Growing Pinto Beans

This year I planted a three-sisters garden, which consist of sweet corn, climbing beans, and squash. I chose pinto and lima beans for my climbing beans, and they are doing very well.

Pinto beans are one of many different types of dry beans, including black, kidney, northern, and more. They are not commonly grown in the home garden but are very easy to grow.

I purchased mine from the Vermont Bean Seed Company. Their catalog lists the pinto bean as a 90-day, half-runner-type pole bean. The light green pods are lightly striped pink and quite pretty. They produce a medium sized bean that is light beige specked with brown. I planted mine on May 27, 2020.

I was able to harvest most of them on August 4^th. Since a half-runner-type bean is part bush and part pole bean, it produced pods closer to the ground. The new growth continued to climb upward on the corn plants in my three-sisters garden.

I harvested the bean pods that were completely dry, with dry beans inside. A small dishpan produced about a half pound of shelled beans. Since they were dry the beans came out of the pods very easily.

I was so excited about my first pinto bean harvest that I brought them right to the kitchen to cook. After cleaning, I boiled them about 10 minutes and let sit for an hour (in lieu of an overnight soak), then drained them. After adding 2-3” of water above the beans, the beans were boiled with a small white onion (also from my garden) and a bay leaf. After about an hour the beans were soft, but not broken.

They taste wonderful alone, but I plan to add barbecue flavor to make a sort of baked bean. I also really like pinto beans as vegetarian refried beans or as a bean dip that includes tomato, chives, and cilantro.

My first experience growing pinto beans was so successful that I plan to grow them again next year, in an even bigger three-sister garden!