Description

A dentist of Cherokee descent passed this bean to USA’s Seed Savers Exchange in 1985, along with possibly the most poignant oral history for heritage seed: As white American settlers pushed south and west from the east coast, the native Americans of the Cherokee Nation were force marched from their Georgia homeland, west across the Appalachian mountains, and all the way to Oklahoma, 1500km away. This occurred during the winter of 1838-9 and four thousand perished. With them they carried this bean, which helped feed them, and to grow in their new “homeland”, and it became symbolic of their struggle for survival and identity. The bean is slightly square ended and glossy black. It is excellent as a dried/shellout bean, however originally its main use was to be ground up as flour. Cooked with blue and black corn (e.g. Hopi Blue Corn) the whole beans turned from black to blue when the ash of herbs was added (to release the B vitamins in the corn). You can simulate this by adding a little baking soda to the cooking pot. Young pods are also excellent as snap beans. The initially green pods ripen maroon, and dry to black and tan stripes. A climbing bean to 2.5m. From Central Tree Crops, 2012; Central Tree Crops, Wanganui, 2012.