Soaking is not enough: another basic cooking question

[cjsmith]

I've heard of two ways to break down the oligosaccharides (*toot*!) in beans and legumes.

- Soak overnight, then drain and rinse thoroughly
- Boil for a while, then drain and rinse thoroughly

The recipe I made yesterday actually called for BOTH of these. I did them both. They were not enough.

I am willing to believe I simply don't know what I'm doing, but I also know that there are certain explanations I am no longer going to accept because I've tried them and they don't work. Never in my forty years have I succeeded in eating beans or legumes without trouble. Anyone who says that I'll "get used to" (as in: no longer produce gas after eating) certain things is just plain wrong. Anyone who says that soaking or pre-boiling is sufficient is also just plain wrong.

I realize that I may be somewhat unusual. I have a coworker who can't eat certain kinds of beans at all, as her inability to digest certain compounds will send her to the hospital. I might simply be someone who will always have trouble with this stuff.

What else do I need to do? Is there a big step I'm missing here? Or should I, as I have on several previous occasions been close to deciding, simply give up on this kind of food?

Comments

researchers

[moriamerri.livejournal.com]

I have a lot of vague ideas about all this, but hadn't realized just how vague my ideas are -- so I think all of this needs a lot of research -- I just hadn't realized it!

I didn't answer the poll but I think that soaking beans will:
1. make em cook faster
2. increase nutritional content (although not as much as if you sprout them -- of which this is the first bit....) [picky footnote: "increase" is not totally accurate for ALL nutrients -- you get less protein but way more of many vitamins -- "more nutrients" is a reasonable way to explain in a general way.] (The enzyme inhibitors that keep beans from growing when dry are released [?] by water, and then the enzymes kick in, resulting in the [slow] transformation of the bean into a sprout, and baby plant.....]
3. decrease gas-causing potential.

Please note that all 3 of these come to mind but I don't really know why recipes recommend it. I'm clear that soaking increases nutrients, but I don't know if that has any relation to why it is recommended. I'm pretty sure that #1 is true (soaked beans cook faster), but not really clear if 3 is -- and not sure if cookbooks would recommend it for the cooking faster or the gas reduction or both.....

On the gas reduction issue, I think cooking the beans WELL is also important. I would guess that the type of bean would also matter. And tofu is not just made of soybeans, it is also very processed, thus (maybe?) pretty different than your reaction to cooked soybeans. Although, heck, try eating cooked soybeans to see if they are any better (I think they take longer to cook than any other bean.....)

Finally, I wonder if it is worth experimenting with soaking the beans for (various) longer amounts of time..... maybe 24 hours, for instance.

Somewhat unrelated note: sprouted lentils are really wonderful. I don't cook them (which is why this seems unrelated) -- probably my favorite sprout? Also especially easy to grow.

Oops, one more thing: I've also read a bean cooking method where you put them in water, bring the water to a boil and then turn off heat (as soon as the water boils) and then leave the beans overnight in the heated water. I think this is also to get them semi-pre-cooked so that the remaining cooking needed is faster. (This also works with steel cut oatmeal)

Re: researchers

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Interesting that you mention increasing the nutritional content. Pre-boiling beans (and then rinsing) will also decrease nutritional content, so in that sense, soaking is nutritionally better.

I wonder if cooking the beans twice as long would help. Seriously, if heat breaks down the polysaccharide, then more heat should break down more of it, right? Until it's gone? I wish I knew more of this stuff.

I'm not at all surprised that tofu is so processed that it's not a valid experiment. Fair enough. :)

I've never tried leaving beans overnight in the water they boiled in! There's a thought! It's probably doubly powerful -- a long time in the water AND with heat added.

Re: researchers

[moriamerri.livejournal.com]

yeah, really "I'm not sure" is my comment on most of this --- but certainly it makes sense to try out as many things as you can (and from your next post it sounds like you are hot on the trail). It's tricky though since there are several variables at least (type of bean, how long cooked, presoaked?, what else you've eaten, and any number of things we don't know to look at....)