Never miss a recipe!
Enter your email address to subscribe to Harvest to Table free via email:
almanac apples artichoke arugula asparagus basil beans beets best bet varieties blueberries bok choy books broccoli brussels sprouts cabbage carrots cauliflower celery chard cherries chilies Chinese cabbage Chinese leaves compost cooking cool-season vegetables corn cucumbers dates delicious bite delicious bites dried beans eggplant farmers market fennel fresh this week garbanzo bean gardening tips garlic grapefruit grapes herbs horseradish hot peppers how to grow in the garden kale kitchen garden kitchen garden almanac kohlrabi leeks legumes lemon lettuce mandarin orange melons mint mushrooms mustard greens nectarines okra olives onions oranges parsnips peaches pears peas peppers pests and diseases pests diseases problems potatoes pumpkin radish recipes rutabaga salsify seed starting shallots soil Southern Hemisphere spinach spring onions squash strawberry summer squash sun-dried tomato sunchokes sweet corn sweet pepper sweet potato tangerine tomato turnip turnip greens vegetable garden watermelons winter squash zucchini
Categories
- Around Here
- Berries
- Best Bet Varieties
- Bulb Vegetables
- Cereals & Grains
- Citrus Fruits
- Companion Planting
- Container Gardening
- Cooking
- Delicious Bite
- Dried & Candied Fruit, Rhubarb
- Dry Gardening
- Flower Vegetables
- Food For Thought
- Fresh This Week
- Fruit Vegetables
- Fruits
- Gardening Tips
- Harvest and Storage
- Herbs, Spices & Condiments
- How to Grow
- In The Garden
- Indoor Gardening
- Kitchen Garden Almanac
- Leaf Vegetables
- Legumes
- Making A Kitchen Garden
- Melons
- Mushrooms
- Nuts & Seeds
- Pests Diseases Problems
- Polls
- Pome Fleshy Fruits
- Quick Crops
- Recipes
- Root Vegetables
- Season Extension
- Seed Starting
- Southern Hemisphere
- Stalk Vegetables
- Stone Fleshy Fruits
- Storing Vegetables and Fruits
- Tropical Fruits
- Tuber Vegetables
- Vegetables
Measurement Converter
Hardiness Zone Finder
Find your zone by entering your zip code
Favorite Food and Garden Blogs
American Community Gardening Association
Center for Ecoliteracy
Common Ground Garden Los Angeles
Compost Guide
Culinate
Eat Local Challenge
Eat Well Guide
Edible Communities
The Edible Schoolyard
The Ethicurean
Food Routes
The Garden Lady
Gardeners Anonymous
In My Kitchen Garden
Local Harvest
Locavores
Mighty Foods
Mother Earth's Garden
National Gardening Association
Reading Dirt
Seafood Watch
Seeds of Change
Shirls Gardenwatch
Simply Recipes
Slow Food USA
Sonoma County Master Gardeners
Sustainable Table
This Garden Is Illegal
Thoughts on the Table
Veggie Gardening Tips
What to Eat
Harvest to Table
A practical guide to food in the garden and market
Borlotti Beans
Filed under: Legumes, Tagged as: beans, delicious bite, delicious bites, recipes

Just tender cooked borlotti beans--often called cranberry beans--are a tasty late summer snack.
Use your thumb to pop open the fresh-picked speckled pods, place a few handfuls of beans in a skillet and cover with just an inch of water; add a couple of cloves of garlic, pepper corns, and fresh sage, and simmer until they are just tender, about 10 to 15 minutes. Drain away the water; let the beans dry a minute or two in a colander or on paper towels; lightly salt to taste and drizzle with extra virgin olive oil. You can serve them alone warm or cooled or add them to the antipasto tray with mixed cheeses and sausages.
If the beans are fresh picked just barely visible in the pod and still young, you can leave out the cooking part, and snack on the creamy textured, nutty flavored borlottis simply adding olive oil and sea salt. If you've brought home dried beans, soak those 3 to 8 hours at room temperature or place them in a saucepan covered with water and bring to a boil, remove from the heat, and soak for 1½ hours before cooking.
The borlotti bean is an oval to round, ivory and dark red to brown speckled and blotched bean. It comes in a pod very similar, streaked ivory and dark red. The beans and pods are just about the same size as a large string bean. Inside, the borlotti is cream colored. Its flavor compares to the chestnut. Borlottis are shell beans; you don't eat the pods.
Cooked borlottis are tender and moist. They are native to
Enjoy the borlotti fresh in summer and dried year round. Its timing is perfect; the borlotti is ready for picking in summer just as the string bean harvest slows.
In the
Choose. Select fresh borlottis in full, brightly colored pods.
Shell. Split open the curved inside seam of the pod with your thumb and remove the beans.
Store. Fresh borlotti beans can be kept in the refrigerator up to a week. To freeze borlotti beans, blanch briefly in boiling water, drain, and freeze in a zip-top plastic bag.
Substitute. Tongues of fire, cannellini, and pinto beans can stand in for borlotti beans.
Borlotti Bean Salad 
Print Options
Ingredients
- 3 cups fresh-shelled borlotti beans (or 2 cups dried)
- 1 medium-size white onion, chopped
- 1-2 cloves garlic to taste, minced
- 1 tablespoon fresh chives, chopped
- 2½ teaspoons salt
- Juice of two fresh lemons
- ½ cup extra virgin olive oil
- 1 cup fresh parsley, finely chopped
- 1 teaspoon finely minced fresh sage
- 2 tablespoons coarsely ground pepper
- 1 red onion, thinly sliced rings
- Zest strips of a lemon, lime, or orange or all three
Method
1 Place fresh beans in a 3 to 5 quart pan cover with water and bring to a boil and then simmer for 10 minutes or so, drain. (For dried beans, soak in cold water for 8 hours; drain and rinse; cover in 2 inches of water, bring to a boil then reduce heat and simmer for about 1½ hours; drain.)
2 Place beans in a large bowl and let cool. Mix in white onions and garlic and chives. Add lemon juice, olive oil, parsley, sage, and black pepper. Mix gently using a wooden spoon. Garnish with citrus zest strips and red onion rings. Salt and pepper to taste.
You can refrigerate this salad a day in advance then warm to room temperature and serve.
You can also simply serve the beans hot with butter and olive oil, seasoned with salt and fresh ground pepper and garnished with fresh chopped parsley.
Never Miss a New Post subscribe to Harvest to Table by entering your email:
Harvest to Table's New Encyclopedia:
The Kitchen Garden Grower's Guide
A practical vegetable and herb garden encyclopedia
The Kitchen Garden Grower's Guide is a how-to guide on planting, growing, and preparing more than eighty vegetables and herbs. This handy home companion is perfect for avid cooks, foodies, and both beginning and expert small scale vegetable gardeners.
Send This Entry To A Friend
Link to this page
Bookmark this page using the following link:
http://www.harvestwizard.com/2008/08/borlotti_bean.html
Do you have a website?
You can place a link to this page by copying and pasting the code below.
<a href="http://www.harvestwizard.com/2008/08/borlotti_bean.html">Borlotti Beans</a>
Never Miss a Garden Tip!
Just enter your email address and you will subscribe to "Harvest To Table" Web site updates via email for free. Make sure you confirm your subscription from the confirmation message you'll receive in your mailbox right away.
Most Popular
Recent Posts
Recent Comments
- Stephen Albert on How to Grow Lima Beans
- AnnM on How to Grow Lima Beans
- Stephen Albert on How to Grow Lima Beans
- anna on How to Grow Lima Beans
- alex linssey markinmy on How to Grow Lima Beans
- Stephen Albert on How to Grow Lima Beans
- tine on How to Grow Lima Beans
- Anonymous on How to Grow Lima Beans
- Stephen Albert on How to Grow Potatoes
- amy on How to Grow Potatoes
- Durgan on How to Grow Potatoes
- Stephen Albert on How to Grow Potatoes
- Anonymous on How to Grow Potatoes
- Stephen Albert on How to Grow Potatoes
- katrina on How to Grow Potatoes
- Stephen Albert on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- charlie b on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- Stephen Albert on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- james on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- Stephen Albert on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- james on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- Stephen Albert on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- Mary Bender on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- Stephen Albert on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- hugh means on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- Stephen Albert on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- leongks on Vegetable Disease Problem Solver
- Stephen Albert on How to Grow Celery
- Sandi on How to Grow Celery
- Stephen Albert on How to Grow Celery
- Flo on How to Grow Celery
- Stephen Albert on Melon Growing Problems: Troubleshooting
- John on Melon Growing Problems: Troubleshooting
- Stephen Albert on Beans: Harvest and Storage
- Holly on Beans: Harvest and Storage
- Stephen Albert on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- mutuelle on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Stephen Albert on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Sue Parker on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Stephen Albert on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Corinne Whitfield on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Stephen Albert on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- mary on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Stephen Albert on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- matt on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Stephen Albert on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- keith on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Stephen Albert on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Carman on Spring Onions, Green Onions and Scallions
- Stephen Albert on Chinese Vegetables: Warm-Season Varieties
- Trent on Chinese Vegetables: Warm-Season Varieties
- Toleomas on Chinese Vegetables: Warm-Season Varieties
- Stephen Albert on How to Grow Radish
- Kathy on How to Grow Radish
- Stephen Albert on Growing Mint
- Chris and Growing Mint on Growing Mint
Subscribe by RSS


Some of my borlotti beans are still green inside the pod. can these be frozen and used in cooking?
Yes, you can freeze your green borlottie beans just as you would green beans and you can cook them like you would sliced green beans or haricots.