Bean Buddies

Do you know about Rancho Gordo beans? I wrote about them years ago, but they exploded in popularity during the pandemic, and they now sell out regularly. You can get on the waiting list for their ‘bean club’ which guarantees you a monthly supply, but there are people on that list that have been waiting for years! They are that popular. They do have the most diverse variety of dried beans, all of which are grown by reputable farmers (some large, and some small, some in the Western US, and some in Mexico), and the supply is quite fresh, unlike grocery store beans, which may have been sitting on the shelf for years.

Imagine my delight when one of my students (thanks, C!) mentioned that Rancho Gordo was starting a Bean Buddies program, in which the company would supply a small amount of heirloom beans to try growing at home. I immediately signed up, both for my home farm and for Merritt’s farm (which is basically where I teach all my labs). I’ve just received four different kinds of beans to trial, and I couldn’t be more excited to get growing.

image credit: Rancho Gordo Beans (Good Mother Stallard)

Good Mother Stallard beans are well known to a lot of cooks. They are known for making the best pot liquor (broth, basically) and have excellent flavor.

But I don’t know anything about any of these other beans. Flor de Mayo beans are from Mexico, and are a bush variety. Apparently they are used frequently in Mexican dishes such as refried beans and soups. I can’t wait to trial them, as they have pink pods and pink beans!

Jacob’s Cattle Bean is another bush bean that is rarely grown in the United States. Slow Food USA says that it’s a speckled kidney bean, named for its resemblance to Hereford cattle. Apparently they get more flavorful, and smell even better, the longer they cook, and they hold up well under that long cooking time, which makes them ideal for soup.

image credit: Rancho Gordo Beans (Lila)

Lila Beans are another unusual bean, and according to Rancho Gordo, they come from the south side of the Popocatépetl Volcano. They are a pretty purple bean which pairs well with pork.

In my class, we are working our way through our last module of the semester, and it’s about partnerships and community building around agriculture and food. Naturally this leads to a discussion of food sovereignty, which has at the heart of its movement the idea that cultural, traditional foods, grown under the control of indigenous peoples, and consumed for the health of all peoples, makes eating these kinds of food a celebration of heritage and history. Beans, being a staple crop for so many indigenous people, and which are adaptable to a variety of climates and growing styles, are an easy and delicious way to find a way in to this wonderful and important tradition.

Random Thoughts

This is Camp Okizu in 2007, our beloved cancer camp in Berry Creek, CA. We started going to camp as a family in 2004, and both Adam and Rin have attended by themselves every summer since they were eight. Adam has been a counselor for two years now, this past summer online, which was challenging but very rewarding for him. Okizu provides camp free of charge for children with cancer and their families. We love it there.

Okizu was badly burned this past week, in a massive fire that had been burning since our first terrible heatwave in August, but was fanned and spread by the high winds we had during our most recent terrible heatwave, a week ago. Berry Creek was one of the communities that was hardest hit, with a wave of fire that bore down so quickly that many people simply could not escape.

Here’s how the lodge looks now.

image credit: Sacramento Bee

We will do everything we can to help Okizu rebuild.

The smoke is still quite bad here in California, but we are hoping it will move out this week. Unfortunately we need wind to move it, and wind isn’t so great either, in terms of fire. Oregon is having a hell of a time right now, and our hearts are with everyone involved there. There are fires burning up and down the west coast and the western third of the country.

Fire has been much on our minds, but classes and work and life do continue despite it.

The day after Labor Day, a professor of mine read aloud an excellent poem, which I thought you might enjoy as much as I did. It’s called “Worker” and was written by the poet laureate of Berkeley, who also happens to be my professor’s neighbor.

“He who works with his hands is a laborer,

He who works with his hands & his head

is a craftsman, he who works with his hands

& his head and his heart is an artist,

so you said, brother Francis.

Were you then an artist, brother,

rebuilding St. Damian & the chapel

Our Lady Queen of the Angels of Porciúncula?

I do not know man or woman who works

only with the hands without the head

weighed down as it be or without heart

though it be bitter & hurting.

It is unjust circumstances that separate

the hands from the head & the heart.

Laborers, crafts-folk, artists

we are all workers —

we earn our bread & put

bread, & wine, on the tables.

If poverty there be it is no fault of ours;

the Earth is generous when it does not fall

into the hands of the greedy.

If there is baptism of water & blood

so also there is of sweat.
”

— Rafael Gonzales

As we drove down highway 101 from San Jose to San Luis Obispo on the 4th to drop Adam off at college, we drove through the beautiful salad bowl that is that particular valley in California. But the bowl was filled with smoke, and we were in a terrible heatwave, and the migrant workers, covered head to toe in flannel to ward off the rays of the sun, and masked because of Covid, were bent over harvesting cauliflower and romaine, working for pennies. That is definitely a baptism of sweat. I hope our future world honors labor, hard labor, essential workers, more than it does now.

Finally, here are a series of videos for you, which are part of my Environmental Justice module in one of my classes. Each one is inspiring - some are easy to watch and very entertaining, and some are hard to watch and may make you feel uncomfortable. Personally I learned from each one and thought you might be interested too.

Today we realized our family has been sheltering in place for six months.

I still haven’t torn out the summer garden. I keep meaning to, but every weekend carries its own challenges; one weekend it’s 110 degrees, the next the air quality is so bad that we have to stay inside with doors and windows shut. On Labor Day, it was 111 degrees here. Two days later it was 68 because the smoke had blocked so much sun. It’s been a hell of a ride.

Appreciating California

Adam and I just arrived back home after a trip to the middle of the country; namely, Ames Iowa, home of Iowa State University. Adam participates in a yearly competition called Odyssey of the Mind; it's too hard to explain it here (click the link for more), but it's a great organization and he's been doing it since the 3rd grade. His team has twice gone to the international portion of the competition after acing both Regionals and State; both times the event has been held at Iowa State in Ames. Tom went with Adam last time, so it was my turn this year. The event itself was mind-opening and exciting, we saw teams from all over the world and saw incredible performances. Our team is already looking forward to next year's event and hoping to attend (it will be in Michigan in 2019).

And the university itself is quite lovely, with all the things we don't get to enjoy in California - vast mowed lawns, swathes of peonies and hostas in the woodland areas, and fireflies in summer. We saw a dramatic afternoon thunderstorm, with dark clouds racing across the big prairie sky.  We had frogs hop in front of the car on the freeway, which bordered a river. Large groups of robins fed from the lawns everywhere we looked. Bunnies hopped out of the bushes at dusk. All of that was quite charming and fun to experience.

But there were far more things that made me appreciate coming home to California. I'm not knocking the midwest, but there are just some things we Californians do better. Like carry reusable water bottles everywhere we go, rather than buying plastic. Having recycling and compost bins next to every trash bin in any public place. Reducing the use of water whenever possible (I watched a landscape-worker watering a flower bed the morning after the heavy rain. When I asked why, he said 'they pay me to do this, so I'm doing it.') Making sure fresh fruit and vegetables are available at every meal (understandable to have canned or frozen in the winter in the midwest, but why in late May, when many things are at their peak?). Don't even get me started on the university's cafeteria food (five soda stations at every cafeteria and only one with water). 

Adam and I ate twice at the cafeteria, and then we had to stop. It just made us feel horrible to eat what was available there (reheated, plastic food). We had the foresight to rent a car which allowed us to explore the nearby town of Ames. Among a million fast food places, we found a diamond:  Wheatsfield Cooperative, a tiny natural grocery store that featured locally grown, organic produce and meals. We were so happy to have a place to buy salads and sandwiches, kombucha and real lemonade. I told Tom when we got back that you really know you are from California when you read a sign on the co-op picnic area wall ("These oak tables were milled and made from the 200 year-old oak that stood next to our store and was felled in a storm") and think "THESE ARE MY PEOPLE." We make fun of ourselves for our "Portlandia" mentality but it really is true that there is a care for the artisanal that lives deeply in us. 

It made me think again about food security and food justice. There we were, in the middle of one of the greatest agricultural places on earth, and it was difficult to find real food. We are fortunate enough to have the means to search out and purchase the best we can find. But what about the people who can't? Why is the cheap, fake food so much more available than the real stuff? This is an issue that many folks are wrestling with and it's a noble battle.

Another very interesting aspect of our time in Iowa was that I saw no bees. The campus is full of flowers that are empty. We visited Reiman Gardens on campus, a lovely 14-acre property filled with gorgeous flowers and trees. I saw two native bees, one carpenter and one bumble. That was it. I asked a docent, "Do you have a native garden section? I'm very interested in the native prairie ecosystem." I was told no. They used to have one but it's being torn up to make more landscaping. I searched their 'pollinator garden' - no insects. I found it incredibly disturbing. 

Meanwhile, we arrived home last night to find a homemade dinner waiting for us, chock full of real ingredients, that Tom had lovingly prepared. This morning, I woke at 6, grateful (for a short time at least) for the dry sunshine. I went outside in my pj's and picked and ate the first blueberries from our bushes, and some strawberries from our strawberry wall. I visited the chickens and gave them some collards from the garden. I watered all the plants and had visions of soon-to-appear tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers. I sat and watched the bees for a minute and appreciated their presence. I knelt down in one of our pollinator gardens, which happens to be full of poppies at the moment: there was a bee in every.single.flower.

I'm often disdainful of California and this state is in no way perfect. But there are a few things we really have gotten right here. I'm very grateful to be home.