of the coolest looking
beans we grow is the dragon bean.

Snap beans, one of the best loved summer vegetables, are here again!  Beans are one of those warm weather plants that thrives in the long day lengths of the Michigan summers.  Michigan is actually one of the highest producing states for green beans, because our climate is ideal for this crop.

Beans are native to the Americas (originating somewhere between Southern Mexico and Costa Rica) and have been cultivated by humans since at least 5000 BC.  The fava bean, another type of plant also referred to as a bean, originated in Afghanistan, but we don't grow that type.  The snap beans we all know and love are vastly improved from earlier beans.  Many of you will remember from years past that snap beans were often referred to as string beans, because of the fibrous string that had to be removed from each bean.  Earlier cultivated beans were often more fibrous in general, and better for eating the seed inside the pod than the tender bean pod we enjoy today.  The earlier beans were most often the pole bean type, with longer vines that lasted the entire season.  Now most farms, including ours, grow the bush type.  This is easier to manage because instead of producing beans all summer, it produces one large crop all at once.  This makes them much easier to pick, and though beans are easier to grow than other crops, the greater amount of hand labor to harvest them is the major drawback to the farmer. Anyone who has grown a significant amount of beans in their garden can relate to the fatigue of hand harvesting beans. Since it is a one-time harvest, we seed many times throughout the season to ensure we are offering them several times during the CSA season.

This year we are growing five different varieties: green, yellow, purple, green Romano, and the heirloom Dragon bean, which is a long, off-white bean that has the purple streaking.  The green bean is the most productive, and the one you will see the most in the shares.  Most of the bean breeding effort has been focused on green beans because they are generally more financially important, and it shows in yield, taste, and tenderness.  We do have some issues every year with our beans, bean beetles being one of the most annoying as they chew little holes in the leaves and beans.  There is also some brown rust that will form on the beans in wet conditions, and it often is more prevalent in the late season.  Another odd issue that we have sometimes is that the beans are ready to harvest around the same time the thistle seed forms in pasture areas, and it starts to blow into the air and often gets stuck on the beans.  Most of it washes off but if you ever see something white on the beans that looks like a very light hair, that is the thistle.

At home, we love to use beans when they are fresh and full of flavor.  Most often we saute them in olive oil, often mixing in a little onion or shallot.  When tomatoes and peppers come in large amounts we often make a spicier dish with fresh tomatoes, peppers, fresh snap beans, and onions which is a really great mix of fresh summer flavors.  Whatever you do with your beans this week, we hope you enjoy them as much as we do!

Recipes

And for some inspiration, here are some great snap bean recipes from Southern Living!  They all involve using the beans at their freshest and most flavorful, so they're perfect for this time of year.  Enjoy!