page_title: Vicia faba
section_title: Culinary uses
hierarchical_section_title: Vicia faba / Culinary uses
caption_attribution_description: Fried broad bean (probably Vicia faba) as a snack, seasoned with garlic, salt and chili. Produced in China. Bought in an Asian supermarket in Germany.
context_page_description: Vicia faba, also known in the culinary sense as the broad bean, fava bean, or faba bean, is a species of flowering plant in the pea and bean family Fabaceae. It is of uncertain origin and widely cultivated as a crop for human consumption. It is also used as a cover crop. Varieties with smaller, harder seeds that are fed to horses or other animals are called field bean, tic bean or tick bean. Horse bean, Vicia faba var. equina Pers., is a variety recognized as an accepted name.
  Some people suffer from favism, a hemolytic response to the consumption of broad beans, a condition linked to a metabolism disorder known as G6PDD. Otherwise the beans, with the outer seed coat removed, can be eaten raw or cooked. In young plants, the outer seed coat can be eaten, and in very young plants, the seed pod can be eaten.
context_section_description: Broad beans are generally eaten while still young and tender, enabling harvesting to begin as early as the middle of spring for plants started under glass or overwintered in a protected location, but even the main crop sown in early spring will be ready from mid to late summer. Horse beans, left to mature fully, are usually harvested in the late autumn, and are then eaten as a pulse. The immature pods are also cooked and eaten, and the young leaves of the plant can also be eaten, either raw or cooked as a pot herb (like spinach).
  Preparing broad beans involves first removing the beans from their pods, then steaming or boiling the beans, either whole or after parboiling them to loosen their exterior coating, which is then removed. The beans can be fried, causing the skin to split open, and then salted and/or spiced to produce a savory, crunchy snack.
caption: Fried broad beans as a snack
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