Eat beans. It is that simple!

"On Tuesday, he enjoyed beans at my home, and they were his first after coming here from Africa" he said.

I decided to go for it.  It was too good an opportunity to miss.

"Not true.  He had beans on Sunday.  Beans that I made," I said.

I knew that my confident assertion would draw a response that would attempt to deny that I cooked beans on Sunday.  Sure enough, it came right away: "No, you made peanuts.  Boiled peanuts."

Tada!

It does not take much for me to get excited and amused.  Am a simple man with simple pleasures. 😉

"But peanuts are not nuts.  They are beans.  I made a dish after boiling the peanuts."

There was disbelief on their faces. 

They tried to read my facial expression, perhaps hoping to detect a smile that might tell them that I was joking.  Of course, I was smiling.  But then my smile never clearly comes across.  People think that I am angry even when I am smiling! 

"You might have your preferences.  Fava beans. Chickpeas. Or black beans. Or whatever.  But, you cannot deny that peanuts are beans."

They looked stunned.

And then for the mic drop moment, I said "technically, peanuts and beans are all legumes."

All that was last evening.

A few years ago, I even reviewed a book that was all about beans.  I retrieved the book-review, which was published in April 2018.  I perhaps read the book and wrote my review towards the end of 2017.  I surely had no idea then that I would be served with a layoff notice in 2021.  Reviewing one's past provides evidence in plenty, over and over again, about the unpredictability of life.

I am impressed with what I wrote about beans, and I hope you too will agree and spread the word not only about peanuts but about all legumes:

For two important reasons, I am thankful that [Ken] Albala has brought to our attention the importance of beans. First, similar to how old languages are dying, we seem to be losing our connections to many old ways in which humans delighted themselves with food. We are increasingly losing these connections because we mistakenly believe that there is only one formula for the pursuit of happiness, which is a U.S. way of life. Thus, we have ended up in a situation where, as Albala notes in the postscript, “people around the world eat less beans than they used to. As long as Western values predominate, beans will slowly continue to be marginalized, or they will be sold as elite heirloom varieties, a trend that as we have seen, is well underway” (p. 223). Of course, it has also been the case throughout history that animal protein is favored when people have money to spend. Albala himself writes about this earlier in the book: “When one can afford meat, beans are the first food excised from the diet, and naturally the first food associated with the poor” (p. 12). Perhaps one of the lessons that we can draw from the history of beans is that we need to rebrand beans from out of their ill reputation as being the food of the poor, so that we will continue to consume tasty, nutritious, and healthy bean dishes even as the world becomes richer than ever before.

There is a second, and even more important, reason why we need to pay attention to the role of beans in human history. That is about our own future. In a world of an additional 2 to 3 billion people, and with increased economic prosperity, the demand for food will increase. Meanwhile, global climate change poses immense challenges for the 10 or 11 billion to sustainably live and prosper. The ecological challenge can be met if the demand for animal protein does not rise, and more so if it falls. As studies have demonstrated, substituting beans for animal protein, especially beef, can be a significant route toward reducing greenhouse emissions—although meeting such environmental goals is now moot after President Donald Trump's decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate accord.

Beans—in their incredible variety—could play a key role in moving toward a sustainable future, if we paid attention to the rapidly changing world. As Albala writes, lentils provide more calories and protein far more efficiently per acre than grazing cattle does. The roots of the legumes naturally fix nitrogen into the soil, thereby increasing land productivity for all the crops. Beans, after they are properly dried, have a shelf life that is seemingly forever. It is no wonder that the many varieties of beans played a huge role in how humans became civilized. Thus, if in the past, “without the beans it is certainly less likely that these early civilizations would have ever arisen” (p. 11), then, into the future, too, beans could play an important role in sustainably supporting human existence on planet earth, which is the only home we have ever known.