A bean is the seed of one of several genera of the flowering plant family Fabaceae, which are used as vegetables for human or animal food.[1] They can be cooked in many different ways,[2] including boiling, frying, and baking, and are used in many traditional dishes throughout the world.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)[5] as applicable only to species of Phaseolus.Unlike the closely related pea, beans are a summer crop that needs warm temperatures to grow.Native Americans customarily grew them along with corn and squash (the so-called Three Sisters),[7] with the tall cornstalks acting as support for the beans.[9] In a form improved from naturally occurring types, they were grown in Thailand from the early seventh millennium BCE, predating ceramics.Not until the second millennium BCE did cultivated, large-seeded broad beans appear in the Aegean, Iberia and transalpine Europe.[11] In the Iliad (8th century BCE) there is a passing mention of beans and chickpeas cast on the threshing floor.The oldest-known domesticated beans in the Americas were found in Guitarrero Cave, an archaeological site in Peru, and dated to around the second millennium BCE.[13] However, genetic analyses of the common bean Phaseolus show that it originated in Mesoamerica, and subsequently spread southward, along with maize and squash, traditional companion crops.Most of the kinds commonly eaten fresh or dried, those of the genus Phaseolus, come originally from the Americas, being first seen by a European when Christopher Columbus, while exploring what may have been the Bahamas, found them growing in fields.The corn would not be planted in rows as is done by European agriculture, but in a checkerboard/hex fashion across a field, in separate patches of one to six stalks each.They would be provided slight shelter from the sun by the corn, would shade the soil and reduce evaporation, and would deter many animals from attacking the corn and beans because their coarse, hairy vines and broad, stiff leaves are difficult or uncomfortable for animals such as deer and raccoons to walk through, crows to land on, etc.Beans are a heliotropic plant, meaning that the leaves tilt throughout the day to face the sun.Beans, average, canned, sugarfree Nutritional value per 100 g (3.5 oz) Energy 334 kJ (80 kcal) Carbohydrates 10.5 g Fat 0.5 g Protein 9.6 g Units.Currently, the world gene banks hold about 40,000 bean varieties, although only a fraction are mass-produced for regular consumption.Most of the foods we call "beans", "legumes", "lentils" and "pulses" belong to the same family, Fabaceae ("leguminous" plants), but are from different genera and species, native to different homelands and distributed worldwide depending on their adaptability.Phytic acid and phytates, present in grains, nuts, seeds and beans, interfere with bone growth and interrupt vitamin D metabolism.Some kinds of raw beans contain a harmful, tasteless toxin: the lectin phytohaemagglutinin, which must be removed by cooking.Red kidney beans are particularly toxic, but other types also pose risks of food poisoning.[36] Beans are a major source of dietary protein in Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.There have been many outbreaks of disease from bacterial contamination, often by salmonella, listeria, and Escherichia coli, of beansprouts not thoroughly cooked,[38] some causing significant mortality.(million metric tons) Country 2016 Share Remarks Total 81.80 100% 1 India 17.56 21.47% 2 Canada 8.20 10.03% 3 Myanmar 6.57 8.03% 4 China 4.23 5.17% 5 Nigeria 3.09 3.78% 6 Russia 2.94 3.60% 7 Ethiopia 2.73 3.34% 8 Brazil 2.62 3.21% 9 Australia 2.52 3.09% 10 USA 2.44 2.98% 11 Niger 2.06 2.51% 12 Tanzania 2.00 2.45% Others 24.82 30.34%.The world leader in production of Dry Beans (Phaseolus spp),[45] is India, followed by Myanmar (Burma) and Brazil.(tonnes) Footnote India 5,460,000 F Myanmar 3,053,012 Brazil 3,035,290 A United States 1,495,180 * China 1,281,586 Tanzania 1,267,648 F Mexico 1,056,071 Kenya 774,366 F Argentina 633,823 * Uganda 603,980 World 27,545,942 A