Heart to Hearth Cookery

French beans and Fava beans

The French beans and Fava beans are next to each other on the table waiting to be preserved but the origins of these two types of beans are oceans apart.  There are about 50 species of the New World beans and Phaseolus vulgaris (the common, French or snap bean) is one of them.  The bean of the Old World is Faba (known more commonly as fava or broad beans).  When broad beans sailed to America in the 16th century, they crossed with the New World beans traveling the other way.

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