Impact of pre-treatment (soaking or germination) on nutrient and anti-nutrient contents, cooking time and acceptability of cooked red dry bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) and chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) grown in Ethiopia

Pulses are processed in diverse ways prior to consumption. Soaking and germination are among the most common traditional, household-level food processing strategies. This study was carried out to determine the effects of soaking, germination, cooking and their combinations on the contents of selected nutrients and anti-nutrients of red dry bean and chickpea. In addition, the effects of pre-treatment on cooking time and the acceptability of dishes prepared from red dry bean and chickpea were determined. The nutrient compositions (zinc, iron and calcium) of most soaked-cooked and germinated-cooked red dry bean and chickpea samples were not significantly different than those of respective controls. However, soaking and germination pre-treatments significantly lowered the phytate and tannin contents of the red dry bean and chickpea samples, with a few exceptions, and overall, polyphenol contents were lower after soaking-cooking than after germination-cooking. Most scores for sensory attributes of bean-based and chickpea-based dishes prepared from soaked or germinated samples were not significantly different than those of the controls. For most red dry bean and chickpea samples, longer germination times yielded superior results in terms of reductions in cooking time, tannin content, and phytate:zinc and phytate:iron molar ratio.