I
n 1865, in south-west Pennsylvania,
John Mostoller spotted a wild goose
in the stream that powered his
family sawmill, shot it, then took
it home for his mother to cook.
I’m sure she felt the mix of emotions
that often accompany gifts of wild meat.
Gratitude and pleasurable anticipation,
accompanied by thoughts of the gory task
of removing feathers, feet and innards.
While gutting the goose she found a
handful of unusual looking beans in its
crop and saved them for planting out that
spring. The resulting beans, which became
known as Mostoller Wild Goose, proved
delicious fresh, shelled or dried, and,
as a testament to their utility, we’re still
growing them 150 years later. John’s mum,
Sarah Mostoller, was my kind of woman.
Undoubtedly the Mostollers weren’t
the first to grow these beans. Indigenous
peoples of North America would have
long been growing pole beans. They are,
after all, a subsistence gardener’s dream.
Not only do they provide soil fertility
as they grow, they can be eaten fresh
or dried for use in winter. I can imaginethat goose gorging itself on somebody’s
crop before making its fateful last descent
into the Mostoller millpond.
While sowing seeds late last spring,
ready for summer cropping, I steered
away from the short-lived but bountiful
bush beans that make up
the bulk of Australia’s
green-bean harvest. Bush
beans are wonderful
things. They burst
through the soil, waste
no time or energy on
growing tall, thinking
only of reproducing while
the going is good, putting
all their energy into
producing beans before
they drop dead, all in about 60 days. But,
for the small-scale farmer, lacking access to
technology like bean harvesting machines,
they mean a sore back from crouching to
harvest from small bushes.
Climbing beans are another matter.
They spread tendrils throughout the
season, twining their way up whatever
support you give them, and producingWe pull off the dried
plants, stuff them
into doona covers
and invite children
to ride bikes over
them until every
pod is shattered.beans along their stems as they grow,
meaning you’ll have to squat to pick
the first few handfuls, but can stand to
harvest as the long season progresses.
Along with the Mostoller Wild
Goose we grow the heirloom named Lazy
Housewife, so called because it’s stringless,
thus saving the ‘“housewife” time. It’s
sweet and crisp when fresh, then white,
nutty and lovely dried. There’s another
with two names, Lohrey’s Special and
Natural Salt, named first for the north-
west Tasmanian family that have been its
custodians for 100 years, and second for
the fact that it’s said to need no seasoning.
It’s deep green, flecked with tiny purple
streaks, and delicious, and produces a
pretty, tan-coloured dried bean with black
half-moons across its surface that any Jack
would happily trade his mother’s cow for.
Our giant trellis will also sport Purple
King, a purple bean that turns green when
it’s cooked (a magic trick that delights
children), as well as Climbing Butter,
which is magnificent to harvest since the
creamy yellow beans practically glow under
the green canopy. Another variety on our
trellis but one that many can’t abide the
texture of (although it’s my favourite) is the
Scarlet Runner. It produces flat beans with
a rough skin that are sweet and crisp when
young, but develop their best flavour
when left to mature a little. Though at
this point they’ll need stringing–atask
best performed sitting with a companion
and a pot between you, so
you can chat as you work.
Mechanisation has
made dried beans so
cheap that small growers
find it difficult to make
them viable, but we’ve
developed our own
threshing technique.
When the season is
done, we pull off the
dried plants, stuff them
into doona covers and invite children to
ride bikes over them until every pod is
shattered. We then throw the plants into
the air, watching pods and chaff winnow
into the breeze, while their jewel-like seeds
fall onto the sheets to keep us fed on
baked beans, soups and stews through
winter, and give us seed to begin it all
again next spring.It’s not every day you find magic beans, but everyday beans
have their own magic, writesPAULETTE WHITNEY.
Top to tail
42 GOURMET TRAVELLERProduce
ILLUSTRATION DAWN TAN.