What is the best way to clean beans?!
Answers: What is the best way to prepare beans to cook. Whether it's the mixed bag of beans or pinto or black eye peas. I let them soak for several hours and drain them, however every time I make them the "dirt" rises to the top of the pot and I find myself scrapping the top.
You're already cleaning them the proper way. That is not dirt that rises to the surface, but foam. The foam is water soluble protein being released from the beans, and will be absorbed back into the bean cooking liquid during cooking. It's completely natural and a normal part of cooking beans, especially ones that were dried. Just skim it off and resume cooking, if you find it unappealing, but it's unecessary. To cut back the production of foam you can add 1 tablespoon of fat, such as butter, or vegetable oil per 1 cup of beans to your liquid.
Here's a link that explains how to prepare beans:
http://www.centralbean.com/cooking.html
first I do what Granny always called "looking the beans" LOL
Basically put a few beans at a time in your hand and look for bits of dirt and small stones. Then put the into a colander and rinse well moving them around with you hands. Then you can soak them with enough water to cover by a few inches. Let soak over night and rinse .
I rinse them in a colander really good after soaking.
Can't get any better rthan what you are doing now... although I "look" at my beans too. Got it from my mom.... pour a few at a time into the palm of my hand and check for stones.
Beans need to be washed.
I have discovered little rocks in mine, so I sift through them
first. I do this in a strainer.
When you allow them to soak, this also removes any lingering dirt. Rinse and strain. Then you are ready to season them to your
taste (I like onions, onion powder, accent and Lawry Salt.
I fix my the Creole southern way......depends on how I feel. I may add other things. Smoke turkey. bell peppers, etc.
I pick my bag of beans one bean at a time. Then I wash them
and soak them over night. I then cook them with
1onion
1stalk of celery
1 green pepper
1 carrot finely chopped
3TP parsley flakes
I put them in water the nite before and let them soke.
You guessed it girl...whatever...soaking your beans and throwing the water off it is a necessary way of dealing with dried legumes ,rice etc...In fact most real rice recipes require you to soak at least twice tossing the water out... same with beans, they are not only filthy...but you need to rehydrate them to almost the state of fresh beans (the whole point of drying is to preserve stuff in the winter...) after you have soaked them for hours they have almost doubled in size! They are starting to look like food! Toss out the soaking water and throw them into a roiling boiling pot of water until done
Case you missed it, the only "culture"that doesn't soak, re-soak, and clean their rice and beans are Americans...We pretend it all comes from some lollypop factory....but the people that grow and supply those beans know that the way they dried it BEFORE selling to the big AG cos. was in the sun and on the ground. Screw it...clean food before you eat it!...