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yard-long bean

yard-long bean

3.5
A long green bean with very long pods used as a vegetable
  • noun
  • /jɑrd lɔŋ bin/
translation icon : frijol yardlong
  • I added chopped yard-long beans to my soup for extra flavor and texture.
  • a pound of yard-long beans
  • Chinese yard-long beans

Some beans, Oriental yard long bean, Blue Lake pole bean, Blue Lake Bush bean, Kentucky wonder pole bean.

Examples

  • Some beans, Oriental yard long bean, Blue Lake pole bean, Blue Lake Bush bean, Kentucky wonder pole bean.

  • Yard-long beans are a delicious addition to stir-fries and salads.

  • You can find yard-long beans at the local farmer's market during the summer.

Synonyms

asparagus bean
vsyard-long bean
5.8

A long thin bean with pods you can eat, often used in Asian cooking

refers to the common cooking vegetable rather than a named cultivar
Vigna unguiculata sesquipedalis
vsyard-long bean
  • Specialized
9.9

A tropical plant like a bean that makes very long edible pods

is the general vegetable term in cooking rather than the botanical label
Vigna sesquipedalis
vsyard-long bean
  • Specialized
9.9

A plant with very long green bean pods that people eat

is the culinary vegetable term not focused on geographic origin or taxonomy

How Thin

yard-long bean
3.5
kidney bean
3 2.0
broad bean
  • UK
2.4

Surface Forms

Morphology

yard-long + bean

The compound is compositionally built from 'yard-long' (a measurement plus 'long') and 'bean', so its meaning—a bean that is very long, approximately a yard—is directly inferable from the parts. Measurement+noun compounds are cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows 'yard' and 'long' (or at least understands the pattern) can reasonably deduce the MWE's meaning from its constituents.

Etymology

The noun yard-long bean comes from a simple picture: the bean's pods can grow almost as long as a yard, so people named the vegetable for its length. That's why yard-long bean means 'a type of bean with very long pods'.