Growing Hodmedod's

You could hollow out some of your bread into a trencher and fill it with summat?..............save on the washing up!

I remember having soup served inside a loaf on holiday in the States, once. Never again! It disintegrated before I could finish it and I got in a right mess!

Your hodmedod pulses are an ideal base for a vegetable stew or soup adding probably all the protein you need. My stew yesterday (that will last a few days yet had dried beans and lentils with potatoes, carrots, leek and parsnips out of the garden and then mushrooms, celery and dried herbs. All ingredients optional with anything else you have. You can thicken if needed with your spelt flour.

Thaks Mark. I tend to cook a big batch of pulses and box them up for the freezer. Then I can pull out a box when needed - for stews or burgers. I admit that my favourite pulses are those that don't need a long time to cook - like lentils and split peas. The ones that take longer tend to stay at the back of the cupboard!

That's one reason I liked the Selma Zebra french bean as it was quite a prolific plant, they dried quite early in the year - well before any frosts and cooked quickly in the pressure cooker. Unfortunately mine has crossed with a soissons which takes a lot longer to cook (about 30min instead of about 12 to 15min.) I used them yesterday and some were well done after 15 minutes but the ones that had crossed (larger and flat but still stripy) were still hard so needed longer. Hopefully, if I grow them away from my other beans, I'll be able to get the original back. I've never had french beans cross before.

That's one reason I liked the Selma Zebra french bean as it was quite a prolific plant, they dried quite early in the year - well before any frosts and cooked quickly in the pressure cooker. Unfortunately mine has crossed with a soissons which takes a lot longer to cook (about 30min instead of about 12 to 15min.) I used them yesterday and some were well done after 15 minutes but the ones that had crossed (larger and flat but still stripy) were still hard so needed longer. Hopefully, if I grow them away from my other beans, I'll be able to get the original back. I've never had french beans cross before.

I have 2 unopened packets of Selma Zebra seeds - 30 seeds in each. Sow by Dec 2022. If you want to try them - I can send them to you.

That's one reason I liked the Selma Zebra french bean as it was quite a prolific plant, they dried quite early in the year - well before any frosts and cooked quickly in the pressure cooker. Unfortunately mine has crossed with a soissons which takes a lot longer to cook (about 30min instead of about 12 to 15min.) I used them yesterday and some were well done after 15 minutes but the ones that had crossed (larger and flat but still stripy) were still hard so needed longer. Hopefully, if I grow them away from my other beans, I'll be able to get the original back. I've never had french beans cross before.

I have 2 unopened packets of Selma Zebra seeds - 30 seeds in each. Sow by Dec 2022. If you want to try them - I can send them to you.

I think I should be ok with what I have. I have saved a couple of hundred beans that have the right characteristics so hopefully lots will breed true. I am going to sow them this year quite a way from any others - and only those that look like the originals, not any of the bigger ones. I might stop growing the soissons altogether as they take a lot longer to cook and are a lot later to ripen but they are prolific. I also have some dwarf french drying beans I bought in a supermarket in France 10 or more years ago (a 500g bagful so no idea the variety). These last year had one plant that was very prolific and semi-climbing (about 4'). I saved about 150 seeds off it to see if they grow the same. May be the hot dry weather was conducive to beans crossing or would they have crossed the previous year?