Food Protection Trends - January/February 2022 - 24

Figure 5. Chickpea plants.
Figure 6. Harvesting pulses.
Photo courtesy of USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council.
Photo courtesy of USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council.
Figure 7. On-farm pulse storage.
Figure 8. Country pulse elevator.
Photo courtesy of USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council.
Photo courtesy of USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council.
sweet pea (Lathyrus odoratus). Although edible, sweet
peas have seeds that contain toxic lectin compounds
that must be heat inactivated. The pods of dry field
peas are ca. 75 mm long and contain four to nine
green, yellow, or cream-colored seeds. Once planted,
peas require 100 days to mature dry seed. Dry peas
are harvested from pods that are inedible in contrast
to succulent peas. Dry peas and succulent peas are not
grown together for commercial purposes and are not
comingled during further processing. Succulent pea
seeds become wrinkled when dry, but dry field peas
seeds have a smooth appearance.
2) Lentils (Lens culinaris) are a feathery-looking legume
with lens-shaped seeds that grow two per pod. The seeds
range from red to yellow to green to brown, and even
black. There are both large (Chilean type) and small
(Persian) seed varieties, ranging from 2 to 9 mm in
diameter. Lentils are a rich source of dietary fiber.
3) The chickpea, another grain legume, is a self-pollinated
pulse crop (Fig. 5) that gets its name from the semblance
of the seed to a baby chicken head. The two main
chickpea varieties (both Cicer arietinum) are Desi and the
Kabuli. Desi has smaller, more angular seeds than Kabuli,
with thick coats that vary from light tan to solid black.
Kabuli, known as garbanzo beans in the United States,
24
Food Protection Trends January/February
have 7- to 10-mm-diameter seeds, with coats ranging
from white to tan. The seeds reach maturity in 120 days,
when seeds begin to change color inside the upper-most
pods and when the leaves turn yellow or brown. The
lowest pod height is typically 107 cm (4 in.) above the
ground (10). The worldwide mean annual production
of chickpeas from 2013 to 2017 was recorded at 11.67
million tons (11).
These three pulse types are allowed to mature and dry in
the field before harvest. Drying pulses in the pod ensures the
pod separates from seeds during combining (harvesting)
operations (Fig. 6), and this enables crop storage with no
mechanical drying.
After harvest, chickpeas, lentils, and field peas are stored in
elevators or silos at the grower farm (Fig. 7) or at a " country " located
facility (Fig. 8). They are then shipped to a cleaning
facility (Fig. 9), where seeds are run through equipment to
remove field debris, foreign materials, extraneous vegetable
materials, and cosmetic defects. Industry vernacular for this
cleaning process is " milling " or " processing, " although it does
not involve any heating, cooking, washing, or grinding steps.
This cleaning process also typically creates no additional risks
for introducing biological hazards into the seeds due to its dry
nature, the regular cleaning and sanitation of these facilities,
and further thermal processing by end users. On completion of
Food Protection Trends - January/February 2022

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