I decided to make a big crock pot of vegetable bean soup. I dumped in some vegetable broth, cut up vegetables (not veggies :)), and dry beans right out of the package. This concoction is going to cook for 5-6 hours. I was thinking that the beans will soak up the fluid as the soup cooks and everything will be fine.
But now I’m wondering if that is the case. Will my beans be edible? Or should I fish them out and soak/cook them separately, then dump them back in?
Thanks!
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They’ll be fine.
Here’s your risks:
1 - you don’t mention what kind of vegetables you put in. Most vegetables don’t stand up to 5-6 hours of cooking. They will probably break down into mush. Tasty mush, but mush nonetheless.
2 - if your beans are old, you risk them not cooking up well. This is the same, though, in the soup as if you had cooked them separately then added them to the soup.
3 - You might need to add more fluid. Beans soak up an immense amount of liquid. No biggie, though, just keep an eye on 'em and add water/more stock if it starts to get low.
Thanks, Athena -
Vegetables = celery, carrots, and onions.
Don’t know how old the beans are, but I just bought them today (for what that’s worth)
I figured I may need to add liquid; extra vegetable stock is on standby.
Thanks again!
mmm
As long as you don’t have tons of tomatoes in there, you should be fine. I have read elsewhere that the “don’t cook dried beans in tomatoes or they won’t get soft” is a myth, but this was not my experience. I once cooked beans that were perfectly good one day in water–turning out fine, and then maybe a week later or so used the same bag of dried bean in a tomato-heavy stew/chili-type dish, and for all the cooking in the world, they never got soft. Literally cooked them for something like 14 hours or so, and at hour 14 they were no softer than at hour 6.
Those are good hearty veggies, but they will probably break down with that much cooking. That’s why most bean recipes call for the beans to be cooked before the rest of the soup - not because there’s something magic about cooking beans by themselves, but they do take longer than most vegetables can handle.
On the other hand, if they do break down, you’ll just get a more stew-like texture to the stock. Not necessarily a bad thing, and if you want more veggy chunks, just throw some more in during the last hour or so of cooking.
Most dry beans, if not pre-soaked, will need more than 5-6 hours in a slow cooker to be really done.* It will depend on the type of bean, too. Maybe try cooking on high until you’ve got a good simmer going, then turn it down to low.
However, I cook a lot with my crock pot and all winter/root vegetables hold up just fine even after eight-plus hours. With the exception of squash, which will just thicken the soup and still taste good.
So you may have to add more water or stock as Athena suggests, and cook it for longer than you intended. Keep your eye on the liquid level and check the beans for tenderness and done-ness after 5-6 hours.
*I don’t know if this is true but it’s the way my mom taught me - adding salt to the water when cooking beans makes them take longer to get tender. Add salt/salty stock near the end of the cooking time. That may be one of those passed-on-down memes though.
Also, I add pre-cooked or canned beans to the crock pot just for the last hour or so. I’ve never thought to add dry beans at the start of the process. I’d like to know how your soup turns out doing it this way!
According to Harold McGee, the culprit for hard beans is not salt or tomatoes; it’s either the bean itself or the storage conditions. Beans grown in high temps and high humidity and low water supplies turn into “hard-seed” beans and will never cook thoroughly.
Beans grown correctly but stored in warm temperatures and high humidity also will not cook thoroughly.
Unfortunately it’s a crapshoot as to whether or not beans are bad; there’s no way to tell until you cook them. About the only thing you can do is buy your beans from markets that go through a lot of beans, and don’t leave them in warm temps/high humidity for months at a time.
It sucks when your beans don’t cook, but it’s not an issue with how you cook them.
Huh, that looks like an interesting book! On my wish list.
Do note that I mention in my case, the same bag of beans was cooked one week apart. I highly doubt one week of storage dried them out to such a point that one week they’re buttery and fine, and the next week they have a seemingly impenetrable skin. shrug
As for the salt thing, actually, soaking your beans in brine the night before makes for a more tender and flavorful bean, contrary to popular cooking myth.
I did miss that part. Sorry. Hmmm, the mystery continues!
Please cook several batches of beans with and without tomatoes and salt, and get back with us with the results, wouldya? Cuz I know I cook beans with tomatoes and have not had issues. 
OP, one other consideration: The relative fart-producing potential of beans is greatly reduced if you soak them first (preferably with a bit of baking soda*) and dump out the soak water, replacing it with fresh for the actual soup. The way you’re cooking your beans, all the fart fuel, a.k.a. oligosaccarides, will have been retained and will be available to the hungry bacteria in your gut who turn them into stench.
I’ll give it another shot. I found it odd, too, as I thought that was just a load of B.S., but I haven’t tried experimenting with it a second time, being afraid to ruin another pot of beans. To be fair, they were cooked in pretty much a pot of tomato sauce, with some other ingredients, so it was a fairly acidic environment, not just a tomato or two.
An alternative to soaking them for hours is to bring the beans to a boil in a pot of water, turn off the heat, cover the pot and let it sit for one hour. Then dump out the water and rinse the beans off. Then cook normally.
I appreciate all the advice.
It’s going on four hours now; I just checked a bean and it’s not yet soft.
I’m not panicking, but I’ll be pretty disappointed if I have to dump the whole pot.
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My mom made a pumpkin-black bean soup just a few days ago. The pumpkin was completely cooked away, leaving it as basically a thick sludge with beans floating in it, but man, it was delicious.
I think there was onion and maybe a few other veggies in it, too, but the beans were the only thing to remain intact.
Surely the only “bean soup question - need answer fast!” is “Never mind what it’s been - what is it now?”
I’ve always been told to soak dry beans overnight in water, then cook them for lots and lots and lots of hours (longer than 5-6) but I’ve only done it a few times and with mixed results… (I gave up and went to canned beans) so hopefully it will work for you and your soup will be delicious. I love beans, personally. They make a good addition to a vegetable soup.
Also, it may depend on the bean. I was usually using pinto beans.
I never soak beans overnight, and it never takes more than a couple hours before they start to get soft, and 4-5 to get totally done. At least if you’re me. If you’re Mr. Athena, beans are never soft enough.
I have had at least one batch of beans that have never gotten soft, but that was years ago.
Why dump out the water?