Why Shouldn’t You Eat Green Beans Raw?

Beans naturally contain phasin in their pods and seeds. This belongs to the group of lectins, which cause severe stomach and intestinal disorders and can cause red blood cells to clump together. Therefore, beans should not be eaten raw.

Cooking inactivates the poison. A cooking time of at least ten minutes is required, as the lectins are highly heat-stable and bound in the cells. With a cooking time of fifteen minutes you can be sure that the cores of the beans are sufficiently heated.

It is not advisable to prepare beans in a steam cooker. Pressureless steam cooking may not reach the required temperature, in some cases consumers had shown severe symptoms of intoxication after eating such beans. In the pressure cooker – i.e. when steaming under pressure – higher temperatures are achieved and the beans are sufficiently cooked (observe the operating instructions).

Even frozen beans need to be cooked, blanching them before freezing doesn’t reduce lectins enough. Preserved beans from the jar or can are sufficiently cooked. These can be used without further heating.

It can be tempting, especially for children, to eat individual beans raw. They need to be made aware of the danger: as little as five or six raw green beans can be fatal to children.