White Lablab

[blueadzuki]

Hi,

One quick question, in the hope that someone has the requisite experiance.

I have always read that when dealing with Hyacinth beans (Lablab purpueus a.k.a. Dolichos lablab) it was always essential to only eat young pods as mature seed was poisonous and only edible after extensive leaching an boiling) However I have also seen huge bags of white dolichos beans (it somehow seems wrong to call white beans that produce green leaves/pods and white flowers "hyacinth beans") sold in both Chinese and Indian supermakers (In the Indian pulse market, they seem to be referred to as "Van dal" (that and lima beans) Does anyone know if the warning somehow doesn't apply to the white seeded forms (it wouldn't be the first time there was a legume that was safe in the white form, dangerous in the colored) I just seems odd that they could sell whole bags of the stuff in supermarkets (alongside more "normal" beans) if it took that much effort to make them safe.

[castanea]

I don't know the answer to your question but would just note that lima, kidney and fava beans can be toxic also. People have gotten sick from eating improperly prepared kidney beans in salad bars.

[paquebot]

There seems to be a lot of conflicting information about their edibility. I've grown one the past 2 years and now find that it's supposedly a rare variety. It's a bush type rather than vining and has pure white flowers. Beans are a reddish-brown with a white "keel". Got them originally from an Indian gardener who treat them as an ordinary dry bean. Thus far, can't find any US source for them. The only white-flowered that I find are climbers rather than bush.

Martin

[blueadzuki]

Dec 23, 2010 22:58:04 GMT -5 paquebot said:

There seems to be a lot of conflicting information about their edibility. I've grown one the past 2 years and now find that it's supposedly a rare variety. It's a bush type rather than vining and has pure white flowers. Beans are a reddish-brown with a white "keel". Got them originally from an Indian gardener who treat them as an ordinary dry bean. Thus far, can't find any US source for them. The only white-flowered that I find are climbers rather than bush.

Martin

They must be, this is the first time I've ever heard of bush hyacynth, it though they were all vines (then again, until recently I had never heard of bush rice beans, or vine soybeans either)

That's a good point about the rest of the beans being potentially toxic as well. Even so, the fact that specific warnings are made about the toxicity of hyacinth beans means that they are considered a level of poisonous beyond that of the ordinary bean (after all catalouges do not normally put big warnings about poisonous seed in the descriptons of their common beans).

I actually bought the bag I have sitting by me now (which is what got me around to asking the question in the first place) since I saw some material that I thought might be useful in adding some more color options to the mix (the way hyacinth bean is normally used in this country means it's more of a flower than a food source, so a never variation on color is more likey to be a good seller) I've had a theory for a while that if the colored seeded versions usually yield colored plants (your bush seems to be an exception as you say it flowers white (and I assume has green foliage) but seeds brownish) and the white seeded tend to yield white flowered plants, that their may be a chance for something in the middle (green shot through with purple with either pale purple or (hopefully) bicolored flowers) I am thefore fiddling around with a minor type in the bagged beans, those that are white but have a black hilum visible as a black line under the "keel" you mentioned with a little black poking out at each end (about 1-2% of the beans in most bags still have this trait)and freckling (a group of tiny black and tan dots (not as yet extensive enough to be really called speckling) that show up on what I would consider the back of the bean (opposite the side where the hilum is) that is heavy (most black hilumed white beans have a freckle or two, but I discovered from last years trys that one or two is usally too weak to show any color, so I now am only planting ones with a good amount of frecking (defined as enough specks I can't easily count them) and of course I am planting plenty of colored ones next to them, for the pollen.

[castanea]

Dec 24, 2010 8:38:24 GMT -5 blueadzuki said:

Dec 23, 2010 22:58:04 GMT -5 paquebot said:

There seems to be a lot of conflicting information about their edibility. I've grown one the past 2 years and now find that it's supposedly a rare variety. It's a bush type rather than vining and has pure white flowers. Beans are a reddish-brown with a white "keel". Got them originally from an Indian gardener who treat them as an ordinary dry bean. Thus far, can't find any US source for them. The only white-flowered that I find are climbers rather than bush.

Martin

That's a good point about the rest of the beans being potentially toxic as well. Even so, the fact that specific warnings are made about the toxicity of hyacinth beans means that they are considered a level of poisonous beyond that of the ordinary bean (after all catalouges do not normally put big warnings about poisonous seed in the descriptons of their common beans).

That's one way to look at the toxicity issue but I think lack of warnings are more related to familiarity and cultural acceptance of a plant than to lack of toxicity. Red kidney beans can be quite toxic when eaten raw or after cooking at low temperatures and if they were new to our culture, I suspect that toxicity would be the subject of numeorus warnings. But familiarity breeds a certain level of comfort. People have died from eating cassava but it is a major crop in some areas of the world and people generally don't spend much time stressing about eating it. The toxic component in lablab is a cyanogenic glycoside, the same as in cassava.

[blueadzuki]

Dec 24, 2010 11:44:46 GMT -5 castanea said:

Dec 24, 2010 8:38:24 GMT -5 blueadzuki said:

That's a good point about the rest of the beans being potentially toxic as well. Even so, the fact that specific warnings are made about the toxicity of hyacinth beans means that they are considered a level of poisonous beyond that of the ordinary bean (after all catalouges do not normally put big warnings about poisonous seed in the descriptons of their common beans).

That's one way to look at the toxicity issue but I think lack of warnings are more related to familiarity and cultural acceptance of a plant than to lack of toxicity. Red kidney beans can be quite toxic when eaten raw or after cooking at low temperatures and if they were new to our culture, I suspect that toxicity would be the subject of numeorus warnings. But familiarity breeds a certain level of comfort. People have died from eating cassava but it is a major crop in some areas of the world and people generally don't spend much time stressing about eating it. The toxic component in lablab is a cyanogenic glycoside, the same as in cassava.

All true, but there is also the question of amount through breeding. With thier long, long history of cultivation and selection, I would imagine that the modern bean, while indeed still containg sufficent glycosides to be dangerous when improperly handled, presumably contain less glycosides than thier wild ancestor (whatever the ancestor of the common bean is, assuming it still exists) The more there is, the more you have to do to make it edible. The USDA may advise soaking you beans for 5 hours and then tossing the water away, but it does not require that you grind the beans up, stick them in a sack and leave them in a flowing river for a few weeks, which is what I understand is needed to make some kinds of legume seed safe to cook and consume. Soaked washed and cooked to an appropriate temperature, a bowl of fava beans is a fairly wholesome dish (assuming you don't have favism), which many a person throught history has eaten as a daily dish. Pull the same thing with a bowl of wild vetch seeds prepared in the same manner as the fava beans, and you'd probably be dead after a few months. As far as I can tell, in those areas where Lablab is a standard food bean, white is usally the choice; the colored ones are usally only used in places where due to one or more issues (bad climate, extra pests, etc.) the tougher closer to wild plant is needed if you want a crop that can survive to harvest.

Actually from what I understand from my college courses, cassava is an interesting case as it was intentionally chosen to be more poisonous (for pest control). Cyanide free (or at least cyanide low) straisn ahve been known in the amazon for all of the crops history, but weren't pest resistant so weren't a good choice. It's sort of similar to how some tribes in Africa still regularly grow poisonous yams along with the "safe" ones, though in this case it to prevent theft. (The idea, as I understand it, is that, when the yam crop is planted, some poisonous yams are planted in the field along with the good ones. This keeps people from other tribes (or in some cases, other families) from digging up the crop and stealing it, since the only people who know where the poisonous ones are buried are those who were there when they were planted and so have earned the crop by thier labor. Sorta like a living example of the urban legend about the watermelons)

[Leenstar]

I can't speak about kidney or hyacinth but fava beans can be toxic to people who carry a genetic factor called G6PD deficiency. It is seen in people of Mediterranean descent, more often males and can be life threatening.

[paquebot]

My white-blossomed hyacinth bean is definitely a bush. When I noted my Indian friends first growing it, I commented that they should be supported. They insisted that it will only get about 2' tall. When I got some of their seed the next year, they were planted where they could climb. They never once tried to produce a climbing tendril. This past season, same 2' tall plants. Next project will be to search some of the Indian seed sites to find exactly what it is called.

Martin

[blueadzuki]

Dec 25, 2010 23:44:32 GMT -5 paquebot said:

My white-blossomed hyacinth bean is definitely a bush. When I noted my Indian friends first growing it, I commented that they should be supported. They insisted that it will only get about 2' tall. When I got some of their seed the next year, they were planted where they could climb. They never once tried to produce a climbing tendril. This past season, same 2' tall plants. Next project will be to search some of the Indian seed sites to find exactly what it is called.

Martin

So you've got Lablab beans that are a bush when the "normal" version is a vine, and Ive got rice beans that are a "bush" (actually a stem as they usually don't seem to fork either (If I get enough of them this spring I may risk sacraficing some in a experiment of pinching off) which are also supposed to be a vine (in fact In my web seaching I have found no mention of a bush type rice bean at all (but them info on ricebeans online is pretty scant) they're about 2' tall as well at least the big ones were (some of the little ones flowered and set pods when they were only about 6") Makes me wonder if somewhere out there are such things as climbing chickpeas!

[paquebot]

Couldn't find anything on the bush hyacinth on Indian sites. I'll have to wait until May to find out the Indian name and where it was obtained. I know that it would be in the hot southern area. If you'd like about 30 seeds, supply me with an address to send them to. Postage would be $1.39 and bubble envelope 25¢. Or, offer me something that I can't refuse. And if you are into Indian vegetables, I have urad/black gram bean and dosakaya/Indian cucumber seed.

Martin

[paquebot]

I may have found what I have, Asia White. Photo looks exactly like them and does not mention growing on a trellis. Their Asia Purple may also be a bush rather than a vine.

www.evergreenseeds.com/hybeaswh.html

Martin