Can I eat this plate of beans?
September 29, 2019 4:15 PM Subscribe
My beans (red, but not kidney) smell funny as they cook. I have cooked beans from scratch before, but they never smell like this. Can I eat them?
I bought a bag of fresh shelled beans (ie not dried, but also not green beans) from the farmer's market yesterday, stored them in the fridge and and started cooking them today. They were a bit slimy but I rinsed them thoroughly and soaked them in the fridge for about 2 hours. I put them to cook with a chopped onion, some dried oregano and a Scotch bonnet. They are partly cooked and smell - and taste - weirdly savoury, as though I'd added beef stock or something. I certainly have not, nor has that pot been used for cooking anything meaty. I often cook beans from scratch and I don't remember ever getting this sort of weird smell, and while I change around the additions quite often, the onion is always included.
Can I eat this? Or are the beans off? Have you ever had this when cooking fresh beans from scratch?
I bought a bag of fresh shelled beans (ie not dried, but also not green beans) from the farmer's market yesterday, stored them in the fridge and and started cooking them today. They were a bit slimy but I rinsed them thoroughly and soaked them in the fridge for about 2 hours. I put them to cook with a chopped onion, some dried oregano and a Scotch bonnet. They are partly cooked and smell - and taste - weirdly savoury, as though I'd added beef stock or something. I certainly have not, nor has that pot been used for cooking anything meaty. I often cook beans from scratch and I don't remember ever getting this sort of weird smell, and while I change around the additions quite often, the onion is always included.
Can I eat this? Or are the beans off? Have you ever had this when cooking fresh beans from scratch?
I'm not keen on beans so I never eat them and therefore am no an expert... but fermented beans are a huge part of Asian cuisine (tofu, natto) and natto definitely has a strong glutamic acid / umami flavour that could easily skew "beefy".
I'm not sure if there are any types of fermented beans that aren't safe to eat, so maybe let the word fermented guide your googling...
posted by nouvelle-personne at 5:33 PM on September 29, 2019
I'm not sure if there are any types of fermented beans that aren't safe to eat, so maybe let the word fermented guide your googling...
posted by nouvelle-personne at 5:33 PM on September 29, 2019
Response by poster: You and I may have different definitions of “a bit slimy”, but if I ever found myself describing fresh beans as such, I wouldn’t even bother cooking them.
'a bit' was pretty marginal, otherwise I wouldn't have cooked them either, but I think I agree with you. Much as I hate throwing out food, I will err on the side of caution.
posted by tavegyl at 5:57 PM on September 29, 2019 [1 favorite]
'a bit' was pretty marginal, otherwise I wouldn't have cooked them either, but I think I agree with you. Much as I hate throwing out food, I will err on the side of caution.
posted by tavegyl at 5:57 PM on September 29, 2019 [1 favorite]
Every time I've continued eating a food after thinking, "Huh, this x doesn't taste like any x I've ever had before", I've deeply regretted it, cf. the Seafood Sundubu-jjigae Affair of 2012
posted by easy, lucky, free at 5:44 AM on September 30, 2019 [3 favorites]
posted by easy, lucky, free at 5:44 AM on September 30, 2019 [3 favorites]
I have soaked and cooked fresh beans before. They weren't slimy at all.
I would probably assume that they went bad, and I'd just bin them. Compost, if possible. I wouldn't eat them at all.
posted by spinifex23 at 10:43 PM on September 30, 2019
I would probably assume that they went bad, and I'd just bin them. Compost, if possible. I wouldn't eat them at all.
posted by spinifex23 at 10:43 PM on September 30, 2019
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You and I may have different definitions of “a bit slimy”, but if I ever found myself describing fresh beans as such, I wouldn’t even bother cooking them.
posted by STFUDonnie at 5:18 PM on September 29, 2019 [7 favorites]