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Kidney beans have β-carotene?
I came across this post from Grant:
"Yes, I did resolve my chronic kidney disease while eating beans. However, I only used the red kidney beans for about 5-6 months. When someone pointed out that the red kidney beans are high in carotenoids I changed over to black beans."
Here: https://ggenereux.blog/discussion/topic/did-grant-resolve-his-kidney-issues-while-eating-beans/
This post is from 2022 and I am sure Grant knows his stuff. I am just astonished by this news- as I replaced Black Beans for Kidney Beans by looking into USDA numbers on VA content in various beans and Kidney were far lower- but I didn't think to look at β-carotene content, and even when I did at this site: https://tools.myfooddata.com/nutrient-ranking-tool/Beta-Carotene/Beans-and-Lentils/Lowest/Household/Common/No They show up as zero.
But wait- it gets worse. Cooking may actually increase the level of β-carotene in the kidney bean:
"True retention factors of β-carotene contents in the cooked kidney beans, peas, and mung beans after boiling were 174.2, 128.3, and 91.8%, respectively."
Source: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30263360/
Does anyone have a site that shows accurate VA and β-carotene levels? I know Black beans are the highest bean for VA and have pondered on here as to why Grant chose it as his 'go-to' bean. Maybe Pinto are better than Kidney? I just don't know where to go for accurate 'micro-level' information like this.
Is it enriched white rice and 80/20 hamburger from here on out? I'm just starting my low VA journey and thought including kidney beans in this mix was low in VA and β-carotene...
I don’t believe that the vA in beans would be a problem. Grant wanted to go zero vA to prove that we didn’t need vA at all. He has done an extremely prolonged limited diet for science. I fully respect this.
However, he’s never said that he thinks zero vA is the way to go for everyone. In fact he’s said that he doesn’t think his diet is the perfect low vA diet. I think once we get obsessional about small amounts of vA in our food we are on the road to stress, a very limited diet and down the line possible unintended consequences.
The way an individual chooses to go about reducing vA is their own choice. If we have overdone vA then we definitely need to reduce it. However, I favour the moderate approach. I’ve taken out the huge sources of vA (supplements, liver, sweet potatoes etc) and have moderate amounts of medium sources and base my diet on low vA foods. However, I keep in variety and use my nutritional therapy education as a basis for my choices (organic, seasonal etc). I obviously ignore their recommendation to add lots of butter to my orange carrots to increase absorption of the lovely betacarotene!!
I’m just hedging my bets so a limited diet doesn’t come back to bite me. Foods are multi dimensional, they are not good OR bad, they are good AND bad. If you base food choice on just vA content you can run yourself into a whole lot of trouble imo. How much trouble would depend on genetics, microbiome, previous diet etc etc. Choline is a perfect example. Some people with PEMT mutations can’t make enough choline and utterly rely on it from the diet. Eggs are a really good source of choline and cutting them out could run SOME people into trouble. I’ve gathered numerous examples like this so as I say nowadays I’m hedging my bets. However, I will never go back to a high vA intake!
@jaj " think once we get obsessional about small amounts of vA in our food we are on the road to stress, a very limited diet and down the line possible unintended consequences. "
Exactly.. Btw I think that this stress around healthy eating can do even more damage than just eating whatever and be stress free at least in terms of diet... Detoxing the body from decades of eating high vit A foods and taking supplements etc. is long journey and if we will stress about every iu of vit A in our diet it can kill you faster than if you just continue eating whatever.. Now I think that at least first year it is a good idea to keep diet very low in vit A and most people even enjoy diet of meats and starches. I did for sure.. But after 3 years of this diet when my average intake of vit A is under 1000iu from all sources. Will I worry about some carotenes in beans? Or if I had some broccoli in my meal? NO... I will just make sure that I don't start eating vit A bombs again and keep my intake low. Like no more than 30% of RDA I we will detox slowly but surely all the vit A the body doesn't want.. In 5 years or 10 years. It doesn't matter.. This should be diet change forever anyway.. I would never eat liver, a lot of eggs, full fat dairy, carrots, squash, sweet potatoes or take any vit A supplements.. Now I know that they are far from optimal foods for me..
@jaj, this is well said, Jenny and my sentiment exactly. Thank you for articulating it so well.
After a long period of strict and limited low VA diet, I have included more foods and totally relaxed about a bit of VA in my foods- and it feels good to do so. I will probably never again eat sweet potatoes, carrots and liver - but I decoded to stop chasing the minute amount of VA in other foods that are highly nutritious.
100% agree with you both
Jiri, I also think that the stress around obsessive eating is a huge issue. Stress slows detox. Finding a reduced stress lifestyle is really key. Having to worry about food all the time, being unable to join in social events, unable to eat out without stress are all issues making people sicker not better. Moderation. And relax…
As you both say this is a permanent lifestyle change. I will never overdo vA in my diet. I know my capacity for dealing with it is not great. Golden knowledge.
I'm totally onboard with the stress thing.
However, "hedging your bets" by eating a diversity of foods is exactly what the RDAs and "eat the rainbow" is about. What you've done is taken your knowledge about Vitamin A and set limitations on the broader rainbow based on that knowledge. Your selecting for a subset of available foods is the same process by which virtually every other modern diet has come into existence...you're weighing the so-called "good" against the "bad" based on what you think is valid information. Your own decision-making algorithm just happens to prioritize Vitamin A content and whatever else you believe is most necessary for health while downplaying or outright ignoring all the other potential problems with the foods you include.
Your algorithm continues to ignore (1) the fact that most modern dietary science has virtually zero predictive power, which is the ultimate measure of scientific truth, (2) the [lack of] availability of most of your chosen foods prior to agriculture, (3) the fact that most of our genetic evolution took place prior to agriculture and therefore our ideal environment is what preceded agriculture, (4) the fact that most or all of the genetic SNPs with identifiable impacts affect the tolerance to eating plant foods, not animal foods, and these SNPs would most likely not matter if people ate a species appropriate diet (i.e. mostly meat), (5) empirical evidence contrasting the health of people on a carnivore diet with those who eat plant foods, and (6) virtually everything we know about anatomy and physiology of humans.
As a tiny example, you don't need to eat eggs (which people would rarely have gotten their hands on before agriculture) in order to get enough choline...there's plenty of choline in meat if you just eat meat instead of eating beans or whatever other plants you're putting on a pedestal.
Who cares what a nutrient database says when you have examples like Shawn Baker that clearly refute the existing nutritional paradigm. It doesn't matter how many years of research went into building that paradigm...all it takes is a handful of examples to prove it wrong, and we have more than enough of those examples from the carnivore community now. This is how science works...a hypothesis lives only as long as there is not proof to the contrary. Well, we now have plenty of proof that you don't need to consume plants, and considering everything we know about plant toxins and disease, if you don't need to consume plants, why are you still putting their toxins into your body? And yes, they ALL contain some level of xenobiotic compounds that our bodies have to deal with that could be considered toxins.
I suggest that, aside from simply following mainstream dietary guidance and what the masses are doing, the main reasons people persist in eating plants is because they're used to it and that comforts them, they all contain carbs that are addict-forming, and they mistakenly think that the uncomfortable symptoms encountered during the healing process that takes place after removing plants from the diet is a sign that their body needs plants, which it sure as hell 100% irrefutably DOES NOT.
If you can ever wrap your head around that final point while also recognizing that nutrients from animals are absolutely essential, then everything else falls into place quite nicely with logical consistency.
If I ate beans I would stick to only white beans, and maybe black ones. I disagree with the other posts in this thread. Most non-white plant foods have plenty of carotenoids in them, the only other prevalent food pigment is anthocyanins which I think is safe, which is in things like strawberries and red onions.
Food databases are not very reliable, especially if it says zero it means they have not made a serious analysis of the food. No unrefined plant food has zero carotenoids, even things like rice have it, although it has extremely low leves, less than 1 iu so it's not a problem.
@jaj, I agree. I just was very frustrated that I had other choices (say pinto beans) but I cannot evaluate any choice without a proper tool that will provide accurate information.
I actually like the 80/20 with onions (so choosing some VA there), rice and beans. I enjoy both the ease and the taste.
@jiri, I agree with your statement: “Now I think that at least first year it is a good idea to keep diet very low in vit A”
I am now ending my second week on April 12 so I am trying to keep it low for at least 2-3mo.
@beata-2, thank you for chiming in. I saw you on the original post and wondered about your thoughts.
I have a long-standing and troublesome health history- MS and EDS-physical type (painful collagen disorder). So I am motivated to start releasing VA in a strong way up front.
@wavygravygadzooks, thank you for your comments. I have doubled my meat intake since hearing from you (other posts) and now I plan to reduce my overall bean intake- not due to VA but because I think it was not in balance.
I know you are an ardent supporter of a moderated carnivore diet. As you say plants have changed. I agree. Then so has the food source for animals. We are what we eat.
@salt, What type of white bean do you enjoy? Would you consider pinto a white bean? I do have Navy beans too.
Thank you to everyone!
When I ate beans I stuck to navy beans and butter beans, black beans should be very low in VA too but pinto beans have more carotenoids.