Good news for Taco Bell and perhaps fewer future giggles for schoolboys everywhere. The BBC reports:
A method of creating super-nutritious but flatulence-free beans has been developed by scientists.
Beans are a cheap and key source of nutrition especially in the developing world, but many people are thought to be put off by anti-social side-effects.
What can they possibly mean by that? MORE:
A Venezuelan team says fermenting beans with certain friendly bacteria can cut the amount of wind-causing compounds, and boost beans’ nutritional value.
“Wind-causing compounds” — are they talking about the weather here? AND:
The research appears in the Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture.
Flatulence is caused by bacteria that live in the large intestine breaking down parts of food – such as soluble fibre – that have not been digested higher in the gut
Beans, such as the black bean commonly eaten across Central and Southern America and tested by the team, contain many of these compounds.
Researchers from the Simon Bolivar University in Caracas found that by boosting the natural fermentation process by adding a particular type of bacteria , called Lactobacillus casei (L casei), the amount of these indigestible wind-causing compounds were reduced.
There they go talking about winds again. Wait…”winds…” Are they talking about political debate in this election year? (I think so).
UPDATE: Great minds think alike.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.