The popular dinner food that's poisonous if eaten uncooked

While cooking we might often nibble on ingredients without thinking, it won't hurt if you're guilty of trying a bit of raw mushroom out of before tossing them in the pan.

But it's vital to know that not all foods are okay to try uncooked. One particular legume contains toxins and can be harmful if ingested raw.

Red kidney beans are a common dinner item, but while making your chilli con carne you might want to steer away from trying it if they haven't been soaked and boiled.

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The red coloured beans are usually found canned in supermarkets ready to eat. However, some people choose to buy them completely raw before they have softened.

According to Good Food, they are poisonous if not boiled "furiously" for 20 minutes during initial cooking. In fact, the Food Network says even ingesting four to five raw red kidney beans is enough to have an impact on your health.

To prepare red kidney beans you should soak them overnight in water. It's important to then throw away the water as it will have absorbed gut-upsetting ingredients from the beans. They must then be cooked in separate salted water.

In the UK, between July 1976 and February 1989, there were 50 incidents of suspected red kidney bean poisoning. Experts researched the cases and found that in nine of these incidents, nausea, vomiting and diarrhoea developed within a few hours of ingestion.

This was confirmed by the detection of haemagglutinin in the beans, according to a study published in the National Library of Medicine. The study summarised: "The haemagglutinin (lectin), which occurs naturally in the red kidney bean, is inactivated by thorough cooking of well soaked beans.

"In many of the outbreaks reported the implicated beans were consumed raw or following an inadequate heat process."