Why Stockpiling Dry Beans Is Not Safe.

Every Prepper, Survival, Off-the-Grid, SHTF, and so forth website and video, where they give you information on what kinds of foods to stockpile, have dry beans as one of the top foods on their list.

In our opinion, and with personal experience and research, this is not a good food to stockpile, unless you stockpile canned beans.

You need a lot of water to soak and cook even just one measured cup of dry beans. And you need to soak the dry beans for many hours overnight, and cook the beans for more than an hour, maybe two hours, maybe more, in a lot of water. It depends on the type of beans you are cooking. If you don't fully cook the beans you can get very sick and may even have to be rushed to the emergency room with poisoning from the beans.

Beans contain Lectins. Lectins can make you feel very weak and listless and, possibly, make you dizzy. This is even if you have fully cooked the beans or eat canned beans, if you have a sensitivity to lectins.

It is important to have knowledge about lectins, especially if you have a thyroid condition, arthritus, diabetes, heart disease, cystitis, or if you are overweight. Lectins have an inflammatory and autoimmune effect on the body.

Lectins are a type of protein. They are carbohydrate-binding proteins that can be found in varying concentrations in foods such as beans, grains, seeds, nuts and potatoes. Actually, they are found in almost all plants and animals. Plants use lectins as natural pesticides and repellents to discourage animals from eating them. So plant lectins are a survival mechanism. If a human or animal eats the plant, they will not feel to well.

For example, eating only a few raw kidney beans can kill you. The lectins in the beans will bind to the sugar coating on your red blood cells causing abnormal clotting.

(As a side note: ricin, derived from the castor bean and from lectin, is a lethal poison that will kill you.)

One reaction undercooked beans can give you is bloody vomiting. Other reactions may include gas, abdominal pain, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting.

The foods that some people are most allergic to have high amounts of lectins. They are dairy, eggs, wheat, soy, peanuts, tree nuts, fish, shellfish.

Some cases of rheumatoid arthritis are caused by lectins in the nightshade family which includes tomatoes, potatoes, eggplants, and bell peppers. The superfood Goji berries also contains a high amount of lectins.

The lectin in wheat is attracted to glucosamine which covers your joints. It can cause inflammation and pain. This is why a gluten-free diet, which includes the elimination of wheat, works so well.

Lectins affect the hunger and satiety hormone, leptin, which may lead to obesity.

GMO foods have higher lectin levels than non-GMO foods. This makes GMO foods more allergenic.

Lectins cause leaky gut, which damages the lining of your gut, causing other food proteins you eat to enter your bloodstream and make your immune system attack other parts of your body, like your nervous system tissue, heart, skin, thyroid, and/or brain.

Lectins block the thyroid hormone, possibly causing a thyroid hormone receptor problem resulting in high LDL.

Lectins can bind with insulin which is a peptide hormone and a protein, which many result in causing diabetes.

Avoiding grains, molds, and lectins will greatly help autoimmune conditions and inflammation associated with IBS, colitis, Hashimoto’s, Crohn’s, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, various forms of arthritis, autism, Asperger syndrome and ADHD.

To avoid high levels of lectins in your diet, eat foods that are high-fat and low carb.

White rice has less lectin than brown rice and white flour has less lectin than whole wheat flour. The best cooking method to destroy lectins is pressure-cooking.

Things to note:

· Undercooked beans may be more toxic than raw beans.

· Cooking beans in a slow cooker may not destroy the toxins because of the lower temperature.

· Kidney beans are the most potentially harmful.

· The lectin isolate ricin, is used as a biological warfare agent.

· Fermenting food to eliminate lectins creates histamines which causes an allergy response. And fermentation can cause the formation of mold toxins.

So what's the point to this article regarding survival and stockpiling food?

When you are in survival mode and using up your stockpile of food, what is the most important thing to stockpile and maintain a supply of?

The answer is water.

And how does this relate to the toxic lectin in beans?

You are going to need a load of water to cook the dry beans. You may skimp on the amount of water you use to soak and cook the beans. You may also skimp on the amount of time to cook the beans. Also, if there is no electricity, and you have another method of cooking the beans, like a butane burner, a propane burner, or a wood stove, you may also, not know how long to cook the beans in these alternative methods. Some or all of these factors may result in becoming very ill or having a life threatening situation because of the toxic lectin in the beans.

Do you really want to waste almost a gallon of water to soak and cook beans. Your stockpile of water is more important to maintain for survival.

Stockpile canned beans instead. They have already been cooked, and there is water in the can with them to use to heat up the beans, so you don't have to add any additional water. And the amount of time saved by eating canned beans instead of cooking dry beans goes into many hours. It only takes a minute to open a can of beans and another few minutes to eat them. And best of all, you don't have to worry about eating undercooked beans.

Yes, the beans still have lectin, but at least you are a lot safer from getting sick.

If you want to add more protein to your stockpile, besides the canned beans, you can add canned salmon, canned tuna, canned chicken, canned turkey, canned spam, canned pork, canned ham, canned beef, and canned lamb.

Your life is worth more than a "hill of beans."