What to train over pergola?

[CarolineW]

Hi, I hope this is the right board for this question.

We are about to build a pergola on our ‘patio’ (actually a glorified passageway :-) ). We would like to grow something over it that will provide shade in the summer but die back in the winter. It doesn’t actually have to be an edible, it could theoretically be decorative, but we’d prefer it to be edible.
Here are the challenging parts:
1) our daughter is terrified of getting too close to anything that stings, and actually has a problem with bugs generally. She’s genuinely frightened of anything that stings, beyond all reason - even though she tries very hard to overcome it and is ashamed of how she feels given how nature friendly the rest of the family are. As she will need to be in regular proximity to the climber, it needs to not be attracting bees (and especially not wasps)

2) It is in partial sun. From early in the morning until 2 pm it has full sunlight, then it becomes indirect, and in late afternoon/ early evening shade

Does anyone have any recommendations, please? Or is it a lost cause?

[ameno]

I think anything edible is likely to attract bees at least during its flowering period. The best you could do is choose something which has a fairly short flowering window, or else give up on something edible.

[Plot70]

If you are prepared to wait for the vines to get going germinate some of the little black seeds from kiwi fruit.
There is a short flowering season that will attract bees. Any fruit can be picked well before it is attractive to wasps and can be eaten after ripening indoors.
The vines have large heart shaped leaves that are red to purple. They drop there leaves in winter.

[Penellype]

Climbing french beans are self pollinating and may therefore not attract so many insects. I grow the yellow variety Monte Gusto which is quite attractive and you can eat the beans young or shell and dry them.

[rary]

I would try growing trombonceno over the pergola would provide shade and once the fruit is growing there would be very few bees attracted to the plant, if trombos are unavailable I would go for cucumber or even try courgettes, tying in the plant as it grows, but to grow anything like that it would be advisable to bury old manure or thick (garden) compost to hold the moisture