Whether crafting silky mung bean soup, traditional sweet mung bean kernel soup (lu dou zhuan), delicate mung bean cakes, or the beloved mung bean and Job's tears combination, achieving that coveted creamy texture and distinctive clean fragrance requires one crucial ingredient: locally grown mung beans. Local mung bean production is centered in Taiwan's fertile Chianan Plain, particularly in Tainan City and Chiayi County.

Mung beans originated in India and, following domestication, spread throughout the world. Taiwan has a remarkably long history of mung bean cultivation—as early as the 59th year of Emperor Kangxi's reign during the Qing Dynasty (1720), the completed Taiwan County Gazetteer already documented mung beans: "Cool in nature and capable of detoxifying. Green in color, hence the name. When ground into powder like flour, it is called 'powder heart' (a type of starch flour) and makes excellent cakes and pastries."

Even earlier references appear in ancient texts. The Xiangshan Wild Records contains an account of Song Emperor Zhenzong: "Emperor Zhenzong deeply cared about agriculture and, having heard that Champa rice was drought-resistant and that Western Heaven mung beans (present-day northern India) were numerous and large-grained, dispatched envoys bearing precious goods to seek their seeds."

Locally Grown Mung Beans Deliver Superior Aroma, Creaminess, and Texture

Mung beans belong to the Vigna genus within the legume subfamily Faboideae. Sweet in flavor and cooling in nature, they possess heat-clearing and fire-reducing properties according to traditional Chinese medicine. Taiwan's mung bean cultivation centers primarily in the Chianan Plain, reaching peak production during the 1970s. However, due to labor-intensive and time-consuming harvesting processes (which rely mainly on manual labor), combined with competitively priced imported mung beans, Taiwan now depends predominantly on imports for its mung bean supply.

Taiwan's domestically grown mung beans are primarily the fen lu dou (powder green) variety, characterized by their yellowish-green husks and relatively small grains. These are typically cultivated through small-scale contract farming arrangements. Fen lu dou require shorter cooking times and achieve tenderness more readily, delivering a distinctively creamy, slightly grainy texture along with pronounced bean fragrance—making them ideal for direct cooking and consumption.