The #1 Plant Every Apocalypse Garden Needs

A few years ago, my son had a school project involving cells, for which we acquired a bag of 15-Bean Soup that was then glued to a paper plate in a representation of mitochondria, ribosomes, golgi bodies and various other cell organelles. Well, this happened to be in the spring as the temperatures were warming up, and on a lark, I took about 5-6 of each variety of bean and planted them in my garden. Just 'cause I felt like it, really. It turns out, I am not the world's best gardener, and my little experiment went largely forgotten until it was time to harvest items from the garden. I will admit that there were many casualties of overgrown weeds that year. Many of the bean varieties were crowded out; I don't think any of them were watered aside from normal rainfall. Despite the flagrant neglect, imagine my surprise to find that there was a very healthy population of the black bean variety.

Having been impressed with the hardiness and yield of this handful of beans, I saved my small harvest and planted an enire row the next year. My goodness. Have I mentioned that while I enjoy gardening, I am overall rather new and not very good at it? My (very minimal) effort yielded 4 cups of dry beans. I never would have expected that black beans would be a good crop for Maine, but I was pleased! What I found most impressive was how I could completely ignore these plants and still have what I consider to be a successful harvest. This year, I planted 2 rows of the black beans. Here they are, living their best bean lives, suffering my neglect, yet still producing for me:

We did have an unusually soggy growing season this year in Maine. I tried to choose a day to harvest when they would be mostly dry. I ended up with a respectable amount in my Hannaford tote bag.

(Note that I invested in the weed barrier cloth this year)

Because the pods were still a bit damp when harvested, I did cycle them through my dehydrator to dry them out. Alternatively, you could pull the plants and hang upside down to dry out, but I am limited on space, so dehydrator it was for me. Then, I let them sit like the patient little harvest they are until I had time to deal with them. I shucked them a little at a time over several weeks. My 2 rows of black beans yielded 12 cups of dry beans, which is about the equivalent of 24 cans of black beans from the grocery store. I also planted one row of Flambo beans (from Johnny's Selected Seeds), and that resulted in a little more than 4 cups of dry beans. Right now, they are sitting in a jar, although at some point, when I am gosh darn good and ready, I will can them up. The beauty of dry beans, though, is that time can be whenever. Last year's bean harvest didn't get canned until about May, and they are just fine. I do like canning them up, as they at that point only need to be put into a recipe or reheated, without all the soaking and planning. However, whether to store dry or can the beans is really a personal preference.

So, why do I suggest that dry beans are a top crop for my apocalypse garden?

1) Easy to Grow. First of all, they are super hardy. You can be busy with obtaining clean water, fighting off zombies and tending and protecting animals (or working, for a non-apocalypse scenario) and not worry that your crop will not produce or will go by while you're off doing other things. Life happens. So should your garden.

2) Beans are a fabulous source of protein. While most of the plants in my garden are lacking in this area, beans really step up. If you couldn't count on the grocery store to provide your nutrition, obviously you'd have backyard chickens for eggs and maybe a few scrawny roosters for meat. But if you had raccoons, foxes or fishers feasting in your yard, the beans could help round out your protein content of your home-produced food while you waited to hatch and raise replacement chicks.

3) Cooking Versatility. From bean dip, to soups and stews, to salads, quesadillas and burritos...there are lots of ways to use beans.

4) Easy-to-Harvest Seeds. Once you buy your first beans (or save some from a bag before cooking dinner), you need only save out a handful of beans at the end of each season to be able to continue growing them indefinitely. No waiting on seed orders long after society and the Postal Service have collapsed.

5) Ease of Long-Term Storage. If you don't have time to preserve your harvest or if you don't know how or don't own a canner....you'll be just fine. Simply get the beans dry and collect them and store in a cool, dry location. They will last a long time with almost no effort, and they are very forgiving. If preservation is a skill you possess, you certainly may can them, but if you don't have experience with it, you'll get by just fine.

6) Improve Soil Quality. Beans are nitrogen fixers, so they help enrich your soil with nitrogen. This comes in super handy on next year's planting, if you plant your heavy nitrogen feeders, such as tomatoes, cukes, squash or cabbage, where your beans grew the previous year.

In all likelihood, we are not anywhere near one plant being the lynchpin of survival, but I do hope you'll give dry beans a try in your garden anyway. They are super easy, super delicious and pack a big nutritional punch as well.