Beans are often overlooked as a wonderful source of vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. In addition, they are full of fiber and protein and are low in calories. And because they are filling and nutrient dense, they can be helpful if you are trying to loose weight. The high amount of fiber found in legumes also works to slow the absorption of sugar in the bloodstream and maintain healthy blood sugar levels. Another benefit of beans is that plant-derived foods have other potential health benefits, including lowering inflammation. If you haven’t regularly consumed beans, you many want to increase your consumption slowly and make sure to drink plenty of water. This is because sudden increases in fiber intake can cause unpleasant symptoms like gas, cramps or bloating.
The ancient spice hing, or asafoetida, is known to be helpful with the gas that can come from eating beans. It is made from the resin of fennel plants that’s then ground down into a powder. It has a very distinct taste and can help elevate the flavor of other spices. The good news is that you only need a small pinch of asafoetida to reap its rewards. You can find jars of the spice for modest prices at Indian markets or online.
Beans, Nuts, and Legumes
All beans are considered legumes. This is because legumes are defined as the fruit or seed of plants in the Fabaceae family, which includes beans, lentils, peas and peanuts. In fact, the Fabaceae family, includes around 19,500 different species and 751 genera of plants! Most types of nuts grow on trees and are considered tree nuts rather than legumes. The only exception is peanuts. Unlike other types of nuts, peanuts actually grow underground and are a member of the Fabaceae family of plants, which classifies them as legumes. The most common legumes are black beans, navy beans, kidney beans, soybeans, green beans, pinto beans, fava beans, adzuki beans, chickpeas (garbanzo beans), alfalfa sprouts, lentils, peas, and peanuts.
The health benefit of beans is particularly profound when it comes to Mung beans. They have been heavily studied because they have they’ve been a part of traditional Ayurvedic diets in India for thousands of years. Isolated compounds from mung beans are even used to preserve certain foods and reduce spoilage. Their antibacterial properties can help increase immunity and fight harmful bacteria, viruses, colds, rashes, irritations and more. Mung beans also promote a healthy balance of bacteria within the digestive tract, which helps with nutrient absorption and immune defense.
Beans and the Paelo Diet
The paleo diet does not include beans because it is believed that humans did not consume beans until our more recent history, about 8-10 thousand years ago. As it turns out, humans were eating them long before then. The practice of drying and storing them, to cook at a later time, started 8-10 thousand years ago.
Another concern from the paleo perspective is about the phytotoxins that are in beans and are thought to cause damage to our bodies. These phytotoxins are there to protect the nutrient-dense seed of a bean plant from being easily eaten by insects or destroyed by fungi. These same phytotoxins, along with many others, are found in higher amounts in foods like kale, chia seeds, parsley, spinach, coconuts, chocolate, almonds, carrots, coffee and broccoli.
Finally, there is concern about the phytic acid in legumes which is considered by some to be an antinutrient. Phytic aicd does cause you to absorb less of a nutrient, but they do not take nutrients out of your body. Consider this. Adzuki beans have 150 mg of magnesium per serving. The antinutrients in them may cause you to absorb only 145 mg rather than the full 150. They do not take magnesium out of your body or even cause you to absorb less magnesium from other foods eaten at the same meal.
Should you Soak Your Beans?
One of the reasons it was advised that you soak beans overnight before cooking was to reduce the phytic acid in them. As discussed about, the concern was that the phytic acid would reduce the body’s ability to absorb certain minerals, like zinc and iron. Studies have shown that this isn’t true in today’s modern society. In fact, there has been research that shows health benefits of phytic acid including that it is a good heavy metal detoxifier. In addition, in taste tests, un-soaked beans had better taste and texture.
Epicurious did an experiment where they soaked and cooked pinto beans 12 different ways. They found that the cooking time between soaked and un-soaked beans only varied by 10 minutes. They suggest that the best flavor comes from covering the beans in water, bringing them to a boil, turning off the heat, and then letting the beans sit in the water for an hour. Add water to cover the beans again by one to two inches and finish cooking. As a result of their testing, they also suggest cooking beans with the lid off and adding salt at the beginning.
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