Purple beans!!

[Homesteader]

 

A new kind of pole bean for me. The pods are purple but turn green when cooked. They're so easy to see against the green leaves on the trellis. They also turn green when canned. They're a keeper for me.    They're called Trionfo Violetto and do well up north after the soil has warmed up. 

 

 

[Mt_Rider]

   We used to grow these .....well, not that variety but the purple type....for that very reason.  Easy to pick them and it's kinda cool to watch them turn bright green in boiling water! 

 

MtRider  .....sigh, some day we'll garden again.   

[Igarden2]

We planted 3 varieties of pole beans this spring.  It rained and rained.  The Trionfo Violetto have grown and produced abundantly as usual.  The other varieties did not do well at all in the  same soil and same row.  Next year my wife wants to skip the other varieties and only plant these beans.  They are well formed and not spotted by fungus ( a rarity in my area).  However, the Japanese Beetles prefer these beans' leaves over the others.  They must know a good thing when they see one. 

[Guest Amber Actually]

A few years ago one another site, several people spontaneously brought up gardening, and almost every one of them raved about this one Trionfo Violetto.  Looks like I will have to break down and try it.

[Jeepers]

Do they taste like the regular "blue lake" bush beans? That is the common variety here. And does the canning water stay purple or clear/green? I'm interested in this bean too. 

 

Do the "yard long" beans taste like the blue lake beans when canned? 

 

All I know about are the blue lake green beans. 

[Guest Amber Actually]

So, one of the variants on the black eyed pea is the pink eyed purple hull.  And the yard long bean is a variant on the pink eyed purple hull.

[Mt_Rider]

Purple tasted just like all green beans, as far as I could tell.  Yeah, I've planted Blue Lake.  Good midwestern variety. 

 

The purple ones are green inside, btw.  Even raw.  Just a very dark purple skin on them. 

 

MtRider  .....water is same as green green beans.  Don't remember purple in it at all.

[Jeepers]

Thanks Annette and Mt.Rider. I think most commercial canned green beans are the Blue Lake variety.

 

Corrected:

Annette! Supposed to say Ambergris. I loathe Kindle auto correct. Correct my spelling, not my words. 

 

Edited August 26, 2019 by Jeepers
Kindle again

[kappydell]

purple ones tolerate rainy cool weather better also reputed to be less bothered by bean beetles too.  i just like the ease of picking & their flavor

[Annarchy]

Purple ones seemed to be more heat tolerant, here.  They were the only beans that produced, that year I planted beans.  

[Mt_Rider]

One other thing I just remembered.  When we grew them in one garden, the watering system got all but a few feet in the middle of the row.  We noted that those that really were probably water-deprived, were the ones with bug damage.  Bugs go after the weak?    Anyway, that's a basic gardening principle and probably not specific to the purple beans of this topic.  But it did happen to be purple beans that were affected by that accidental experiment.

 

MtRider   

[Homesteader]

2 hours ago, Mt_Rider said:

  We noted that those that really were probably water-deprived, were the ones with bug damage.  Bugs go after the weak?    Anyway, that's a basic gardening principle and probably not specific to the purple beans of this topic. 

MtRider   

 

Theory has it that weak plants give off a substance similar to pheromones. Bugs detect it and go after the plant. I've never taken the time to test that theory. 

[Mt_Rider]

   No, I wouldn't want to do that experiment again.....unless it meant the bugs would leave the rest of the plants alone.....decoy?  Pheromones, huh? 

MtRider  

[kappydell]

Yard long beans do indeed taste like 'regular' snap beans.  And they are much more heat tolerant.  Just do not pick them too early (less than 1 foot or so long) or they won;t cook up tender.  Discovered that error when I trialed them this year.  Never got that first picking to cook up tender....stayed firmer than regular cooked snaps.  Since Mary likes her beans cooked very done, she did not like them, though I did, so I kept experimenting until I found I was picking them too early.  Few of them are bush beans though, and tend to grow quite tall so poles are a must.  

 

I love purple beans unabashedly. They are more tolerant of cool,damp soil in the spring, bugs seem to leave them alone a  bit more than green snaps, and I love the turning green (a nice visual indicator of when they are blanched for freezing).  Its a nice, dark green, too, very attractive when mixed with yellow wax beans.

I like both of them for ease of picking.  I miss far fewer beans hiding in the leaves.

Edited October 28, 2019 by kappydell

[Guest kathy]

We have grown these beans the last two years. The first year was just a few plants to see how they grew and what they would taste like. They were delicious!

 

We had such good luck with this bean we planted a 10 foot row this year. These bean plants are excellent producers, and we were able to grow enough to freeze. I didn't think about canning them, I will have to try that next year. I can tell you, when we cooked them, the water did not turn purple, I sort of expected it to change the color of the water, which I think would have made me a bit uneasy.