Beans, as well as such gassy goods as cabbage, soybeans, peas and onions, are naturally sweetened with a family of sugars called oligosaccharides. These sugars are big, clumsy molecules -- too big to slip into your body through the lining of the small intestine. Normally enzymes in the small intestine would rush in and snap these molecules apart like Legos. But due to a gross oversight, an anti-oligosaccharide enzyme is not standard equipment in a human being.

So these complex sugars pass unmolested through the small intestine and enter the large intestine still bearing valuable nutrients. Unabashed at digging into leftovers, the less reputable bacteria among the 200 strains in your large-intestine start to chow down. Their population grows as they divide into new generations to take advantage of the bounty. And as they gulp in the big sugars, they let out gas. In essence, your gut accumulates millions of wee bacterial farts.

But there's hope for those who love beans, but not the results. Mold is blessed with the bean enzyme, one alpha-galactosidase. So AkPharma, Inc., a New Jersey company, extracts the enzyme from a species known to its friends as Aspergillus niger, and sells it to the easily-embarrassed under the brand name Beano. Sprinkle a few drops of enzyme on your beans and enjoy. The enzyme will snap apart those big sugars into handy little sugars, like sucrose, glucose and fructose, your body can use. The stinky bugs in your colon will go hungry. The breath-holding social pauses will go away. The dog will go unmaligned.