Beans rock….and other reasons to sort your beans

 A while back, Monica over at Run, Eat, Repeat did a tutorial on cooking your own beans instead of grabbing them from a can. This is something I do constantly, so no real shocker there.

What shocked me was that her grandma told her horror stories of people breaking their teeth from biting down on a rock, but she’s never found a rock in dry beans! I know she buys them in bulk, in small quantities, and probably of a much better quality than I ever do, but it still sorta threw me off that it sounded almost like a myth to her, lol.

I don’t have a bulk store anywhere near me, so I buy a large bag of beans at the grocery store. And I most definitely sort them.

Here’s why:

That’s from a little over half a bag. That’s definitely more than I usually find, but still, doesn’t really surprise me any either.

You can see a couple “ugly beans” in there, too, which is another reason why I sort them. Even if I find only a rock or two, I tend to find a few really ugly beans that don’t seem fit to eat. I sort at least twice (usually I sort once on the table, and then again as I push them off the table into a bowl or strainer) and then also rinse to pick out any debris or really wrinkled, funky beans that might float to the top.