The Broad bean, Vicia faba, Fava Bean, Field Bean, Bell Bean or Tic Bean is a species of bean (Fabaceae) native to north Africa and south-west Asia, and extensively cultivated elsewhere.

Broad beans can be eaten as both green shelled and dry shelled beans.  Dried broad beans are large, very hard beans that need to soak overnight before cooking.     

Broad beans are popular in Mediterranean cuisine and are often added to pasta, risotto, and soups. They have a sweet, nutty taste and a creamy texture.     

Broad beans are eaten while still young and tender, enabling harvesting to begin as early as the middle of spring for plants started under glass or over-wintered in a protected location, but even the maincrop sown in early spring will be ready from mid to late summer.

Horse beans, left to mature fully, are usually harvested in the late autumn. 

The young leaves of the plant can also be eaten either raw or cooked like spinach.

Commonly cultivated broad beans mainly fall into two classes

• Longpod broad beans feature eight beans per pod and are more durable to different climatic conditions.     
• Windsor broad bean varieties have four or five beans per pod and are considered by some to have a finer flavour.