don't know beans

don't know beans

To know nothing or next to nothing. Don't ask me! I don't know beans about car engines.
See also: bean, know
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

doesn't know beans

Ignorance. The New England uncomplimentary description of a Bostonian who's so ignorant that he or she can't even cook the city's most famous dish of baked beans spread to the rest of the country.
See also: bean, know
Endangered Phrases by Steven D. Price
See also:
  • doesn't know beans
  • (I) can't say as I do(, can't say as I don't)
  • don't ask me
  • don't ask me!
  • all in (one's) head
  • come Monday
  • don't bet on it
  • don't give up the ship
  • don't cry before you are hurt
  • don't fret
References in periodicals archive
I came back here and visited a number of different companies and they all said, 'You've got an interesting background but you don't know beans about energy.
Energy force
Truly, you don't know beans, lettuce or corn until you've experienced the heirloom varieties.
Heirloom vegetables: historically and nutritiously precious
"The problem is we don't know beans about it," Lancaster Finance Committee member Walter Sendrowski said.
Field of dreams? Selectmen concerned over lack of field data
The technology experts who don't know beans about marketing.
Six Dangers of Marketing Automation
Four-fifths of the way through her new book, For the Time Being, Annie Dillard confesses, "I don't know beans about God." Up until then she nestles her theology behind sharply pointed questions or submerges it in the ideas of Teilhard de Chardin, Simone Weil, or the cabalist Hassids.
For the Time Being
I am curious about women's bodies, though I don't know beans about them.
Bikini brief
They're smart guys, and I've had chicken at their place, but they don't know beans about trees or shade or how, with just a few minutes' work and some decent root growth, they could have a first-rate, cool-water pond that would give everybody in the neighborhood a hand up.
Confessions of a Ninja tree sapper