From Our Fields: Peas and Fava Beans
Spring legumes are a race against the clock. Growing them ourselves is how we win it.
## A Short, Sweet Season
Fresh peas and fava beans share a problem: they are at their best for a very short time, and they start turning the moment they are picked. The sugars in a fresh pea begin converting to starch within hours. A young fava is sweet and tender one week and tough the next.
This is exactly the kind of crop a long supply chain ruins. By the time market peas reach most kitchens, the sweetness is gone.
## Fool Akhdar
Young fava pods — fool akhdar — are tender enough to eat raw, straight from the pod, with a pinch of salt and a little olive oil. It is one of the simplest pleasures of a Lebanese spring, and it only works when the beans are genuinely young.
Peas are the same story: at their peak they are sweet enough to eat raw; a few days past it and they need cooking to be worth eating.
## Why We Grow Them
There is no trick to fixing an old pea. The only answer is to pick it young and move fast — which is the one thing growing our own actually lets us do.