bean
Pluralbeans
Pluralbeans
- 1A large edible seed harvested from certain pod-bearing plants, such as the broad bean, navy bean, or garbanzo.
A dried bean will keep for years if stored somewhere cool and dark.
If you soak the dried beans overnight, they cook faster and keep their shape in the chili.
- 2The bean-shaped seed of certain unrelated plants, especially the coffee plant, or the long cured seedpod of the vanilla orchid.
Freshly ground coffee beans give the kitchen a rich aroma.
Each vanilla bean is cured for months to deepen its flavor.
Similarpod
- 3The edible seedpod of a bean plant, harvested young and tender and eaten as a vegetable.
She trimmed the ends off each bean before tossing them in the pan.
Lightly steamed beans keep their bright color and crunch.
Note
Green beans, also sold as French beans, are the everyday case: the whole pod is eaten, seeds and all. Botanical writing uses French bean for the plant as well, so context decides whether a cook or a grower is speaking.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
- Green beans are eaten with their pods and immature seeds. en.wikipedia.org
- 4Any of several plants in the legume family Fabaceae, grown for their large edible seeds or edible pods.
Farmers often rotate beans with corn to restore nitrogen to the soil.
A climbing bean needs a sturdy trellis to support its growth.
Note
Botanical writing pairs the common name with a Latin binomial, as in French bean, Phaseolus vulgaris, because "bean" alone spans several genera. Here the word names the whole growing plant. The edible seed and the pod are narrower uses of the same word.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- French bean is identified botanically as Phaseolus vulgaris. rhs.org.uk
- Beans belong to several genera. en.wikipedia.org
- 5A small bean-shaped object, usually plastic or styrofoam, used in bulk as packing material or as filling for beanbags and similar items.
Weeks after the beanbag chair burst, she was still finding the odd foam bean behind the sofa.
The kids' beanbag had gone flat, so we poured in a fresh sack of polystyrene beans until it was plump again.
- 6A person, especially a baby, addressed as a term of affection.
The whole family already adores the new little bean.
"Come here, my sweet bean," he said, lifting his giggling daughter onto his shoulders.
UsageMostly with an adjective: little bean, good bean. Warm and teasing, for people you are fond of.
Similardarling, sweetie, cutie, sweetheart
Note
The rhyme in "mean bean" shows how playful it is. "You're a good bean," from Alex Bradley's Hot Lunch (2007), shows it praising a friend rather than a baby.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Alex Bradley wrote Hot Lunch, published in 2007. penguinrandomhouse.com
- The novel contains the exact quotation "You're a good bean," used affectionately about a friend rather than a baby. en.wiktionary.org
Less common meanings
- 7To strike a person with a thrown or pitched object, especially on the head.
The wild pitch beaned him just below the helmet.
Players sometimes bean each other with snowballs during a friendly fight.
Similarhit, conk, bop, clobber
Note
A ballpark verb with regular forms (bean, beaned, beaning) that travels easily beyond the diamond. In P. G. Wodehouse's Jeeves in the Offing (1960), one character needs iron self-restraint to keep from beaning someone with a cocktail shaker. The verb sits naturally beside the slang "head" meaning, since a beaning usually lands there.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 2 facts
- P. G. Wodehouse wrote Jeeves in the Offing, first published as a book in 1960. en.wikipedia.org
- A character contemplates beaning someone with a shaker and says that preventing himself will require iron self-restraint. en.wiktionary.org
- 8A person's head or brain.
She knocked her bean on the low doorframe and saw stars.
He's no fool; there's plenty going on inside that bean of his, even if he rarely says much.
UsageSet phrases: use your bean or use the old bean, meaning think.
Similarnoggin
Note
Slang that treats the head as a small, hard seed, and it works in two ways. "Using the old bean," as Maxwell Droke puts it in You and the World to Come (1959), means thinking. A bottle brought down on someone's bean, in P. G. Wodehouse's Jeeves in the Offing (1960), is the physical skull. Noggin is a close synonym, and the same novel uses the verb for striking someone.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 4 facts
- Maxwell Droke uses the expression 'using the old bean' in You and the World to Come to describe thinking. en.wiktionary.org
- P. G. Wodehouse wrote Jeeves in the Offing, first published as a book in 1960. en.wikipedia.org
- The novel uses 'bean' for the physical head in a passage imagining a bottle being brought down on it. en.wiktionary.org
- The same novel also uses the verb 'bean' for striking someone. en.wiktionary.org
- 9One of the small, rounded pads on the underside of a cat's or dog's paw.
When the cat rolled over for a belly rub, she showed off the soft pink beans on her hind paws.
The vet trimmed the fur growing around each bean on the dog's front paws so he wouldn't slip on the floor.
UsageThe full form, toe beans, is clearer for someone who has not met it.
Similarpad
Note
A pet owner's clipping of toe bean, used mostly in the plural. A cat's beans are the pads of its paws, named for their small, rounded shape.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- Bean in the paw-pad sense is a clipping of toe bean. en.wiktionary.org
- A cat's beans are its paw pads. en.wiktionary.org
- The name refers to the pads' resemblance to beans. cfa.org
- 10
- 11The clitoris.
She laughed and said the narrow bike seat was murder on her bean after a fifty-mile ride.
She explained that the bean is far more sensitive than people expect.
UsageCasual and intimate; in clinical or formal writing, use clitoris.
Note
Because the "head" meaning is also slang, the surrounding context does the work of telling them apart.
- 12A pill or tablet of any kind, especially benzedrine or a similar stimulant.
He washed down a bean with flat soda and felt wide awake for hours.
Back in the sixties, long-haul drivers traded beans at truck stops to stay awake through the night.
Note
Drug slang for a pill, with benzedrine, nicknamed benny, as the classic case. It behaves like any countable dose, and a bean "kicks in," as in Sean Thor Conroe's Fuccboi (2022): "Once the bean kicked in." It shares its spelling with harmless food words, so only a setting of drug talk signals this meaning.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- Bean denotes a pill, especially benzedrine, also called benny. en.wiktionary.org
- Sean Thor Conroe wrote Fuccboi, published in 2022. hachette.co.uk
- The sentence continues with three further words; there is no period after “in”. This is the fictional narrator Sean's narration. bingebooks.com
- 13Clipping of JavaBean: in Java programming, a reusable software component whose properties are read and set through standard methods.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origin
From Middle English bene, from Old English bēan, going back through Proto-Germanic *baunō, perhaps to a Proto-Indo-European root *bʰabʰ- meaning "bean." It is related to Dutch boon, German Bohne, Swedish böna, and Latin faba, and is a doublet of fava.
Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 5 facts
- Bean descends through Middle English bene and Old English bēan from Proto-Germanic *baunō. en.wiktionary.org
- Bean is related to Dutch boon and German Bohne. en.wiktionary.org
- Bean is related to Swedish böna. en.wiktionary.org
- Bean is related to Latin faba. en.wiktionary.org
- Bean and fava are doublets. en.wiktionary.org