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Most people agree that canned beans don’t taste as good as dried ones. But there is disagreement about how to cook dried beans, how to soak beans, and even whether you should do either. There are, of course, the big issues that people argue about (to salt or not to salt), but there are also a lot of small issues that people really care about (rinse the beans or not?)
The “right way to cook beans” is very important to many people, so we took the debate to the kitchen, where it belongs. We grabbed a dozen bags of pinto beans (Goya, if you must know) and got cooking. After twelve pots of beans and a lot of burrito bowls, we’re here to answer some of your most important questions about cooking beans. Ready to bust a few bean myths? Here we go:
Beans are an economical, nutrient-dense, and versatile pantry staple perfect for soups. However, most bean soup recipes call for soaking the beans overnight before cooking This convenient tip shaves hours off the cooking time, but what if you forget to soak? Can you skip soaking altogether or will your bean soup turn out subpar? Let’s explore the reasons behind soaking beans, if it’s truly necessary, and how to cook perfect bean soup without the 12-hour soak
The Purpose of Soaking Beans
Traditionally dried beans are soaked prior to cooking for a few key reasons
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Rehydration – Soaking plumps up the dried beans by reabsorbing water which shortens cooking time. Beans double in size as they rehydrate.
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Digestibility – Soaking beans breaks down indigestible oligosaccharides that cause gas and bloating. The water draws out some of these complex sugars.
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Nutrients – Soaking can help remove phytic acid and tannins that inhibit nutrient absorption.
So in theory, soaking leads to faster cooking, easier digestion, and more available nutrients. But are these reasons compelling enough to remember to soak beans ahead of time for soup?
Do You Really Have to Soak Beans for Soup?
The short answer is no – you absolutely do not have to soak beans before making soup. With a few easy tweaks, you can skip the overnight soak and still end up with tender, flavorful beans perfect for soup.
Use a Quick Soak
Rather than soaking beans for 8-12 hours, you can “quick soak” them. Simply cover beans with water, bring to a boil, remove from heat, and let sit for just 1 hour. The intense heat jumpstarts the rehydration process. Drain, rinse, and add beans straight to your soup.
Cook Them Longer
Unsoaked beans take slightly longer to soften fully. Increase total cooking time by 30-60 minutes for perfectly tender beans without presoaking.
Add Acids or Baking Soda
A bit of acid from lemon juice or vinegar lowers pH which helps break down the bean skins. A pinch of baking soda does the opposite, raising pH for faster softening.
Use a Pressure Cooker
A pressure cooker cuts bean cooking time significantly, even without soaking. Cook under high pressure for 15-20 minutes.
Pick Smaller Beans
Opt for quicker-cooking beans like lentils, split peas and black-eyed peas which don’t require as much prep time.
Use Canned Beans
Keep canned beans on hand for shortcut bean soup with no soaking required. Just rinse before adding them to the pot.
Tips for Making Bean Soup Without Soaking
Follow these simple tips for fork-tender beans in your next pot of soup:
- Pick over beans to remove any debris, rinse, and drain well. No need to cover with water and soak overnight.
- Sauté aromatics like onion, garlic, and celery first to build a flavor base.
- Add spices, herbs, broth, tomatoes etc. for maximum flavor absorption.
- Simmer longer – Expect unsoaked beans to take 1-2 hours to reach desired tenderness.
- Check often and add more broth as needed to keep beans submerged.
- Finish with acid like lemon juice or vinegar for brightness.
Ideal Beans for Quick-Cooking Soup
While all beans can be prepared soak-free, smaller beans naturally cook faster and are ideal for spur of the moment soup:
- Lentils
- Split peas
- Black-eyed peas
- Mung beans
- Adzuki beans
- Cannellini beans
- Cranberry beans
- Navy beans
Larger beans like chickpeas, kidney beans and butter beans may take a bit longer but with the right techniques, no overnight soaking is required.
Creative Flavorings for Bean Soup
Take your quick bean soup up a notch with bold flavors and additions:
- Smoked paprika, cumin, chili powder, garam masala
- Onion, carrots, celery
- Ham hock, bacon, sausage
- Chicken or vegetable stock
- Diced tomatoes, tomato paste/puree
- Kale, spinach, chard, cabbage
- Parmesan rind, miso
- Wine, vinegar, lemon juice
Satisfying Bean Soup Recipes Without Soaking
Now that you know beans can be coaxed into tender submission without an overnight bath, try out these satisfying soak-free bean soup recipes:
- 15-Minute Lentil Soup
- Sausage and Kale Soup with White Beans
- Curried Red Lentil Soup
- Tuscan Ribollita Soup
- Moroccan Chickpea and Lentil Soup
- Ham and Bean Soup with Collard Greens
- Smoky Black-Eyed Pea Soup with Greens
- Southwestern Vegetable Soup with Black Beans
With a few minor adjustments, you can now enjoy nourishing homemade bean soup any night of the week without having to plan ahead. Skip the overnight soak and unlock quick, flavorful bean soups on demand.
The Best Way to Cook Dried Beans
For the Epi test kitchen, the results were clear. The beans had great texture and a flavorful broth after being quickly soaked, salted at the start of cooking, and cooked in a pot without a lid. You should rinse the beans in a colander before cooking them. The bags you buy at the store probably won’t have any sand or stones in them, but this is a good idea just in case. Ready? Here’s how to cook dried beans, step-by-step:Step 1. Quick-soak the beans.
Place 1 lb. dried pinto beans in a large pot. Add cold water until it’s about 2 inches above the top of the beans. Beans shouldn’t dry out during cooking, so they should stay in a few inches of water the whole time. Cover pot, bring to a boil over medium-high heat, and then remove from heat. Let rest 1 hour. (You can also quick-soak beans in the Instant Pot or another pressure cooker. )Step 2. Salt and simmer the beans.
Stir in 1½ tsp. sprinkle with kosher salt (and flavorings if you want; see below) and heat the beans and their water until they boil. Take off the lid, lower the heat, and simmer the beans until they are soft and creamy. Check them after an hour and add more water if they need it to stay submerged for another hour and a half.
Even though we tested this method on pinto beans, you can use it on any kind of bean, like black beans, navy beans, kidney beans, white beans, you name it. And don’t forget about heirloom beans. Some beautiful and tasty bean varieties, like Christmas Lima Beans, Yellow Eye Beans, and Scarlet Runners, don’t come in cans and will make your bean game even better.
Note that the cook time of various beans will be dependent on their size. Great Northern beans might take a little longer to cook than small black-eyed peas, which could be done in 35 minutes. Keep an eye on the heat and make sure the water stays at a simmer. If it boils too quickly, the skins could break and the beans will become mushy. Keep an eye on the stockpot, but don’t fuss over it. Your beans will be fine. Add flavorings, if you want.
You could add a half-cut tomato or onion or a few garlic cloves to the pot along with the salt to make the beans taste even better. To add some heat to your beans, a dried chile works well. Take it out when the beans are done. You could also add spices or herbs, like cumin seeds, bay leaves (one or two leaves per pound of beans), or a dash of dried oregano. Fresh sprigs of rosemary, thyme, or marjoram are also tasty. These aromatics infuse the cooking liquid with a burst of bright, herbal flavor.
Similar to a ham hock or the ends of a hard sausage, the rind from a wedge of Parmesan or another hard cheese can add a lot of savory flavor to beans. Keep these kinds of things in the freezer for your next bean cooking session, and you’ll have a pot of flavorful, creamy, tender beans in no time. Step 3. Store your beans.
It’s true that cooking dried beans isn’t as easy as opening a can, but you can still use these beans during the week. When you have time, just cook a lot of beans at once and then freeze them in 1- to 2-cup portions. In the fridge, cooked beans will last for five days in a container with a lid. Frozen beans will last for up to six months in a container that doesn’t let air in.
The Epicurious Myth-Busting Guide to Cooking BeansMyth 1: Dry beans must be soaked.
Do you really need to soak your beans? Soaking dried beans is supposed to help them cook faster and more evenly. Some people also say that soaking beans breaks down some of their complex sugars, which makes them easier to digest. Because every stomach is different, we didn’t test for digestibility. Testing the soaking theory, however, was simple: We covered 8 oz. pinto beans with 8 cups water and left the container on the counter overnight. The next day we placed those beans and their soaking liquid in a pot. In a second pot, we placed an equal amount of dried unsoaked beans and fresh water. Both pots were set over a medium-high flame and tested periodically. Results: The soaked beans did finish cooking first—but the unsoaked pinto beans were finished just 10 minutes later. Our feeling: Why bother?.
Takeaway: Don’t bother soaking beans.Myth 2: Dry beans must be cooked in fresh water.
This myth was no longer true after our first test—if you don’t soak your beans, you’ll always cook them in fresh water. Some people will still want to know if they should drain the soaked beans in a colander and fill the pot with new water, or if they should cook the beans in the water they were soaked in. When we tried this, the beans that were cooked in the liquid that had been soaking were tastier, darker, and had a better texture.
You don’t have to soak your beans, but if you do, cook them in the water that they were soaked in. Myth 3: If you don’t soak overnight, you should at least quick-soak.
Man, people are just really attached to this idea of the presoak. Using the “quick soak” method, you put beans in water, boil them, turn off the heat, and then let the beans soak for an hour. We tried the quick-soak method. The cooking time didn’t change much—the beans cooked 5 minutes faster than the ones that were soaked overnight and 15 minutes faster than the ones that weren’t soaked at all—but the flavor was our favorite.
Takeaway: Quick-soak, but do it for the flavor.
If you cook beans without a lid, some say the result will be a firmer bean. Keeping the lid on? Your beans will be creamy. The beans that were cooked with the lid on took about 15 minutes less time to get ready than the beans that were cooked with the lid off. However, the flavor of the lid-off beans was vastly better. Without a lid, the cooking liquid can evaporate more quickly, making a bean broth that gives each pinto more flavor.
Takeaway: Leave the lid off.Myth 5: Cooking beans in the oven is easier.
It’s easy to cook dried beans, but we heard that putting the pot in the oven could make the process even easier. So we brought some beans to a boil on the stovetop, then placed them in a 325°F oven. The beans were pretty creamy in the end, but they took a long time to cook and didn’t taste great—I think of the word “waterlogged” to describe them. Makes sense: The water in the pot had barely reduced.
Takeaway: Unless you’re making baked beans, keep them on the stovetop. Myth 6: Salted beans take longer to cook—if they ever finish cooking at all.
One of the most persistent myths about how to cook dried beans involves salt. Some recipes say to wait to add salt until the very end of cooking because it stops the beans from getting soft. Some recipes say to add it at the start because, well, salt is flavor and we’re going to eat these beans, right? In our test, we looked at a batch that was cooked with salt added at the start and a batch that was cooked with salt added at the end. The beans that were salted at the start were more tender.
Takeaway: Salt early and often.
How to Cook Dried Beans – The Right Way – For Maximum Nutrition
FAQ
Should I soak beans before making soup?
What happens if you don’t soak beans before cooking?
Can you cook dry beans in soup?
Should you drain beans before adding to soup?
Should you soak dried beans before cooking?
When starting with dry beans, it’s generally recommended to soak the beans overnight before preparing the soup. Soaking dried beans overnight reduces the required cooking time significantly. The texture of the cooked beans is also best after soaking, with fewer that split open and burst.
What is the best way to eat beans?
The best way to eat beans is to first cook them in a large pot of water, about 4 cups of water to every 1 cup of beans. Adding lemon grass or other herbs to the water can improve the flavor. Once beans are cooked the best thing to do is combine them with cooked rice, this is because beans are low in methionine and rice is low in lysine, so combining them makes a more complete protein.
Can you cook beans without soaking?
Soaking beans in the refrigerator overnight will reduce the time they have to cook drastically. And the texture of the beans will also be it their best, with fewer split-open and burst ones. But like we said, you don’t have to commit this hard. If you’re the impatient, bean-hungry type, you can cook your beans from dry without any soaking at all.
Can you soak beans overnight?
If you have the time to soak the beans overnight, make sure you add a little salt to the brine and cook them in the soaking liquid.