TKF Science Writing

Who hasn’t heard this song?

Beans, beans, the miracle fruit
The more you eat, the more you toot
The more you toot, the better you feel
So eat your beans with every meal

Beans can indeed be a miracle fruit for anyone on a budget. Rich in fiber, they fill you up fast and are inexpensive. Personally, black bean soup is a favorite of mine. Chili, three-bean salad, even simple beans and rice can go a long away for those looking to save a few bucks.

Many recipes call for beans to be soaked overnight before cooking. The theory is that by soaking the beans, you are essentially leeching out the compounds that…well make you toot. Could you also be washing some important nutrients as well Scientists aimed to find out. A study was published in the Journal of Food Science by a group of scientists from India where beans are an important staple.

Soluble fiber in the beans is the main culprit of flatulence. More specifically, it is the bacteria within our gut that produces the offending odor. The fiber moves through our digestive tract undigested and makes its way down to the large intestine where bacteria go to work. The bacteria, for lack of a better term, eat the fiber, and through their own metabolic processes, produce a gas that eventually makes its way out of our system. Soaking not only reduces the cooking time for the beans but it also washes away some of that soluble fiber which leads to less work for the bacteria and less flatulence for us.

The researchers took five legumes (white kidney bean, red kidney bean, lentil, chickpea, and white gram). These beans are very common throughout the world. They were soaked in:

Water
2% NaCl (salt) solution
Acetic acid (vinegar)
Sodium bicarbonate (baking soda)

What they found were reductions in phytic acid and tannins.

Phytic acid is known as a chelator, which can bond with minerals such as calcium, zinc, magnesium, and iron in our bodies. Once this bonding occurs, these minerals are useless to us in that our bodies can’t absorb them in this form. When combined, they form insoluble salts or phytates and end up being excreted.This is a real problem in developing countries whose populations may suffer from mineral deficiencies if too much phytic acid is ingested. For people in more developed countries, phytic acid can have some therapeutic benefits. Since we can get enough minerals from different foods, the phytic acid can act as a phytonutrient anti-oxidant which may prevent colon cancer.

Tannins are defensive compounds found in plants. They are present as a defense
mechanism because they mess with the surface proteins on bacteria and fungi,which attack it. The chemical process is similar to putting a square peg into a round hole. The tannins rearrange the proteins on the attacking bacteria so it can’t bind to the receptors on the plant. These tannins also deter herbivores by producing a bitter taste in the mouth and interfering with digestion. They act in a similar fashion as phytic acid by combining with minerals rendering them useless to our bodies. Due to this, phytic acid and tannins get the name anti-nutrients.

The results found by scientists were that the maximum reduction of these anti-nutrients occurred when the beans were soaked in sodium bicarbonate followed by cooking. Although soaking did slightly reduce the amount of protein, minerals, and sugars in the beans, it looks like a good option to keep those anti-nutrients at bay. As an added plus, it won’t make you toot as much.