Standardization of process for development of instant chickpea using Desi and Kabuli variety

Abstract

Chickpea is considered among the most important leguminous crops in the world but is not a regular meal pulse due to their long cooking time and lengthy preparatory procedure. This gives rise to the need of converting raw chickpea into convenient food. For the preparation of instant chickpea from Desi and Kabuli variety, Central Composite Rotatable Design (CCRD) under Response Surface Methodology (RSM) was employed which consisted of four variables i.e. sodium chloride (NaCl), sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3), ammonium carbonate (NH4)2CO3 and temperature for soaking treatments. This design was used to develop models for the soaking time, change in colour, split %, alkalinity and cooking time for prepared instant chickpea samples. High-temperature hydration (60 °C) required lesser time to achieve the maximum hydration, whereas low-temperature hydration (30 °C) enhanced the hydration time and reduced the cooking time of instant chickpea significantly (P≤ 0.01) but this condition was inverse for the splitting/butterfly defects. Increasing the concentration of sodium bicarbonate and ammonium bicarbonate from 0.5 to 1.5 % during soaking treatments increased the splitting and alkalinity and produced undesirable colours in treated samples of chickpea. RSM optimized values concerning concentrations of different salts i.e. NaCl, NaHCO3, and (NH4)2CO3 in soaking solution were 0.59, 0.85 % and 0.82 %, respectively at 49.81 °C temperature for Desi instant chickpea having 11 minutes of cooking time whereas corresponding values for Kabuli chickpea were 1.07 % NaCl, 0.79 % NaHCO3, and 0.70 % (NH4)2CO3 at 46.53 °C temperature with 13 min cooking time. Keywords: Central Composite Rotatable Design, Chickpea, Soaking, Cooking time, Instant