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Wild Jack Bean Canavalia Papuana Seeds
Packet of 10+ home grown rarely available seeds!
I have been collecting and eating the seeds and pods of this plant for more than two decades now and I was originally told they were the same as the other Jack Bean, just with longer thinner pods.
Turns out that they are not actually Canavalia rosea~Canavalia maritima, they are actually another related Aussie native called Canavalia papuana.
While pretty much every other Canavalia species we grow has a long written history of being used as a food this fella doesn’t.
Well maybe it does, but as everyone incorrectly identifies it as the more commonly known relative also known as Jack bean, it just hasn’t really been recorded under the correct botanical name?
That’s my theory anyway, and I personally consider it edible when cooked, just like all the other Canavalia beans are.
Whether you want to use it as a food, or just grow it as an ornamental is all up to you, keeping in mind that I’m just a random doofus on the internet and you personally may react differently to them to me.
If you get sick or drop dead, then them’s the breaks, and you won’t hold me responsible for your own actions.
I will now tell you how I personally like to eat them.
I eat the long tender young pods fried in butter or boiled in soups, stews and curries.
I pressure cook the dried bean seeds, dump the water and freeze the tender beans to use later in stirfries, cooked into an onion gravy, added to spicy Mexican food, whatever really.
As an ornamental they are great and they provide heaps of habitat for the critters.
Super hardy and masses of beautiful pink flowers that the native bees love.
Great for a green manure crop on poor soils and they are one of the most drought hardy plants here.
They are native to the whole of WA, NT and QLD, and the range extends right up into PNG.
They are normally found along creeklines as the seed pods float and the seeds themselves have no trouble sinking a tap root directly into rocky rubble.
The king parrots love to rip the green pods up but I’m not sure it they are actually eating them or they just like making me cranky and creating a mess…
Great nitrogen fixing native vine that looks cool, feeds the critters, provides habitat and may or may not be edible.
Grown by me and the Mrs organically, no chems, no nasties, no problems!!!
