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november 2017
snap
savor
them substantial. Green beans simmered
in a pot with water and pork was the
main dish, not a side accompaniment
like it is today. The leftover parts of the
pig — hog jowl, fatback, bacon — were
combined with the beans to add calories
and create the feeling of satiety, which
increased the amount of energy that could
be expended in fields or factories until the
next meal.
The beans were simmered for a long
time because the pods contain lignin, a
substance also found in wood, hemp and
linen, which make the bean tough and
difficult to digest unless fully cooked.
Early 19th-century cookbooks from the
likes of Mary Randolph and Lettice Bryan
published recipes calling for different
cooking times, but by the 1870s it was
nearly universal for Southern cookbooks
to call for simmering beans for around
three hours with salt pork.
IS THE GENERIC TERM
FOR A DIZZYING NUMBER OF
DIFFERENT LEGUMES.
There are more than 130 varieties of
Phaseolus vulgaris, literally translated as
“common bean.”
The green beans of the South are
mostly string, snap or pole beans. String
are so called because of the tough fibrous
strings along the pods that needed to be
removed back in the day before most seed
companies successfully bred the strings
away. Snap is associated with the freshness
when the stem end is snapped off and the
beans are halved or quartered lengthwise
before cooking. Pole beans grow on a vine
that has to be trained onto a pole.
In a fast-moving, modern-day factory
farming culture, pole beans belong to an
old farming craft. They take up acres of
space for the trellises that have to be set
up, and then they have to be handpicked
again and again. The reason pole beans
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WBM