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Re:Edamame



Re: Edamame
   It's true that tofu varieties can be used for edamame.  We understand 
that China exports large amounts of frozen edamame that are hand picked 
from fields of tofu variety beans.  Varieties grown in the the north like 
Vinton 81 are indeterminate and have beans in all stages of maturity on 
the stalk at the same time.  You have a real advantage if they mature 
uniformly where you live.  We understand that edamame varieties are 
determinate, giving a more concentrated harvest. Hand picking edamame is 
only possible in a place like China where there is a large very low paid 
labor supply.  

Varieties like Butterbean have been around for a long time, more than 30 
years, and are usually sold as vegetable soybeans - they do not make good 
'grain' type soybeans.  They are low yielders and their pods tend to 
dehisce, or split open, when mature - this makes harvesting dry soybeans 
for feed/food or for seed very difficult.  Butterbeans are reputed to 
have a somewhat better flavor when green, certainly a different, less 
starchy flavor with a higher sugar content.  Butterbean seed is available 
from a number of American seed companies, such as Johnny's.   There are 
new varieties that have been developed primarily in Japan that may have 
better quality, at least to the Asian palate.  The best varieties have 
silver pubescence (hairs) on the pods and an even higher sugar content 
than Butterbean.  We've been told that these newer varieties dehisce even 
more than Butterbeans, making them very difficult to produce seed from.  
Consequently, the seed prices are quite high.  Seed from these newer 
varieties is imported from Japan and the varieties are patented.  We 
understand there are edamame varieties that are better adapted to the 
southern/mid Atlantic US, but we are not familiar with them.  There's a 
large edamame industry in Taiwan for processing, they must have varieties 
adapted to hotter climates, but initial seed would be very expensive.  

The Japanese are reported to plant edamame soybeans at lower field 
populations than we would ordinarily plant soybeans in the US.  This 
allows better sunlight penetration to lower pods.  Highest yields in 
American research are at 80 lb/seed per acre.  We don't personally have 
enough experience to know what yield to expect from that seeding rate - 
we have just recently researched this information, looking at edamame as 
a possible processing vegetable.  There are a couple of brands of frozen 
edamame available in the US, Snopac and Cascadian both market frozen 
edamame and they are really quite good to eat .  The frozen edamame 
tasted much better than our own Vintons tasted when we tried cooking them 
young and in the pods, but we think the edamame were harvested younger 
than we harvested the Vintons - they seem much like lima beans that way,  
when young they have a sweet, crisp, non-starchy flavor (what they call 
lima beans fixed this way 'butterbeans' in North Carolina!), but when 
older, the starch flavor predominates.  We really don't know what 
constitutes good edamame flavor though.  However, if your customers like 
the flavor of Vinton picked as edamame and if your Vintons act as 
determinate plants (unlike in the north), you are fortunate - your seed 
cost will be less and your yields may be higher.     

There are several good resources available for more information on 
edamame.  First, Dr. Carol Miles at Washington State University has been 
doing quite a lot of work on these and other Asian vegetables in a 
northern region.  Since soybeans are highly day length sensitive, this 
may not be of as much value to growers further south, but could be a 
starting place.  She has an extensive website that lists cultural 
information and seed sources.  Also, the Asian Vegetable Resource Center 
in Taiwan has lots of information on varieties, cultural requirements, 
harvesting and marketing.  They do not have a website, but can be reached 
over email at sundar@Netra.AVRDC.org.tw.

Hope this helps someone out there!  Klaas and Mary-Howell Martens 

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