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Concept
Bean
Summary
A bean is the seed of several plants in the family Fabaceae, which are used as vegetables for human or animal food. They can be cooked in many different ways, including boiling, frying, and baking, and are used in many traditional dishes throughout the world.
The word "bean" and its Germanic cognates (e.g. German Bohne) have existed in common use in West Germanic languages since before the 12th century, referring to broad beans, chickpeas, and other pod-borne seeds. This was long before the New World genus Phaseolus was known in Europe. With the Columbian exchange of domestic plants between Europe and the Americas, use of the word was extended to pod-borne seeds of Phaseolus, such as the common bean and the runner bean, and the related genus Vigna. The term has long been applied generally to many other seeds of similar form, such as Old World soybeans, peas, other vetches, and lupins, and even to those with slighter resemblances, such as coffee beans, vanilla beans, castor beans, and cocoa beans. Thus the term "bean" in general usage can refer to a host of different species.
Seeds called "beans" are often included among the crops called "pulses" (legumes), although the words are not always interchangeable (usage varies by plant variety and by region). Both terms, beans and pulses, are usually reserved for grain crops and thus exclude those legumes that have tiny seeds and are used exclusively for non-grain purposes (forage, hay, and silage), such as clover and alfalfa. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization defines "BEANS, DRY" (item code 176) as applicable only to species of Phaseolus. This is one of various examples of how narrower word senses enforced in trade regulations or botany often coexist in natural language with broader senses in culinary use and general use; other common examples are the narrow sense of the word nut and the broader sense of the word nut, and the fact that tomatoes are fruit, botanically speaking, but are often treated as vegetables in culinary and general usage.
Official source
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