Oregon Giant

Oregon Giant is an RHS Award of Garden Merit winner known for broad, thick, sweet pods that typically reach about five inches long. The pods are notably fat, wide, and rich green. Because they retain their sweetness, they can be picked a little plumper than thinner-podded snow peas without becoming starchy. Though usually harvested young, the pods stay tender even after they broaden, and the plants begin producing early and keep bearing well into the season, setting flat, sweet, wrinkled-seeded pods in steady supply.

The pods are good eaten fresh out of hand, tossed into salads, lightly steamed, or added near the finish of a stir-fry or fried rice so they stay crisp.

Oregon Giant's vines are vigorous and benefit from staking, which keeps the pod-laden branches upright and easy to harvest. The plants tolerate some heat, making them well suited to spring plantings, though a second sowing as late as July can also produce a fall crop. They also carry built-in resistance to pea enation mosaic virus, powdery mildew, and fusarium wilt race 1, giving them a foundation of disease tolerance.

Oregon Giant traces to Dr. James Baggett's pea breeding work at Oregon State University, part of a program the university began in 1954. That effort yielded a large-podded, high-yielding snow pea recognized for its sweet flavor and crisp texture, and it went on to become one of the most widely grown snow peas in home gardens.