visualize whirled peas...and fava beans

so i debated whether to include the following tidbit about myself. i thought about it long and hard, and decided to just put myself out there. plus, i figured that those of you reading this now are either friends or family, so the following won't come as a huge surprise.

when i think of fava beans, i immediately reflect on the slapstick humor of jim carrey and jeff daniels in the perennial comedic classic, dumb & dumber. why? you might ask.

harry: check out the funbags on that househound.
lloyd: i'd like to eat her liver with some fava beans and a bottle of chianti.

no set up for those lines needed. the randomness and hilarity of this movie is just so great.

if you're still reading, first - thank you for not judging me; and second, let's move on to the meat of this post. i wanted to write about fava beans and snap peas for a few reasons - these vegetables are beautiful and so easy to grow.

forget the beans (they're not yet mature), fava blossoms are wonderful sights. the transformation from flower to food is really something to see. we only have a few pods right now, maybe about 2 inches long. these guys will get huge in a short time. ah, and courtesy of jamie oliver, i learned this weekend that fava beans are extraordinary nitrogen fixers, which does wonders for the soil. he suggested planting as a cover crop - i think we'll give that a shot later this year, perhaps in the corn bed (since corn's a heavy nitrogen feeder).

anyway, jamie oliver is awesome. his new show, jamie at home, focuses on eating seasonally, growing your own food, and making wonderful, simple creations. enthusiasm in the garden and in the kitchen is inspiring so many. last saturday, the show featured peas and broad (ie: fava) beans, hence the inspiration of this post. he shared his "incredible smashed peas and broad beans on toast" recipe (link to the recipe and beautiful photo) - cannot wait to try this once the favas are up to speed. it features fresh mozzarella and gobs of olive oil - yum.

with this recipe, i'll segue into the other topic at hand...peas. funny story (at least to me and my siblings). one day, i came home from school late and found my dad in the living room watching the news and eating dinner. his meal of choice? a giant bowl of peas. cooked, frozen peas. i think my mom must have been out. a favorite food of his and a point of family humor. hi dad!

so with that...we planted a ton of sugar snap peas earlier this spring. two varieties - cascadia and oregon giant. they're maturing now, so we've been able to enjoy small handfuls out in the garden and at the dinner table over the past few days. tender, sweet, and snappy (as their name would suggest) - these guys rock.

i snuck some pea vines into dinner the other night - they have a similar flavor and the little curly q's that form on the ends are just so cute and whimsical. one thing i'd note about our pea-planting endeavors...we (alright, by "we" i mean "me" - er, i suppose that would be "i") may have situated them a bit to close to each other, which might be putting some stress on the plants. whoops. next time, we'll thin them out once they sprout up - give em some room to stretch out. a learning process, but at least we get to eat our mistakes along the way.