1. Did you shock your beans in ice water to stop the cooking after blanching? 2. I'd ask if you have a self-defrosting freezer because that perpetual cooling-warming cycle is very hard on stored foods. 3. What about your packaging? Is it possible it wasn't airtight enough? Finally, I think the next time around you should try steam-blanching. I believe you'll like the results better. Carol

digdirt With the Fortex beans, I've been removing the stem-end of the bean and leaving the curved point. Maybe I should remove both in the rest of them. Now, note that they don't get mushy without blanching if I make sure there's no air in the package AND if they are put directly into boiling water from the freezer. That's what I normally do when cooking them anyway, so mushiness hasn't been a problem. David & oregonwoodsmoke I hear you about preferring the French cut! Many years ago I used to buy the Green Giant ones with slivered almonds, but then we got to be more set in our ways, I suppose. I like the mouth-feel of Frenched beans less than the whole-cut ones, but it sounds like a good thing to do with beans that may be tougher or older. The Fortex pole beans are truly the best I've ever grown and eaten, either fresh or frozen. They're very long, eight to ten inches at even pencil-size in diameter or smaller, no strings at all, and yes, a true green pole bean. Linda Lou I'd think blanching would be needed for canning beans maybe more than freezing them. Wouldn't freezing beans either slow down or altogether stop the enzyme action until they reach "deterioration" temperature, whatever that is? That's what I concluded after realizing that if I quickly freeze the just-picked beans (without exposing them to air in the package after freezing) and then put them directly into boiling water from the freezer, they are nearly indistinguishable from fresh-picked beans. I've also found something similar with corn. This was by accident. At least thirty years ago, I stopped at a road-side stand at the end of the summer and bought the guy's last bushel of corn for a dollar. I had a car-full of little boys who'd been to the beach, so when I got home, I didn't have time to shuck the corn that we didn't eat at dinner. So I tossed it into plastic garbage bags with the shucks still on and put the whole shebang into the garage freezer and promptly forgot them. Just before Christmas, I remembered those ears of corn. When I checked, they hadn't suffered freezer-burn, so I brought out a few of them to thaw and shuck. They were absolutely delicious! We had the rest for Christmas dinner and New Year's Eve! Truly, they tasted fresh-from-the-garden, too. So I do wonder, sometimes, about traditional wisdom, though in most cases it truly covers the situation. I suppose digdirt's advice is good advice for adventurous sorts like me, to test things out. [Of course, you can do that with freezing vegetables but not with canning them.]

I had some skanky looking beans that I froze last winter, browinsh , freezer burnt . Thought I would add the to some soup to see what would happen. THey turned out great! turned bright green and were tender like I picked them that day.

A blanch involves quick heat for a couple of minutes. If just in boiling water and then allowed to cool on their own, they do continue to cook. A dip into ice water immediatly after the BW dip is the best way to stop any further cooking. allowing them to simply cool of their own will be like cooking them twice (if frozen), or 3 times if canned. A Frencher seems to work best for fresh picked. You like long beans, try the red noodle. They are reddish color and can gor to over 3 feet long!. I was amazed at the length, and the redish color remains even after all cooking. They are a pole type and do require a tall trellis. To quickly remove the ice water after the blanch, I use an Oxo Salad spinner. These are great for most all blanced stuff and take out quite a lot of standing water. After a few spins, I place them on a big thirsty clean towl, and cover with the towel. They freeze to a loose package, as opposed to a big frozen lump. I also do broccli crowns and peas the same way. Love that spinner!!