Red beans, also known as adzuki beans and adzuki beans, are officially called adzuki beans in Shen Nong's Classic of Materia Medica and Compendium of Materia Medica, and are a kind of food with the same origin of medicine and food. Red beans are sweet, flat and non-toxic. In traditional medicine, it is mainly used for promoting blood circulation (such as treating edema), invigorating qi (such as removing beriberi) and strengthening the spleen. That is, it has the effects of invigorating spleen, promoting diuresis, detoxifying and reducing swelling. Therefore, Shen Nong's Herbal Classic in Han Dynasty expounded its function: "Red bean can dredge the small intestine, facilitate urination, reduce swelling and expel pus, clear away heat and toxic materials, treat dysentery and beriberi, quench thirst and hangover, and promote lactation and fertility." "So in Sun Simiao's" For Emergency Use ",there will be a medicated diet made of red beans and carp to improve edema beriberi caused by pregnant women in the third trimester. It is precisely because carp can nourish and diuresis, while red beans can diuresis, clear away heat and detoxify. In traditional Chinese medicine, red beans can improve edema caused by kidney, heart and beriberi, which is mainly due to the role of saponin compounds contained in them. In addition to diuresis and constipation prevention, they also have detoxification and vomiting effects. The content of saponins in the seed coat of red beans is particularly high, so don't peel red beans when cooking. According to modern nutritional analysis, red beans are rich in vitamin b 1, which can not only prevent fatigue substances from depositing in muscles, prevent beriberi, but also make sugar easier to decompose and burn. So red beans also have the effect of preventing obesity. "Dietetic Materia Medica" says: "Eat thin people for a long time. The enclosed red bean carp soup is a famous slimming dish. Red bean is a very suitable food for women, because it is rich in iron and has a good blood-enriching function. Whether it is aimed at improving postpartum hypogalactia's condition of pregnant women or relieving the discomfort symptoms of ordinary women during menstruation, drinking a bowl of hot red bean soup often can play a role in regulating menstruation and promoting lactation. However, it must be noted that it is best not to mix it with sweets such as glutinous rice balls and rice balls, because the heat will be too high, but you can add a little brown sugar, which will have a warming effect.

In modern nutritional analysis, red beans have always been considered as a staple food with high nutritional content. However, in the process of human digestion, the bean fiber of red beans is easy to produce gas in the intestine, so people with weak intestines and stomach often have flatulence and other discomfort after eating red beans. In fact, when people eat red beans, they are used to adding some sugar to improve the taste. But from the perspective of Chinese medicine, they think that "being willing makes people full". Therefore, people with spleen and stomach deficiency and cold are more likely to feel full if they eat too many sweets. Therefore, adding a little salt when cooking red beans will have the effect of "softening and hardening" and help to eliminate flatulence.

In addition, when some people cook red beans, in order to remove the astringency, they will scald them once before cooking, but the water for scalding red beans contains dissolved saponin compounds, so don't pour them out, and then cook them with red beans. Red beans are often cooked with cereals such as oat or barley. Because protein contained in red beans is an incomplete amino acid, it must be eaten with cereals, which is more helpful to health.