Soaking / Brining Dried Beans

Some cookbooks urge you to soak beans (usually overnight) before cooking - others tell you not to bother. Mexicans generally do not soak their beans, but writers of cookbooks for other cuisines almost always tell you to soak. Many writers in magazines and on-line tell you not to bother. All this results in considerable confusion. What, exactly, is the truth?

More on working with Beans Peas & Lentils.

Soaking:

It is certainly true that dried beans can go directly in a pot with water and be cooked satisfactorily in one shot - so why soak?

Soaking beans cuts the cooking time at least in half. This will often make scheduling a recipe much easier.
Presoaked beans tend to break up less when cooked, making for better appearance.
You can discard the soaking liquid. It will contain some of the indigestible complex sugars that result in gas generation and farting. Mexicans don't care about this because they eat beans so often they've developed enzimes to digest those sugars.

Brining:

This is a new take on soaking and highly recommended. This is a normal soak, but with 1/2 Tablespoons of salt per cup of beans added to the soaking water. Rinse after draining. The salt makes the skins more permeable resulting in beans that cook more quickly, more evenly and with less breaking up than with any other method. In my opinion it also reduces flatulence. This method, developed by the Cooks Illustrated kitchens, has been confirmed by other testers.

Quick Brine:

This method seeks the advantage of brining but taking less time. Put the beans in a pot with about the normal amount of soaking water and 1/2 Tablespoons of salt per cup of beans. Bring to a boil and immediately take off the heat. Set aside for at least an hour before draining, rinsing and cooking.

Lentils:

These are rarely soaked and if they are it's for no longer than an hour or two. Red lentils in particular are peeled so they cook very fast and are never soaked.

Dal:

For southern Indian cooking, dal (split and peeled beans, peas and lentils) are not pre-soaked unless a particularly creamy texture is desired. In any case, dals need only a fraction of the soaking time of whole beans, peas and whole lentils.

Cooking:

Salt or no salt? Some hold that if you cook beans in water with salt added before they are completely cooked you will have tougher beans than with no salt. Tests by the Los Angeles Times kitchen have disproven this, and other testers are of similar opinion.

bp_soak 121115 - www.clovegarden.com
© Andrew Grygus - agryg@clovegarden.com - Photos on this page not otherwise credited are © cg1.- Linking to and non-commercial use of this page permitted.