COOKING GREEN BEANS

Cooking green beans is a cinch, but first, if you want them really delic and healthy, then think first about growing green beans. Bean plants are the simplistic veg to grow. You put a seed in the ground and come back six weeks later, and hey presto, green beans.

Bush beans have the advantage in that they are quick. You'll have a crop in about six weeks. So, bush beans is the choice way of growing beans in early Spring.

For me, rather though pole beans. Or, as we call them in Africa, climbing beans. You'd be astonished at the crop you'll get off just three or four pole bean plants. Not enough for a green bean casserole, three bean salad recipe, bean dip recipe and the like, but sufficient for one person. Pole beans bear much longer too, and if you get unexpected heavy rain they don't get mildew. Just plant two or three seeds every week.

But for our family, I plant three times, perhaps fifty beans at a planting. We eat them morning, noon and night!

GROWING GREEN BEANS ... where to start

Beans are tremendous food, rich in protein and carbohydrate, but to get full value, you need some compost. Preferably quite a lot. Start by digging a trench and filling it with whatever garden and kitchen waste you have. First prize, if you have the space, is making a compost pile for yourself but growing beans don't really require well-rotted compost. They're not fussy, but if you want quality beans, find or make the compost. It's good for the environment too if you can use all your kitchen waste in the garden. Potato and banana peels, egg shells, beet skins, old flowers, grass cuttings... all the organic material. Not cooked food though.

Some of the best compost comes from decomposed sticks and logs, only it takes longer. Here's a giant pile of sticks that has come out of the jungle, that was formerly my apiary. Must have bees again, so instead of burning these sticks...

The other advantage of pole beans is that they are so easy to pick. With bush beans, you might require a couple visits to your chiropractor!

An aside: Whether you grow bush beans or pole beans, or get them from the supermarket, think about these lower back exercises. I've just seen this 82-year old lady. She came four months ago with severe pain down the front of her left leg. A pinched nerve in the midlumbar region - can you see where the vertebra has slid forwards? That's called a 'spondylolysthesis'. Long word!

Back to GROWING GREEN BEANS

When the world wearies

and society ceases to satisfy...

THERE'S ALWAYS THE GARDEN!

In your mind's eye, can you see the succotash? SUCCOTASH RECIPE

Not many things more rewarding that picking the fruit of all your labour. In ten minutes, having top and tailed 'em, you'll be cooking green beans, your very own. Pour a small amount of boiling water into a pot, perhaps one centimetre deep, bring the water hard to the boil again, and toss in the whole pole beans and put the lid on. Assuming they are nice and young, about two minutes of hard boiling is enough. Turn the stove off, they'll go on cooking for another five minutes. Drain, retaining some of the water.

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If the rest of your supper's ready, straight onto the hot dinner plates. If your cholesterol is in shape, smother them with some fresh butter. Yum.

And if your cholesterol's not in good shape? Don't take statins, no research showing they will add a day to your life (unless you've already had a heart attack). Think rather of eating foods that will lower your cholesterol naturally. It works, dinkum. My cholesterol is 4.2, and just ask Helen, I eat far more butter than is good for one. But then I do enjoy Helens 15 euro salad several times a week. And in the summer, I get plenty of practice at growing green beans. Both growing green beans (the exercise) and cooking green beans (and eating them) will keep your cholesterol profile in order.

FOODS THAT LOWER CHOLESTEROL ...

HELENS 15 EURO SALAD ...

NITROGEN FIXATION

Our bodies require abundant amounts of nitrogen in our food to manufacture amino acids, the building blocks of living tissue. Nitrogen fixation bacteria in the roots of legumes provide that nitrogen, for us and for all the other plants in the garden that like us are dependent on nitrogen fixation for utilizing the nitrogen from the air.

That's the beauty of growing legumes like pole beans and growing lima beans in our gardens - they reduce our reliance on proteins from red meat and dairy; there is now abundant evidence that animal protein eaten in excess, cause many cancers.

Research in Holland which has the highest rate of breast cancer in the world indicates that red meat, dairy and eggs, eaten in excess, are the main cause. BREAST CANCER AND PREVENTION

GREEN BEAN SALAD

This is my favourite way of enjoying green bean recipes. It's also quick and easy. In five minutes after cooking green beans, your green bean salad will be ready for the table. Perhaps less, believe you me, I'm the one who makes it! Well, sometimes!

INGREDIENTS for a green bean salad

What could be easier?

PS: We need to educate our tongues to the fact that not everything must be sweet. But if you insist, add a teaspoon of raw honey.

Make it pretty with some slices of tomato and a sprinkling of fresh parsley, and it's GRUB'S UP. Time permitting, it's good to wait for a while for the flavour of the garlic and herbs to permeate the beans.

Anyway even if you have no desire to live to be a healthy ninety with all your marbles intact, MY LUNCH TASTES DIVINE! As we said in Holland, Eet smakelijk. Enjoy!

Red meat max once a day remember, probably three times a week max... get more protein from legumes, fish and fowl.

SAVE BEAN SEED @ COOKING GREEN BEANS

GROWING LEMON TREES

Dips, Pâté and Soup to go with COOKING GREEN BEANS

GREEN BEAN SUCCOTASH RECIPES

Corn and beans out of a can is definitely only fit for hogs (taste-wise) but, straight from the garden, green beans and fresh corn is to die for. Healthy, full of fibre, very low glycemic index, high in protein, full of phytosterols ... plain good food. GREEN BEAN SUCCOTASH RECIPES ...

GIGANTES BUTTER BEANS RECIPE

Giant butter beans are used for this delic healthy Greek dish. Other than soaking the beans overnight, it can be made in a jiffy. Healthy good stuff, high in protein, low in fat and carbohydrate ... butter beans are just dried lima beans (see more below). GIGANTES BUTTER BEANS RECIPE ...

GROWING LIMA BEANS

USEFUL LINKS @ COOKING GREEN BEANS