How popular is edamame?
The fuzzy pods filled with sweet green soybeans are a traditional appetizer in Japanese restaurants, where diners pop the beans from the pod right into their mouths. Edamame have now found their way from the restaurant table to freezer cases and produce sections of supermarkets, as Americans too are enjoying and appreciating the little green bean. The convenient bags of frozen edamame, in the pod or shelled, are also sometimes called sweet beans. Edamame are a special variety of soybean, different from the soybeans that are grown and used for tofu, or oil or other soyfoods. Edamame are picked while still green, so they are mild, sweet and tender. Edamame are amazingly versatile. Use the shelled beans in recipes as you would green beans, lima beans, garbanzo or fava beans. Consider adding them to succotash or humus, tossing them with pasta or in pasta salads, sprinkling over pizza or bruschetta, pureeing for a dip, stirring into soup or three bean salad. To prepare, follow the direction
