I forgot to rinse lentils before adding them to soup. Is the meal still safe to eat?
I get a bit too freaked out about health and safety when it comes to cooking.
I am cooking a lentil soup today and have just added a whole bunch of lentils I forgot to rinse. Is the food safe to eat? Is the rinsing for hygienic reasons or for flavour/consistency reasons?
Best Answer
I can only speak for UK supermarkets and you haven't said where you're from, but our lentils are clean as bought. A typical packet doesn't say to rinse them. With red lentils the only reaosn I can see for rinsing is to (slightly) reduce foaming; with Puy lentils and some others even that's not an issue and you may lose flavour.
Some Indian recipes (actually from India rather than westernised) say that when you rinse you need to pick over for stones, but I've never had that with dried lentils or beans.
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Can you get food poisoning from lentil soup?
Like other legumes, raw lentils contain a type of protein called lectin that, unlike other proteins, binds to your digestive tract, resulting in a variety of toxic reactions, such as vomiting and diarrhea. Yikes. Luckily, lectins are heat sensitive, and break down into more digestible components when they're cooked!Do you wash lentils before making soup?
The other good news: Lentils don't need to soak as beans do (though you do need to sort and rinse them before cooking). That's two reasons why lentil soup is such a winner. Different types of lentils cook in different amounts of time. Some, like red lentils, dissolve as they cook and make for a smooth soup.This Rent Week Lentil Soup Will Save Your Wallet | Struggle Meals
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Answer 2
Fifty years ago you might have needed to rinse your lentils and pick them over for stones. Modern food methods (and lawsuits for dentist bills..) have made that completely superfluous in much of the world.
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