Pressure Cooking 15 bean soup...

[rch10007]

Ok, so I got a bag of beans. The 15 bean kind. It says on the package to soak overnight or at least 8 hours, but I'm inpatient!

They are in the pressure cooker right now. How long do I let them go?

I put in a whole onion, green pepper, and tomato for taste - if in fact it will do anything other than waste them.

What do you think? I got the timer set for an hour. I'm thinking that is about the equivilent as soaking them for 8 hours and then cooking them for 2 hours after bringing them to a boil, according to the directions on the bag.

Is an hour enough or is it too long?

Thanks!

[jeff]

I have not cooked with a lot of beans in the past. This is an answer for google

Cliff Notes, Soaking the beans will soften them up and make them cook faster.
After soaking for 1 hour, you ask how long to cook them for. I dont think there's a way to answer that.
As far as the green pepper, onion, and tomato goes, I'm guessing the beans will take in the flavor of those, but the items themselfs wont be very tasty since the beans should absorb all the flavors leaving the items mushy and tasteless.

please do a follow up post on this. let us know how good or how bad it turns out. based on your 1 hour soaking time. also post up how long you had to cook them for.

Thanks.

Soaking beans allows them to slowly absorb the moisture they need to cook evenly. Soaking keeps the beans from splitting open or from the having the outside shell fall apart while the middle is still hard. For many people, eating beans causes intestinal discomfort, or gas because it is difficult to digest complex sugars in beans The main reasons for soaking dried beans is to soften and return moisture to them, and to break down the oligosaccharides (the indigestible sugars that cause gas). The hardest class of beans are also troublesome for digestion and soaking helps breakdown these types.

Another reason to soak beans is that it maximizes their nutritional benefit which is important. When beans aren't soak ed it means longer cooking times before they become soft enough to eat. The longer the cooking times the more proteins, vitamins and minerals are destroyed in the heat - all the good things they we wanted when we selected the beans in the first place.

The longer soaking time is recommended to allow a greater amount of sugar to dissolve, thus helping the beans to be more easily digested. Always discard the soaking water.

Lastly we want to soak beans because it is economical, so listen up all you frugal shoppers. Beans are protein, and pound for pound they are equal to a good cut of meat, but cost only a few pennies. As stated above, the longer you have to cook beans the more valuable protein will be destroyed and this can impact the nutritional needs of your family, especially if you do not serve protein in other forms to compensate.

Also on the subject of dollar stretching if you are cooking those beans longer than necessary by not soaking first then you are watching your energy dollars go up in smoke - well make that steam - by using more natural gas, electricity or propane fuel in cooking.

[rch10007]

I had them in the pressure cooker for an hour, I didn't soak them at all.

This is what I did and they actually turned out really good!!

Poured the bag of 15 bean soup into the cooker (about 6-8 quart?)
Filled about 1/3 of the cooker with water.
Cooked the beans on a slow rock (the pressure value thinggy) for an hour
Released the pressure and checked the softness of beans - there were a few that needed a little more time
--the onion, tomato, and green pepper cooked down into mush <= this was the effect I was looking for - it thickens the water into a stock, sort of
I added about 2 cups more water and 4 sweet sausage links (cooked in microwave for 3 mins) and started it up again for about 40 mins
40 mins was too long - i will try 25 next time

Result: some really tasty beans but a little softer than I liked (due to time)

[rch10007]

Did you get my PM?