I have managed to grow some Kew Blue shelling beans that either Galina or AJ sent me. This years harvest has been wonderful they have grown very fast and I am overwhelmed with both fozen beans and seed. I have never used hard beans in cooking so could some kind soul tell me what to do with them before we eat them as I believe they are poisonous if not cooked right.
Dried beans are fairly easy.
Firstly, make absolutely sure they are fully dried out before storing in jars or they will mould.
Then when cooking. You can soak the beans first to make cooking easier but you can also pressure cook them straight from the jar. Regarding the toxins in dried beans, I've always made sure that they're cooked by boiling temperatures until fully cooked (soft in the middle) - I don't take a chance on dried beans in slow cooked meals unless they've been boiled first as I'm worried the temp is not high enough to destroy the toxin.
But do a little googling on the subject if you're unsure.
I always soak mine overnight and throw away the water. Make sure you use a big enough dish. I used a mug once and when they swelled it was impossible to get them out.
It is important to boil them so do not use in a slow cooker which uses a very low temperature for a very long time.
I make my own baked beans delicious.
Brown some onions and bacon (optional) in oil, add celery, carrots.
Other veg as available, a few green beans are ok as well but I don't put in potatoes as I find it makes it burn. I prefer to zap them in the microwave and serve with beans on top.
Then add tin of chopped tomato or passata (lidl do a nice one cheap) and the pre- soaked beans
about half a mug full before soaking.
A few green tomatoes can go in too if available.
Half cup apple juice or two or three small pealed apples. (Another great opportunity for my apple corer)
Tomato tin full of water (actually slightly less because of the apple juice.)
Teaspoon of ginger (More if you like it) and mixed spice and herb de provence
(or your own mixed herbs if you have them.)
If you like salt add some, but I think the bacon has enough I tend to cook without.
Zap in pressure cooker for about 10-15 minutes until beans are nice and soft.
That sounds delicious Digeroo. One question. How long do you boil the beans for? I don't want to poison ower Tone do I
It only takes ten minutes boiling to take away entirely the very small amount of poison in French bean seeds. You will generally boil dried been seeds for longer than that to get them soft. The only caution is using slow cookers, because some models never actually come up to a proper boiling temperature as Digeroo said. This whole issue came to the fore because raw food enthusiasts regularly ate large quantities of beans that were soaked and then not cooked.
I recall reading that broad beans are more poisonous than French beans and Soy beans are more poisonous than both. Broad bean seeds for a few people can be very poisonous for another reason, favism, but that's off topic here.
However, judging by how many people regularly munch freshly shelled beans from the garden and come to no harm at all, the poison is nowhere near as potent as for example poisonous mushrooms, where just a tiny amount can be fatal.
Now that runners and French beans are started to go to seed.. I pod and cook some of the seeds fresh from the pod. Just 5 mins of rapid boil and simmer another few minutes until cooked soft and then they are safe and ready to eat as they are or added into different dishes.
When I use them from dry...they get soaked until they've swollen back into fully plump shape..French beans over night and runners may take full 24 hrs. Then they are rapid boiled in fresh water 15 mins and simmered until soft.
I'm particularly careful with runnerbean seeds cooking...in early days I made chilli con carne that was really painful indeed...I didn't cook them correctly and by gosh my tummy hurt after eating good portion of the beans. I soon learned not to do it again...
Thanks for all the info.So glad I started growing them