Bean Seeds Are Back—Grow Your Own Protein!

Vegetarians, and especially vegans, listen up! The return of bean seeds to our catalog and website means you can grow your own protein right in your own garden and be certain it’s free of pesticides and GMOs. Many of the beans, especially the lima and dried bean varieties, can average between 12 and 18 grams of protein per cup when boiled. It’s even possible for home gardeners to get their entire daily requirement of protein, just by choosing the right beans that fit your diet needs.

Bean seeds made their debut on our website this spring, and their popularity is right up near the head of the class. There are many types of beans to choose from, so there is always one that provides the perfect ingredient for almost any type of cuisine. And beans are easy to grow in the home garden—there are plenty of bush varieties that don’t require a lot of space and many of them have a short growing season, so multiple cropping is simple. With a little extra work, pole bean varieties can be made to fit even small gardens with our special trellising accessories.

To launch our first offering of beans, we feature the variety ‘Inspiration’—a brand new bush green bean, which “has a bred-in, appealing sweet flavor in classy, high-quality pods with remarkable ‘beany’ texture and eating quality. Best of all, ‘Inspiration’ can handle the hottest heat stress ever. Pods are crisp, about 6 inches long, slim, dark-green and white seeds are highly resistant to bean common mosaic virus. Highly productive plants grow to a compact 16 to 20 inches, and are ideal in patio containers, but need caging.

For those healthy food lovers, we offer ‘Great Northern’ in our dried bean collection, one of the best protein substitutes at one gram of protein per 14.2 calories. “’Great Northern (85 days) is perhaps our best baking bean for the Midwest, although extremely popular in the North, including New England. Semi-vining, 24-inch plants are prolific and hardy. Pods 3-4 inches long, are filled with tasty, large, white seeds of excellent uniformity.”

Have you had your favorite meat-substitute beans today? Order seeds now!