15

A recipe calls for a can (15oz) of cooked beans. How many cups or oz's is that to dry beans? Is this conversion even possible to estimate given that beans differ in amount of water absorption?

Elias Zamaria
  • 176
  • 1
  • 5
chrisjlee
  • 2,999
  • 20
  • 52
  • 63
  • http://cooking.stackexchange.com/questions/12861/how-do-i-convert-a-weight-of-dried-chick-peas-to-volume-of-cooked, maybe even a duplicate. – rumtscho Jan 05 '12 at 00:45
  • 1
    not an exact duplicate, so I'm going to answer it. Also the previous answer wasn't very helpful. – FuzzyChef Jan 05 '12 at 06:27

1 Answers1

20

According to the Kitchen Companion, a terrific general handbook which I recommend, 1 lb (about 2 cups) of dried beans is roughly 6 to 7 cups cooked beans, and one 15oz can of cooked beans is roughly 1.75 cups drained, making it equivalent to 1/4 to 1/3 lbs ( or 1/2 to 3/4 cup) dried.

Per my personal experience, dried beans increase in volume from 2.5X at the low end (red lentils, mung beans, etc.) to 5X at the high end (garbanzos). 3X or 3.5X is a good median value for this.

So what kind of beans are we talking about?

FuzzyChef
  • 58,085
  • 18
  • 142
  • 218
  • Thanks! That's really helpful. I'll check out the kitchen companion too! – chrisjlee Jan 05 '12 at 19:42
  • Small white beans? Conversion would they be the average? –  Oct 26 '13 at 18:14
  • @GALEMCINTOSH I think so, roughly - they're certainly bigger than lentils but smaller than garbanzo or kidney beans. If they're pretty small (like black beans or smaller) I'd probably guess 3x. – Cascabel Oct 26 '13 at 20:08