Hey all,
Lately I've been working on going vegan, which has meant that I've been using beans as an ingredient a lot more in my cooking. I use just about any beans for hummus, I've made roasted chickpeas with my air fryer and want to start making falafel, I want to start adding black beans to my tacos, I use mung beans for omelettes, you get the drift.
Anyway, I was recently thinking about the packaging the beans come in. This came to mind since I've been re-evaluating the products I purchase and how to put my dollar where my heart is, and in looking at where my canned beans come from, I started thinking about the packaging of the dried beans I have.
While not all the dried beans I have include info about the ability to recycle the packaging, Walmart for all their flaws made things easy with some dried beans I got in the past and has the "Not yet recyclable" label from how2recycle.info, and I can guess that the other brands I have are in the same boat as they all appear to have the same packaging.
In comparison, I already know for certain that the cans for canned beans can be recycled, and the labels are just paper, meaning the same case for them. Now reading things from what I know it appears as if using canned beans is more environmentally suitable than dried, assuming both are sourced domestically, but I want to ask if there's anything I might be forgetting here that could also factor into things that I may not be aware of. On top of this, some recipes specifically call for dried beans, and I'd have trouble substituting them with canned product, namely with falafel and my vegan omelettes.
Should I make the switch? Any and all input is greatly appreciated.
Transporting heavy, wet beans in a can with a diesel truck to your store probably makes the dried beans a better choice.
Would you say this would likely still be the case if it was domestic? For reference if it helps I'm in Canada, and I can't say I know where exactly in the country the beans I buy are grown and canned. Could be in Ontario for all I know which is essentially across the country for me.
Yes. With dried beans most of the weight is beans. With canned beans most of the weight is water and metal.
You can ship way more dried beans for the same amount of fuel. Not to mention the energy required to make the cans and run the canning facility.