Not sure why anyone would want to eat raw uncooked beans of any sort but in case you are tempted, do not try it. I bet you have heard of “phytohaemagglutinin” right? Sure you have, you probably just don’t remember like me. Phytohaemag… let’s just call it PHA… is a toxin which is found in kidney beans. Since cannellini beans are white kidney beans they too have the toxin but only about 1/3rd of the amount. Still enough to take seriously. Hemagglutinin is lectin which is derived from a plant, mostly from the red kidney bean. Ingesting the toxin can result in extreme abdominal pain, extreme nausea and diarrhea. Some people have had the pain so severe they went to the hospital. However the symptoms last only for 3-5 hours after they start. This of course seems life a lifetime for those going through this.
Good to know what the future has in store for me.
You see, I was trying to save money by buying a bag of those hard/raw beans. It cost less than $2. How hard can soaking beans be, I thought. But now they're still kind of hard, even after I accidentally soaked them for 24 hours. I've been trying them periodically to test the texture. Then I tried googling 'what to do if your beans are still hard' and came across a plethora of sites, including one article from the Clean Plate Club called "Failed Beans".
Basically what I'm trying to say is I'm growing a bean garden in my stomach right now, according to the blog entry above I discovered.
Now go enter my Tuesday Giveaway Contest (blog entry below) before I start sneezing beans.
UNT
