How long do I need to soak dried kidney beans for before they're ready to cook?

How long do I need to soak dried kidney beans for before they're ready to cook?  I'm suspicious about how cheap dried beans are where I live, but it'll help me save money in the short term, so I'm going to go for it.  Just don't know how long it takes to soften them up properly...

Overnight is ideal. If you are in a pinch, you can soak them in warm water for about five hours.

I believe if you have a pressure cooker, you do not need to soak beans which is neat!

Liike Timothy said, none with a pressure cooker. Otherwise 6 hours is the minimum. I tend to do it for 24 hours, just due to me being in the kitchen at the same times. One note, don't cook your beans with salt. Some here believe that makes them not soften. This as been my experience with stored for 10 years beans. Use other seasonings, but salt your beans after cooking.

Howdy,

I soak beans over night, which is at least 8 hrs. I also pressure cook them. Salt is added at the last, after cooking, before serving. Sometimes I don't use salt cause I am using my homemade tomato sauce.  I am soaking beans right now, chile tomorrow...

Soaking them isn’t just to soften them up to shorten cooking time, it is to remove the toxic phthalates in them.   Soak them and rinse well.  

We ended up with some dried beans which wouldn't soften, even after 24 hours, even cooked for 2 days.  What we ended up having to do was to boil them after soaking them, because that was the only way to soften them.  My MIL says its because they were likely grown in China and were heavily genetically modified.  I don't know, I just know we decided that from now on we're just using canned beans instead, because this happened to us two different times and it was very frustrating.

Howdy,

I have beans, 50lb bags, I bought a long time ago(40+yrs? coop bulk buying). They are organic, USA grown. They are still edible, can be a little "crunchy" when they are cooked up. I've been told that's a sign of "old" beans. There still good. I can't just throw them out; I do grow some of my own beans.

I try and buy food as local and organic as possible and not support agri biz.

I like to soak them from four up to 24 hours, and I do pressure cook them then.  This is the main way that I use my pressure cooker.  While it takes longer than I think it will to come up to pressure, it still cuts cooking time by half or more.  To have pea soup in half an hour from start to finish, even with all of the chopping of onions, celery, carrots and ham and have it taste like it's been cooking in a slow cooker all day, is still remarkable to me!  I've made some of the best meals using it, and would recommend to anyone to get one.  I don't have an instapot, but I guess they work the same.  If I had more storage, I would be interested in getting one of those.  I like that they work with electricity right on the counter, rather than taking up a burner on the stove.

I've heard that with most dry beans you need to drain away the water after soaking to remove the phthalates.  I'm not sure how you do that with a pressure cooker.  Can you drain them after cooking or did the pressure cooking just seep the phthalates back into them?  Or does the pressure destroy the phthalates?

Howdy,

I pour off the soaking water, cook in pressure cooker(15-25mins). I let the cooker cool down on its own and pour off that water also. Then I just make something, ministrone soup, chili, so everything comes back to a boil, not pressure cooking..

I also don't cook split peas or soy beans in my pressure cooker.

Yes, I drain on both sides of the cooking into a strainer.  I often make a very simple white bean or kidney bean or black bean dish where I dice up celery and onion and put that in the strainer before dumping the beans in while still hot.  I dump that back into the pressure cooker, add a little salt and pepper, a bit of balsamic vinegar and about a TBSP. of oil.  (which reminds me; if you're cooking beans in a PC, you'll want to add a TBSP of oil to keep the foaming down and the vent from plugging.) Then I just toss it and enjoy.  I like it luke warm or cold.  It's a really good side dish or lunch.  Sometimes, I'll add other vegetables, but it's not necessary.  Sun-dried tomatoes, cukes, peppers...whatever I have from the garden.  

randal cranor wrote:Howdy,

I pour off the soaking water, cook in pressure cooker(15-25mins). I let the cooker cool down on its own and pour off that water also. Then I just make something, ministrone soup, chili, so everything comes back to a boil, not pressure cooking..

I also don't cook split peas or soy beans in my pressure cooker.

Faye Streiff wrote:Soaking them isn’t just to soften them up to shorten cooking time, it is to remove the toxic phthalates in them.   Soak them and rinse well.  

EXACTLY! So, even though a pressure cooker will render them soft without soaking, resist the temptation!

Phthalates are "slow acting poisons" - meaning, they won't kill you on the spot, or even give you a belly ache... The worst that they will give you on the spot is gas (btw, commonly associated with beans -- this is why!)

These are NOT chemical phthalates, as used in plastic, etc. So organic beans or not will not matter. These are naturally occurring phthalates (which is better, definitely), BUT STILL: these are phytoestrogens. This means that their chemical structure is similar to the hormone estrogen, and out body often cannot tell the difference.

Thus, if you don't soak the beans overnight, a dose of hormone therapy will come with them at dinner time, whether you need it or not. And increased levels if estrogen lead to weight gain, PMS and even breast cancer. Not worth it!

Simply plan the night before, and throw them in a pan with a pinch of baking soda, then drain in the morning.

For faster meal prep next time freeze it can your leftovers:)

Bean and corn soup.

For beans that won't soften during the normal time of cooking, try adding baking soda. It really works. It's especially needed for old beans.

While the beans are in the hot water, either at the beginning of cooking, or after you're getting frustrated because they've boiled so long and aren't soft yet, add a little baking soda. If it fizzes, it means the beans were acidic and need it, so stir it in and add a little more, step by step until it stops fizzing.

After cooking, you can add something acidic to neutralize the alkalinity, like tomato products, lemon juice, or vinegar. But you might not taste the baking soda anyway.

Soaking and/or cooking with salt in does not affect the beans softening, but adding anything acidic will definitely make them difficult to soften.

I soak beans overnight if possible, or at least a couple of hours. In a pinch I've cooked them direct, but it takes longer. I'm at very high altitude so I always cook them in a pressure cooker. I use the low tech foolproof Indian pressure cooker with a whistle weight. I bring the beans up to pressure and let it whistle once, then turn it down to the minimum and simmer for 50 min for kidney or garbonzo beans, and less for smaller beans. Then if it's for a stew or dal where I want them to hold their shape, I add something acidic, or if I want them mushy I don't.

Everyone in India cooks beans in a pressure cooker, and frequently. Think of it this way: about 17% of the world's population eats beans, garbonzos or lentils cooked in a pressure cooker several times a week!

I have only cooked dried beans for a couple of years, mostly black beans and kidney beans. They seem similar to me, cooking-wise. I have never tried a pressure cooker, and have only half-heartedly experimented with baking soda, and don't know if I have cooked particularly old beans - but soaking ca. 20-30 hours seems to be pretty fool-proof. I do change the water at least a couple of times. Soaking from the morning until the afternoon is too short, from late evening to next afternoon is sometimes too short, but from one afternoon until the next  has always worked. I have the impression that from morning until next afternoon is even better (for the texture of the beans, not really for taste or cooking time), but it may be imagination as the difference is small.

I think dried beans have 'always' been cheap, so I would not be especially suspicious about that. Soaking in a couple of changes of water will not only get rid the beans own 'poison' (whether by leaching or breaking down) but probably also wash away a lot of other contamination that you might vaguely be worrying about in cheap unprovenanced (?) food. I find that when they are soaked for around 20 hours (in room temperature) there will usually be small bubbles forming - whether the beans themselves are starting some kind of life process that gives off gas or fermentation is beginning, I don't know, but it feels like a good sign.

I love beans, specifically soup beans, and make them (from dried) often.  I wanted to know, once and for all, what (if any) difference there was if you soaked the beans or didn't.

Soaked beans (the usual 8-12 hours) reduced cooking time by only 20-30 minutes.   I discard the soaking water because I find it gets rid of most of the impurities that cause beans to foam up as they cook.  Taste-wise?  The beans were more bland, even though you season them while cooking.  If you think about it, when you soak beans, they're just soaking up plain old tasteless water.  It wasn't worth saving 20-30 minutes of cooking time.  You can save a little more time if you soak them in boiling water and cover them.  But, still... bland.

Unsoaked beans take that extra 20-30 minutes to cook, but when they're done, they're a lot more flavorful because the beans soak up the flavors you season/cook your beans with because that flavor is in the cooking water/broth.  It's not in the soaking water.

Just my 2¢ in a world where there's a million ways to do most everything and the "best" way is the way that works for YOU.