Dried runner beans ?

[Odsox]

I mean the dry seed rather than dehydrated green beans.
Has anybody tried runner bean seed as in haricot, butter or borlotto ?
I neglected to pick for several days and coupled with the fact I always miss loads when picking, I have about a bushel of old bean pods that are now going yellow. Now I know that you can eat them, but are they worth it, do they taste of anything ?
My reckoning is, if they taste that fantastic how come it's not the norm to shell all those beans you missed and eat those as well at the end of the season ?
Or maybe I've missed out on a free delicacy all my life.

[diggernotdreamer]

I ate some runner bean seeds a few years ago, cooked them quite well and ate them with some runner bean pods, tasted not too bad, I can only tell you from my personal experience that I got a bit of a tummy ache, followed later on by some quite impressive wind, but maybe I should have cooked them with some summer savory, give it a go, you can always amaze your family and friends with your enormous farts if you have the same reaction as me

[MKG]

They're OK as long as you do the normal long soak and boil the backside off them - just don't expect the nice fresh taste that's the reason for growing runners in the first place. Or you could grind them and add the bean flour to other flours to make bread. Or you can add bean flour to a sausage mix - that's interesting. Or use them in chilli con carne, where they're fine if not red.

Oh - if you're really bothered about the gaseous side, lose the skins - but life's normally too short

Mike

[oldjerry]

I thought the reason they weren't used as dried was simply that barlotti et al had more beans to the pod,and THEIR pods weren't worth eating.

Mike's dried bean flour sounds interesting.

[Odsox]

Mike's dried bean flour sounds interesting.

Indeed it does, thanks for that Mike I hadn't thought of grinding them up.
Looks like it's worth saving them then, rather than chuck them away. I shall be beaned out this winter with the loads of haricots I'm picking on a daily basis (intentionally grown for sugar free baked beans), black beans and borlotto , and now runner beans.

[boboff]

I bought some broad bean snacks from Olives Et al at the weekend, the ones which were battered and deep fried were very nice!!!

I wonder if this would work with your runner beans?? ( or a healthy variant, egged, bread crumbed, seasoned and baked????)

[Crickleymal]

I made some humus using broad beans last year. Tasted very nice but it did arouse the comment from my work colleagues that it looked like baby poo!

[The Riff-Raff Element]

Or you can add bean flour to a sausage mix - that's interesting.

New one on me! What sort of proportion does one add, Mike? Is it as a rusk substitute or is there another point to it?

[MKG]

Not a complete rusk substitute (at least, I've never done a complete substitution), but used as a part of the total volume of rusk (ie remove an eighth of the rusk and add the same weight of flour). It seems to provide a more homogeneous texture - which isn't always what you want - and (how to describe this?) a slightly more defined flavour. As I'm not a lover of plain pork sausage, anything which makes it different is OK by me.

Mike

[The Riff-Raff Element]

Interesting! Thanks.

[Odsox]

A thought occurred to me Mike, if you have to rapid boil beans for 10 minutes to get rid of toxins, how does that work if you grind them up ?
Are you talking about ground bean flour or mashed cooked beans ?

[grahamhobbs]

Sorry I'm a bit late adding my pennyworth. As far as I can see there is no real difference between runner beans and butter beans. I grow both and eat both, but then we tend to eat any left over beans, after saving what we need for sowing next year.
Runner bean pods are long and the butter beans shorter and the beans bigger, but otherwise they are the same. In fact the bean variety Czar I've seen advertised sometimes as a runner and other times a butter bean.

[Odsox]

Thanks Graham, in fact as mine are white seeded they look just like butter beans.
These are the new runner/french cross so maybe they will taste like bigger haricots, either way I'm going to have lots of them by the end of the season.

[oldjerry]

[quote="Odsox"]
These are the new runner/french cross


Details please,when you've got time ,Tony.

[Odsox]

These are the new runner/french cross

Details please,when you've got time ,Tony.

No problem Jerry, they are called Moonlight and lots of places sell them including Nickies Nursery.
They don't need pollinating like true runners, so I can grow them in the tunnel and not have to worry about bees getting in.
They are stringless, taste like true runners and flower for ages and I can thoroughly recommend them.
I picked the first cook in mid June and they have only just stopped (succession second row now just started)