Cranberry beans

Here are the shelled beans from the mess of magenta-specked pods I posted about earlier. Aren't they striking? I often imagine them to be tiny birds' eggs, some relative of the robin as these as lovely as are the Tiffany blue of Mr. Red Breast's eggshells. As I mentioned, they do turn an unfortunate, uniform shade of gray when cooked, but they hold up well and have a terrifically firm yet smooth and creamy texture.

The cranberry bean originated in Colombia, there known as the cargamanto. Italians bred a form of this, the borlotti, that has a thicker skin. Neato food history, eh?