Snap and snow peas are types of peas that are eaten whole, pod and all, when the peas are still immature. We recommend stringing them prior to cooking. They cook very quickly and make great additions to stir-fries, pasta salads, and rice pilafs. They can (and should!) be eaten raw.
4 thoughts on “Sugar Snap and Snow Peas”
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Are sugar snap and snow peas the same thing?
They are closely related, but not the same. Snow peas are flat, while snap peas are rounded. We grow a variety of snow pea that is tender and sweet when eaten raw like a snap pea, but snow peas are generally cooked, while snap peas are usually eaten raw. And even though the snow peas are sweet they don’t match the sweetness of snap peas.
So, I planted half a row of snow and half of what I thought were sugar snaps—but they both start out flat like snow peas and then the sugars fill in, right? I forgot to mark the row and don’t want to ruin a huge crop of snows waiting for them to mature because I thought they are sugars. Or do sugars start out looking completely different and I’ve really just planted a huge row of snow peas? Thanks!
Sugar snap and snow peas will start out looking similar, but you should be able to tell the difference pretty quickly. Snow peas will remain flat and become longer than sugar snaps, while sugar snaps will be round and shorter than the snow peas. Also, check your seed package to see how tall each variety will get. There are tall and short vined varieties of both snow and sugar snap peas, but perhaps you got a tall variety of sugar snap and a short variety of snow or vice versa.