Yellow Wax Beans: Your In-Depth Guide to Growing, Storing and Cooking

13 January 2025, written by Barbara Pleasant

The best garden vegetables are easy to grow, fun to cook, simple to preserve, and not often seen in stores. In my garden, yellow wax beans check all of these boxes, and more. Maturing in only six weeks, wax beans are easier to pick compared to green snap beans because the ripe pods stand out among the green foliage. I grow yellow wax beans every year, stocking my freezer with the generous crop.

The wax bean’s history is a tale of global travel. From its origins in Central America, the tender, yellow-podded beans traveled to Algeria, and then to France in the 1840s. Recipes for baking wax beans covered with buttered breadcrumbs began appearing on French menus in the late 1800s. In Hungary, wax beans became a summer garden favourite, used to make Zöldbabfőzelék, a creamy soup accented with paprika. In the US, wax beans are an essential ingredient in sweet-and-sour three bean salad.

Yellow wax bean seed packets — By the 1920s, plant breeders had crossed the old Black Wax variety with other types of green beans. A flat-podded type called Long Yellow Six Weeks quickly became popular

Choosing Wax Bean Varieties

Bushy and productive, classic yellow bean varieties including Gold Rush and Cherokee Wax, first introduced in 1947, have been improved over the years to update their disease resistance, and they can be phenomenally productive in good years. These and other older wax bean varieties with black seeds like Pencil Pod Black Wax deliver the buttery colour, beany flavour and crisp texture that has made the strain popular for centuries.

You can now find almost any type of snap bean with yellow pods, for example Capitano, a heavy-yielding bush Romano with flat yellow pods, or delicate Borsolino filet beans for stir fries or refrigerator pickles. Twining pole varieties include Monte Gusto and Kentucky Wonder Wax. There are many wax bean varieties to try!

Yellow wax beans with fabric mulch — Strips of cloth mulch retain moisture and suppress weeds between rows of wax beans.

How to Grow Yellow Wax Beans

Like their green counterpart, yellow wax beans are direct-sown in late spring or early summer, after the soil has warmed. Before planting, dig in some rich compost or a light application of a balanced organic plant food. To ensure a dense stand, sow seeds about 2 inches (5 cm) apart, and thin them to 6 inches (15 cm) as the seedlings gain size.

Check often for signs of cutworms, which are notorious for chopping down bean seedlings at the soil line. Fill in row gaps with more seeds. Rabbits and deer love beans, too. In high-risk settings, it’s best to stick with low-growing bushy varieties, which can be protected with cages or insect netting.

Harvest wax beans when the pods turn yellow. The first pods are set low on the plants, with heavier production from secondary branches. Plan to pick every other day once the beans start ripening, and expect a harvest window of about three weeks. When production falls off, replace the beans with fast-growing salad greens or another autumn crop.

Prepping yellow wax beans for freezing — Before freezing, blanch wax beans in steam or boiling water to preserve their quality

Freezing Wax Beans

Yellow wax beans are wonderful fresh, and they are fun to work with in the kitchen. Cook them as you would any other green bean, and include them in your summer pickling projects. Freezing wax beans is my favourite way to preserve them, as it’s the handiest way to have small amounts for everyday cooking.

I use a small steamer to blanch wax beans for about four minutes, because blanching improves the colour, texture, and nutrition of frozen beans. I try to include a few purple-podded beans in the mix because they turn green when the perfect cooking point is reached. After the steamed beans cool, I spread them out on cookie sheets and freeze them. When frozen hard, they go into freezer-safe containers.

Braised yellow wax beans — Pan-braised wax beans caramelise as they cook

Cooking with Wax Beans

Whether fresh or frozen, the best way to sample yellow wax beans is to pan braise them in a little butter or olive oil until they begin to brown. Better than potatoes, the juicy morsels explode with summer flavor. You can accent their yellow colour with lemon, or treat them like pasta and sprinkle with herbs and cheese.

Use wax beans freely in soups, casseroles, and any dish involving penne pasta. In recipes, yellow wax beans can do anything green beans can do, only better.