Fava bean fever – from growing to harvesting

Fava beans from my garden.

For more than a year, I’ve been reading a lot about broad beans and their health benefits. Earlier this year I ordered some fava beans online and planned to sow a 4’ x 8’ bed of them in the garden this spring. I had no idea how beneficial these beans are. They contain vitamin B1 or thiamin, iron, copper, phosphorus, potassium and magnesium, dopamine (improves mood), and their high-protein, high-fiber content can help with weight loss. Why don’t all gardeners plant these miracle beans?

It seemed to take forever for signs that the favas would actually grow. The plants’ flowers look like white and purple orchids and were in full bloom for several weeks, attracting many pollinators.

Fava plants have orchid-like flowers.

After impatiently waiting for the fava plants to reach maturity thanks to this summer’s weird weather, I noticed plump pods 5-6 inches long hanging from what used to be flowers.

Anxious to open the pods and try this wondrous bean, I picked most of them right away, propped myself in front of the TV with a couple of 80s movies and started to shell each pod. It took about an hour to shell eight pounds of pods.

Let the shelling begin!

Only three beans per pod? Hmm. But, as I opened larger pods, sure enough, there were four or five beans per pod. Not too shabby, I thought.

Some pods yielded five beans.

  

I bit into one of the beans. Yuck – it was bitter. I re-read a few articles from my gardening magazines for help. Apparently, the bitterness is favored by people of Mediterranean origin. My North American palette didn’t like it. The beans’ casings had to go.

After shelling all of the pods, I ended up with six cups of beans. I put the pods into the fava bed and worked them into the soil as they are rich in nitrogen which is great for the garden and they are a great cover crop. There are still some pods yet to be picked, so I hope to get a few more cups of beans this month since the weather is getting warmer again.

It took about an hour to shell six cups of beans.

Now, I had these delicious looking beans with the bitter tasting outer skin. What to do? The fava preparation process is a hotly debated topic on the Internet. It reminded me of the time that I researched how to stack firewood. Ask 10 people, get 10 different answers, and everyone thinks that his/her way is the best. In the end, I weighed the pros and cons and went with the method that I thought would work best here, given our climate and terrain.

After what seemed an endless amount of reading and wading through online bickering by food enthusiasts, I decided to go with a suggestion in Mother Earth News magazine to blanch the beans in salted boiling water for no more than two minutes, then immersed them in very cold water with ice to stop them from cooking.

After cooled and drained in a strainer, the beans would easily pop out of their bitter casings. Voila! The process worked like a charm! After another 40 or so minutes later, each bean had been released from its casing. I tasted a few – delicious. I am officially hooked on fava beans. Next year, I plan to have at least two beds of them.

Fava beans after removing the outer casing.

I like to lightly sauté fava beans with 1 tbsp olive oil and one clove of minced garlic in a pre-heated pan for about 10 minutes, or steam them for no more than 10 minutes and add to salads, rice, pasta or sauces. Fava beans are a versatile food.

Looks like a lot of waste for a small amount of yield. Incorporate the waste into the garden.

Note that they do not keep for long periods of time in the refrigerator and will normally develop brown spots after a few days. I blanched a few cups of beans, plunged them in ice water, drained them thoroughly, and then packed them in freezer bags, sucking as much as out of the bags as possible with a straw.

I’ve read that they should keep in the freezer for at least a few months, but I find myself dipping into a bag now and then for a handful. Once thawed, they are wonderful in a salad of veggies fresh picked from my garden. One cup of fava beans is less than 200 calories. I think it’s time for a snack. Fava fever!