Camp, I too cannot stand butter beans from a can nor frozen, these are just as terrible and overly large and tough as the green peas found in tv dinners, yuk. Wayne, thanks for the Fordhook bush tip but my bush days are over except for snaps (green beans) which is the best way to freeze large fresh batches at once. My back ain't what she used to be so my days bending over to pick BBs is behind me. Last year while I was expecting a dismal repeat of King of the Garden limas I planted Butter Peas bush variety as a back-up, these were productive and tasty but way too much effort bending over to harvest. Sticking to pole picking. PN, wonder what the heck happened to Sieva seed beans? If King of the Hill seed wasn't offered around here we'd have zero pole varieties on the market today. Wish too that I had saved some Sieva seed :(

Good to see you again Joy, very pretty impatient and thank you for the offer of Fava beans, need to check what to send you. Hi Jeny, I've had impatients of both kinds return for years except the double glowered, if you have double-camellia bloomed- especially splashed with white? thanks Bea

Yes, the favas (geez, I had "limas" typed out just then - even still, I'm getting the names confused!) taste quite a lot like edamame. I think that's why I enjoyed them so much. The texture and flavor were similar, but a bit more assertive in the favas than you'd find in a soybean. I was feeling too blah to cook the limas after making a batch of kale chips to snack on (have you all tried them? Holy goodness, they are SO good!), so I'll have to futz with them tomorrow. It sounds like they need a bit of cooking time, as some of the recipes I saw said to boil them for 15 minutes or until tender, and they were referring to fresh limas. That sounds like an awfully long time to boil anything green, so we shall see. I like mealy beans a lot, so that might not be a bad thing. Vall3fam, I hadn't even thought of checking out TJ's or Whole Paycheck for frozen favas, and I was just there today! I'll have to look the next time I go. I'd love to buy them fresh, but even at $1/lb, I'd end up composting 3/4 of it because the shell to bean ratio is so small, and decreases even more when you peel the skins off of the beans.

Someone in another thread had mentioned people taking certain medications should not consume favas. Also, I know from another internet site I occasionally go to that some people have a genetically acquired inability to deal with favas, resulting in a rare but at times life-threatening anemia. Even the pollen can harm such people...but favas are also claimed to be helpful to people with Parkinson's disease! Here is a link that might be useful: Most informative link I could find