let's look at how to cook beans. the soaking, the
cooking methods, what does the science say is the best way to get the most benefit out of these
nutrition powerhouses. first, should we soak or not? most people soak so beans will cook faster
but there are other benefits. beans contain some great nutrients but they also contain some
stuff we want to reduce, like the famous lectins yeah you often get that reaction nowadays when
you mention the L word. we'll come back to why they're not a big deal. you may also have heard of
something called phytates. now, phytates sounds like something out of a boxing match but it's actually
a kind of nutrient package. if you go on a hike you might pack some food for later. beans do exactly
the same. beans are seeds at the end of the day so they store nutrients for later when they sprout
and need those nutrients to grow and the way they store them are phytates. that's all fine and dandy,
only problem is phytates bind strongly to calcium, iron, zinc etc making it really hard for us to
absorb those minerals. soaking breaks down the phytates and frees up those nutrients for us to
absorb. okay, how long should we soak? as we all know, beans swell in water. after 16 hours they're
saturated, they're done absorbing water so usually overnight, one day, is a solid ballpark. believe it
or not, teams of scientists have actually sat there and measured what happens to beans if they soak
for one day, two days, three days... your tax dollars hard at work! so phytates actually keep dropping
up to three days so if you want to soak longer, two or three days, you can. otherwise, one day is a solid
soak. another great option is to sprout. all you do is drain the soaking water and leave the beans
sitting in a jar or bowl and rinse once a day that's it. four to six days total seems to be
ideal. sprouting gets rid of the most phytates and it also makes the nutrients in beans more
absorbable. it also increases the antioxidant power of beans, peas, chickpeas etc. the exception are
lentils which actually seem to lose antioxidant power with sprouting. so if you want to sprout your
beans, go for it. if not if, you don't have the time, just give them a good soak, still a great food. i
always wondered why the water changes color when you soak beans. with black beans it gets dark, with
chickpeas it gets kind of yellowish. yeah because that's the type of thing that keeps me up at night...
it turns out the coloring is exactly because there are soluble constituents of the beans that are
leaching out into the water which is why before cooking the bean experts recommend discarding
the soaking water. switching to fresh water gets rid of the phytates that leached out during
soaking. also, beans are notorious for causing gas some people even avoid them altogether because
of that. that's caused by some oligosaccharides, some small natural sugars in beans. turns out
those also leach out during soaking so discarding the soaking water helps get rid of them as well so
adding that step may help us get the best of beans without the worst. also, if you're not used to
eating beans just start slow, small amounts and then slowly build it up, that allows your gut
bugs, your microbiome, to slowly grow, it's just like building muscle at the gym. okay, cooking. cooking
also helps reduce the phytates and the lectins okay let's deal with this real quick, there are
several reasons why we shouldn't be scared of le... i mean, of these. first, they're highly
thermolabile which means they're destroyed by cooking. it's been repeatedly shown that
after 10 minutes at boiling temperature lectin activity is reduced to zero. second, lectins
have also been tied to some potential benefits including anti-cancer activity. the point is not
that we should go buy lectin supplements or stuff our face with purified lectins, the point
is these things are rarely black and white, good and bad, it's usually a matter of amount
and context so even foods we don't necessarily cook like tomatoes are not suddenly overnight
made unhealthy because they contain lectins that doesn't make any nutritional sense.
we know if a food is health-promoting or disease-promoting from direct tests of that
food, not from speculating about an individual component in a vacuum. now, of course this
goes both ways, sometimes people want to argue eggs are bad or olive oil is bad strictly on
the basis of a component. the food industry also loves this logic, some ultra processed artificial
food is suddenly good because it contains vitamins that's not a strong argument. has the food itself
been shown to promote health or disease? that's the bottom line, the rest is misdirection. legumes are
consistently tied to beneficial outcomes whether it's in controlled scientific experiments
where they're swapped with other foods or observations of long-lived populations, across
the board they come out as huge winners. finding a new molecule doesn't change anything. the direct
test of that food already accounted for all the components. we already know the net effect
of legumes is massively positive regardless of what each individual molecule is doing. so
we don't need to be scared of lectins anymore okay cool that worked. okay how should we cook
beans? some studies suggest steaming over boiling because it seems to retain more antioxidant
activity. they also mention pressure steaming using a steaming basket inside the pressure cooker
but if you don't have that apparatus, regular steaming or pressure cooking generally looks
a little bit better than regular boiling. again, lentils are the odd man out, regular old boiling
seems to work best for them. quick parenthesis, the point of all this information is not to make
us OCD. peace of mind is also huge for health. in this house, we have a pressure cooker so we use
it but when i'm traveling or i'm somewhere else i use whatever i have, regular pan, whatever. unless
you do something really weird like eat raw beans they're a great food no matter how you cook them.
people have been eating them for eons and enjoying their benefits without reading a thousand studies
on how to cook beans so please don't stress over this. all that said, since my fellow nerds sat
there and watched chickpeas boil for a living and we have all this information at our fingertips
and this fellow nerd went through all the studies why not be aware of the information and get that
extra benefit if it's not any extra work? how long you cook your beans depends on your equipment and
your method of cooking, of course. you want them soft enough to squish with a fork or between your
fingers. ballpark, an hour give or take if you're boiling or steaming. if you're boiling in the
pressure cooker, 10 to 15 minutes is usually enough okay what do we do with the cooking water? some
of the bean components leach into the cooking water just like during soaking. that goes for
those oligosaccharides that can cause some gas and it also goes for the minerals like calcium,
iron and zinc so here you have a choice because it depends from person to person: if gas is a
problem for you, you can discard the cooking water and minimize those oligosaccharides.
otherwise you can consume the cooking water if you want and get those extra minerals, in a soup
for example. if you can eat beans like a champ and no gas crisis, you can do that. or if you're upset
at your family and you want to punish them. learn all kinds of tips with these videos. one last
tip for iron: the iron and beans is non-heme and you can boost the absorption by having
it with a source of vitamin C like red bell peppers or with some onions or garlic or with a
source of beta-carotene. all of those boost your absorption of non-heme iron. need more ideas for
plant protein? here's my top seven and here's some more on iron. how to maximize absorption and get
all the iron you need. i'll see you next week
