2021 Little Easy Bean Network - Bean Lovers Come Discover Something New !

[flowerbug]

Well, we Linux afficionados may as well be Martians 😆

I like to think of Linux as the 1960s farm truck of the computer world. If you want to crack open the hood and get your hands greasy, when it breaks you can usually fix the thing with a bit of chewing gum and nylon stocking.

Fortunately it's also gotten a lot of attention from big tech, so it doesn't guzzle gas like a '60s farm truck. And it now has power steering too. Quite different from when I started using it 20 years ago...

almost every large corporate computing system which runs on some kind of central service probably uses Linux or some derivative of it.

and while the desktop can need some poking here or there there are now more friendly desktops available which most people who have been running a desktop would be able to use. it may take some time to get used to a few things, but on the whole i've never missed not running windows. special devices are always the pain in the butt until someone writes a driver for it, but i rarely have any use for those. with a lot of companies doing websites all you have to worry about is if they are writing the web site software to be compatible enough with your internet browser and that should be ok if they're actually sticking to the standards.

 

[flowerbug]

i have had so many odd beans that i rarely talk about each one any longer. in terms of strange colors i've had a very black bean but it also had a very bright coating over the black to where it looked like it was a silver finish. i wonder if i even have any of those still in my collection as that would have been somewhere around 2013-2015 or so and i've not been doing much with my black bean projects since then.

 

[capsicumguy]

I am of the opinion that keeping knowledge to yourself to provide an air of mystique and superiority ultimately is detrimental to the general quest for knowledge. Learning correctly about the world is hard enough without egos making it harder.

Hear hear, thoroughly agree. I somehow find myself in the PR wing of a tech company these days, and while we generally have an ethos of "honesty always, transparency whenever possible", I prefer to be transparent *always* and it kills me to hold my tongue when info that could be helpful to a few people isn't deemed fit for public consumption. (BTW I was just being silly when I suggested you conceal your sources; hope I didn't offend.)

Doesn't really surprise me. Based on it's appearance I believe that Fort Portal Jade is just the result of someone picking green seeded beans out of the Bantu population and letting them grow amongst themselves. So any color that showed up there should show up in Bantu.

Ha, you know, I always suspected that!!

Anyhow, it sounds like you've been collecting some pretty unique and interesting sports over the years. If you'd like some steel-blue Bantu beans with a copper streak down their backs, happy to share in the fall. (That is, if they come true.)

 

[Pulsegleaner]

Hear hear, thoroughly agree. I somehow find myself in the PR wing of a tech company these days, and while we generally have an ethos of "honesty always, transparency whenever possible", I prefer to be transparent *always* and it kills me to hold my tongue when info that could be helpful to a few people isn't deemed fit for public consumption. (BTW I was just being silly when I suggested you conceal your sources; hope I didn't offend.)

I generally try to only keep my tongue when it is necessary for me to get what I need. For example I have a friend/rival in book collecting who I often share tips with when I see something I don't think he has. But if I want whatever it is, I keep quiet since I know that telling him would just cause a bidding war between us (as it stands now my collection is larger than his so if I don't have it yet, he doesn't either.)

And then there's dealing with some of my other hobbies, like bead collecting. There lying cheating and misrepresentation is SO extensive and SO pervasive that it 1. Can almost be assumed (a real "caveat emptor" world) and 2. Almost REQUIRED in order to sell something (which is why I'm so bad at selling, I refuse to lie and refuse to cheat people.)

Ha, you know, I always suspected that!!

Anyhow, it sounds like you've been collecting some pretty unique and interesting sports over the years. If you'd like some steel-blue Bantu beans with a copper streak down their backs, happy to share in the fall. (That is, if they come true.)

I'm not sure "sports" is the right word. As far as I can tell, most of what I have are legitimate varieties (though I suppose you could argue that all varieties initially come from either a sport or a cross) . They come perfectly true when re-grown (well, except for Coals In The Candle). And since I have found more than one of most of them, they probably have been around a while, so they long since passed the single origin point.

I'll have to see about the Bantu's. As I said, they didn't do that well for me (in the ground, they grew very short, so it was easy for the squirrels and chipmunks to reach up and pick the pods before they were ripe.) Plus I already have a few odd test beans slated for planting next year (there were a few common beans in a lot of tropical seeds I got, and I'm growing them out.) The flip side of growing so many things is that I can't grow that much of any of them; space is limited.

 

[flowerbug]

3300+ old emails sorted through and filed. now i can get back to what i was doing before (trying to figure out some early seed swap sources, names and dates). that was a bit more tedious than i wanted it to be, but it did get done. next!

 

[BeanWonderin]

Not sure if this is the right bean thread to post in now, but since it's about last year's beans I think it makes sense.

Just before Christmas we did a test bake of several beans that we grew in 2021. This was just a fun way for everyone to see how their bean cooked up and compared to others. Plus, it was interesting to see how they compared during soaking and cooking as well as how the cooked beans compared in texture and flavor.

This wasn't a scientific test and I didn't really keep notes on our observations, so I'm just going to show the pictures. They all turned out well, though, and we enjoyed eating them.

I measured out a consistent volume of each bean (I think 1/4 cup) into ramekins, soaked overnight, topped off with fresh water in the morning, and baked uncovered until tender. I added water as necessary during cooking.

Beans after overnight soak:

Succotash

Viola

Pale Grey Lavender

Dapple Grey

Owl’s Head

Fort Portal Jade

Red Marbles

Giele Waldbeantsje

And the cooked beans:

 

[flowerbug]

Not sure if this is the right bean thread to post in now, but since it's about last year's beans I think it makes sense.

Just before Christmas we did a test bake of several beans that we grew in 2021. This was just a fun way for everyone to see how their bean cooked up and compared to others. Plus, it was interesting to see how they compared during soaking and cooking as well as how the cooked beans compared in texture and flavor.

This wasn't a scientific test and I didn't really keep notes on our observations, so I'm just going to show the pictures. They all turned out well, though, and we enjoyed eating them.

I measured out a consistent volume of each bean (I think 1/4 cup) into ramekins, soaked overnight, topped off with fresh water in the morning, and baked uncovered until tender. I added water as necessary during cooking.

Beans after overnight soak:
View attachment 47733

Succotash
View attachment 47734

Viola
View attachment 47735

Pale Grey Lavender
View attachment 47736

Dapple Grey
View attachment 47737

Owl’s Head
View attachment 47738

Fort Portal Jade
View attachment 47739

Red Marbles
View attachment 47740

Giele Waldbeantsje
View attachment 47741

And the cooked beans:
View attachment 47742

thanks! now i'm hungry!