Precooked chickpeas as backpacking food

Precooked chickpeas can make tasty, tender and nutritious backpacking food. They can be eaten as healthy snacks or as part of evening meals, with or without further cooking.

Background and introduction to the precooked chickpea recipe

Pulses for good nutrition. Dried pulses such as Pinto beans and Chickpeas make excellent backpacking meals with dense and balanced nutrients.

Precooked pulses make fast and efficient trail meals. Most dry pulses take a considerable time to rehydrate and cook, making them unsuitable for backpacking trail meals where time and cooking fuel are often scarce. There are endless discussions on backpacking forums about cooking uncooked beans efficiently. However, it is hard to argue against using precooked, then dried beans to avoid the skill or time involved while on the trail.

Additionally, for extended walks and ski trips, I ensure that many of my backpacking meals can be eaten without cooking if conditions are too difficult or there is not enough time to cook food. It means that under difficult weather conditions, the trekker can continue to resist hypothermia and the food can be browsed, on the move, to fuel the body.

Precooked pulses can fit this survival eating requirement, and their palatability can be enhanced with a wide range of other nutritious and tasty dry additives that need no further cooking. With the best pre-cooking processes, they can attain a pleasant and easily eaten texture, either as is or after brief soaking and optional camp cooking. They become a trail snack that can be eaten at any time, anywhere. Here is a little video of my goats appreciating my premium curry and milk powder-coated Chickpeas. The crunching is much softer than that in the latter video where, lets say, less than premium spicy Chickpeas are being eaten.

Lastly, a meal that is based on pre-cooked pulses can be simply heated to a ‘nice eating temperature’ at camp as there is no further cooking required.

Pinto beans, the US through hikers’ mainstay. In the US, bulk precooked and dried Pinto beans are very popular as trail food. They are sometimes referred to as ‘refried beans’. However, this latter name is possibly misleading as the refried term refers to the traditional frying process that can follow the initial cooking by boiling (usually after soaking in water). The process is a common one used for preparing bean fillings for burritos and there is no dehydration of the cooked beans implied by this name.

In the US, they can purchase a big drum of pre-cooked and dried Pinto beans. They take what they need for a section and forward the drum to the next trailhead. Various flavours and additives can vary an otherwise bland diet. In Australia, we don’t have such a supply of dried cooked Pinto beans and most of our extended trails don’t have a postal service at trailheads to deliver supplies to.

Because bulk-cooked and dried Pinto beans are not easily available in Australia, this post is about using DIY pre-cooked Chickpeas instead for my trail food.

Alternative pre-cooked and dried pulses that could substitute for Pinto beans. In this table, the nutritional properties of many beans are listed for: Brown beans, Cranberry beans, Red kidney beans, Green and brown lentils, Red/pink lentils, Chickpeas/ peas, Cowpeas/ Black-eyed peas, Broad beans, Lima beans, White beans and Fava beans (or Faba beans).

Unfortunately, the list does not include Pinto beans that I would like to use for comparison with my Chickpea recipes. Nevertheless, there are only small differences in the major nutrients across all these beans, and they should be nutritionally equivalent.

In the table below, I have calculated the average of each nutrient concentration for the above-listed beans. The energy, protein, carbohydrate and fibre contents make them all wonderful trail foods for an active body and healthy gut while trekking. Perhaps the fat is a little low? However, Chickpeas (the core ingredient of my recipes) have significantly higher fat content than the other listed pulses.

Fortunately, my recipes often include full-cream milk powder, dehydrated cheese and olive oil, which can build up the fat content to any required level. In the table, for comparison, I have included individual values for Chickpeas (that are the core of my recipe) and Brown beans (assumed to be similar to Pinto beans, for comparison).

Table 1. The similarity of the nutritional value of many pulses, Chickpeas and Brown beans

Nutritional Value (/100 g raw)*	All bean average	Chickpeas/ peas	Brown beans
Energy (kcal)	316.9	341.0	313.0
Protein (g)	23.3	21.3	22.0
Total fat (g)	1.5	5.4	1.5
Carbohydrates (starch) (g)	42.2	43.8	40.0
Fibre (g)	15.7	11	16.0
Calcium (mg)	109.2	160	135.0
Iron (mg)	7.9	5.5	5.0
Magnesium (mg)	159.5	130	131.0
Phosphorus (mg)	385.9	310	420.0
Potassium (mg)	804.0	1 000	1 040
Riboflavin (mg)	0.2	0.24	0.2
Thiamine (mg)	0.5	0.39	0.6
Zinc (mg)	3.1	3	2.0
Niacin (B3) (mg)	1.8	1.9	2.2
Folate (μg)	370.4	180	394.0

Note*: The nutrient compositions shown are for the raw pulses. If you have cooked pulses, you would know that they leach out some interesting compounds. Depending upon the subsequent drying or dehydration process used, some of these leached nutrients may not be retained in the cooked and dried pulses that are used for the backpacking meal. As an example, the extract from Chickpea boiling can be used as a substitute for egg-white. Nevertheless, the values in the raw pulses should be indicative of their relative nutritional value. Lastly, when the pre-cooking is done by roasting, such losses should be negligible.

Damn beans, peas and pulses-definitions and naming

The various names for pulses and the cooking and drying processes are a bit confusing. For example, Faber beans can also be called Faver beans. Even Chickpeas can be called garbanzo beans and and many other names. No doubt some beans are called peas. Luckily, we have the word pulse that hopefully encompasses them all.

Precooked Chickpeas make fast and efficient Aussie trail meals

Why focus on Chickpeas? For many of my home meals, I include a range of pulses. They range from lentils that cook quickly and easily break down to a puree to Brown beans that require more cooking time, and while, within a batch, many beans retain their shape, while some others disintegrate. This variable cooking is not a problem in a home-cooked casserole, but it is not good when preparing pulses for dehydrated trail food.

Here is a little video of my favourite Goat, Sweetpea, demonstrating the rather excessive crunchyness of my spicy Chickpeas that I made without bringing my best culinary skills to the task. Note the sound in this video compared with the sound of Sweetpea rapidly eating my premium soft curry chickpeas in this little video. “Better her teeth than mine!”

Pre-cooked Chickpea culinary processes

Some simple culinary processes that can be used to prepare bulk pre-cooked Chickpeas are discussed and are summarised in Table 2, below.

Chickpea preliminary soaking. Pre-soaking is a simple process that may improve the properties of pre-cooked Chickpeas. During soaking, the peas swell to twice their original size and weight. I speculate that this simple transition eventually improves the tenderness when making dry trail snacks from Chickpeas. It also makes the peas rehydrate more quickly when required to make evening trail meals, with or without further cooking.

Bitter taste. To my taste, natural dry Chickpeas have a bitter flavour, which is similar to that of uncooked green peas. Such bitterness may be associated with phytonutrients that can be protective against cancers or in rare cases may be toxic. This flavour is there after soaking and it diminishes to varying degrees with the subsequent cooking processes used. “So my preferred processing may diminish the phytonutrients that could reduce cancers, but on the other hand, the peas probably will not poison me and they taste much better.”

Chickpea cooking by boiling. Cooking Chickpeas by boiling is simple and quick if done in a pressure cooker. Such cooking makes the nutrients more available for our Sapien digestive system. “It also reduces farting!” It removes the bitter taste and contributes to a pleasant, soft crunchy texture that is easy to eat.

Chickpea roasting. Initially, I thought that Chickpeas can be cooked, without boiling, by roasting or even double roasting when I read the label on commercial single and double roated Chickpeas. The roasting imparts a pleasant nutty flavour. It also may diminish or mask the bitter taste a little. However, roasting alone does not eliminate the bitter taste and seems to makes the peas develop a delightfully fine texture upon crushing.

More recently, I have looked at many other roasted Chicpea recipes and they often start with canned Chickpeas or with boiling of the Chickpeas. So my assumption about cooking Chickpeas by roasting only may be wrong. Consequently, my experimentation will combine both boiling and roasting to see if this makes a premium trail-worthy precooked Chickpea. “Roasting only may be part of another post.”

Canned Chickpeas. Canned Chickpeas make a convenient starting point for a dehydrated pulse-based trail meal. The commercial canning process leaves the peas uniformly soft and porous without much pea breakup. They are ready for rapid dehydration, but a ~400g of canned peas will yield only ~100g of pea dry matter. “So, in this form, we are paying for a lot of water.” Consequently, my interest was to start with bulk natural Chickpeas that are considerably cheaper and more environmentally friendly when DIY prepared from an bulk bag of dry Chickpeas.

Preventing hardness in dehydrated and precooked Chickpeas. To better understand my previous inconsistent preparation of pre-cooked pulses, it was time to do some systematic cooking. I had a hunch that, premium soaking of dry Chickpeas may produce precooked Chickpeas that are consistently softer, less bitter and quicker to absorb water on the trail whether roasted or not.

Experimental preparation of precooked Chickpeas in the kitchen

I soaked 800g of natural chickpeas in water for about 8h, and they swelled to twice their original size and doubled their weight. The texture and taste were similar to fresh, mature green peas with that distinctive bitterness. I cooked them in a pressure cooker for 20 minutes starting with boiling water that thoroughly flooded the peas . The cooking interval was measured between the time when full pressure was reached and the time when the heat source was removed. So the total cooking time was probably about 30 minutes.

After draining the excess liquid off, I split the batch into two equal portions. One lot was spread as a single layer on Teflon dehydrator sheets and was immediately put into my dehydrator, which was set to 75C for quick drying. At this stage, there was very little bitterness that I could taste.

The other portion was similarly spread on metal oven trays and roasted in a fan-forced oven set at 180 °c. As the peas dried, they turned a golden colour and I removed them from the oven. After tasting a couple of peas, I could tell there was a little residual moisture in them because they were crunchy on the outside and softer in the centre. So I spread them on dehydrator mesh trays to dry along with the other peas.

Test results

Table 2. Effect of various simple culinary processes on dehyrated Chickpea properties

	Chickpea properties after processing according to the various culinary processes
	Bitterness	Crush texture	Crushed particles	Additional flavour	Re-hydration speed
Combined experimental  processes
S-BP-D	absent	soft	granular	none	fast
S-BP-R-D	absent	soft	granular	nutty	fast
RC1	strong	very soft	very fine	nutty	slower
RC2	medium	very soft	very fine	nutty	slower
Preparation process key; Soaking (S), Boiling pressure cooker 20min (BP), Roasting in domestic oven (RD), Domestic dehydration (D), Single roasting commercial (RC1), and Double roasting commercial (RC2)

Turning precooked Chickpeas into tasty and appetising trail nibbles and meals

Most of us like to eat wicked food as trail nibbles when expending a lot of energy during our trekking adventures. Under such circumstances, such ‘bad food’ probably does the least harm to our health and blood glucose levels. However, having healthier ‘real food’ in our diet will improve our nutrition and provide us with complex carbohydrate and fibre for sustained energy, better gut health and healthy regular poo (stools or poop for those over in the big Trump ditch).

Well with all this talk of good nutrition and it end effects and the above named person, I feel a poo ode coming on.

Our Chickpea trail meal was a tasty stew,
Satiety, and farting fibre content? there was a clue,
Dinner went down quite well,
There, I did not mention a malodorous smell,
Before hitting the trail, we all had good morning poo.

Tender, nutritious, palatable and bland precooked Chipeas can make endlessly tasty and varied backpacking food. Chickpea trail nibbles and some ‘one-pot’ evening trail meals will be used as examples of the endless variety of meals that can be made with them. They may be a great Australian alternative to America’s bulk precooked Pinto beans.

Curry-precooked Chickpea trail nibbles.

To make the trail nibbles, I coat the dehydrated and precooked Chickpeas with a little olive oil, and over that, I add a mix of full cream milk powder, a little raw sugar and curry powder (or other spices such as Moroccan spice mix). If the nibbles are to be stored for some time, I seal them in gas-tight sachets to limit oxidation of the fats. Otherwise, a plastic screw-cap jar with a short plastic spoon in it can be used for convenient trail nibbling. Replenishment sachets can be decanted into the same jar when required.

100g of precooked and dried Chickpeas

1 dessert spoon of olive oil,

0.5 dessert spoon of raw sugar

2-4 dessert spoons of full cream milk powder

0.5 teaspoon of curry powder or Moroccan spice mixor coarse ground pepper or lemon garlic spice blend (the options are endless).

Chickpea and cheesy sauce with dehydrated mixed veggies. I use a sachet of DIY dehydrated cheesy sauce and add it to the precooked Chickpeas and dried vegetables that have commenced rehydration at lunchtime. After simmering the peas and vegetables, the cheese sauce mix is added. My vegetables are par-boiled before dehydration, so that they require minimal cooking at camp.

Kangastew and precooked Chickpea and vegetables. This meal is made as above, but a DIY dehydrated Kangastew Bolognese sauce is added. (Made with ground kangaroo mince that is a healthy red meat that is environmentally sustainable, and comes from humane and necessary kangaroo culling). My Kangastew already contains vegetables and some Chickpea to aid dehydration, pulverisation and rehydration, so adding extra vegetables is optional.

Discussion and conclusion about my precooked Chickpeas

Why did I not find this Chickpea preparation sooner? I have always been keen on using a pressure cooker to save time and energy while cooking domestic and backpacking food. I think with all my busy activities, I did not think that pre-soaking before cooking was important. “Thorough soaking takes some time to do it well, but luckily this time can be spent doing something else that is just as important”.

Oven roasting temperature? I used an oven temperature of 180 °c for roasting, and about 5% of the peas on one side of the oven tray became significantly darker than the rest. But they still tasted very good. Consequently, I would try using 160 °c (for longer) next batch and rotate the tray during the roasting. Roasting after dehydration might be another way to improve the roasting and that may be part of another post.

When I reviewed the roasted Chickpea recipes of others, they often used a little oil during the roasting. I resisted using oil this way, as it probably will contribute oil that may oxidize during storage. If the Chick peas are to be used quite quickly the use of such oil probably would be suitable and may enhance the roasting process and flavour. (Another subject for another post.)

Kitchen equipment for preparing precooked Chickpeas. All the simple steps of the process can be done in a modest kitchen. Simple boiling at atmospheric pressure, for a longer time, could substitute for pressure cooking. If a dehydrator was not available, the dehydration could be done in the oven at say 105 °c. For food safety, the initial drying/dehydration should be done immediately and quickly to prevent spoilage by bacteria and yeasts.

The outside of the Chickpeas can become dry quite quickly, while the inside may still be moist. So, to dry the peas completely without using excessive electricity, I stop the drying process for several hours before starting it again. This allows the moisture to migrate outwards to where it can be more easily evaporated in the subsequent drying phase.

Precooked pulse costs. Bulk Chickpeas can cost as little as $3-4/kg, while I noticed that the double-roasted Chickpeas were nearly $12/kg. So, to a hard-core trekker on a budget, the DIY precooked Chickpeas could make a good deal if you have the time and patience to prepare them in bulk quantities,

The wrap-up. Chickpeas can be precooked and dehydrated to be tender and ready to eat on the trail or to rehydrate quickly to make a meal at camp. Simple soaking and then boiling, followed by roasting and then final drying, produces very tender, still crunchy, and nutty-tasting peas. The roasting for the nutty flavour can be omitted, and the end product is just as tender. Regardless, the resulting peas have no residual bitter taste, as with the commercially single or double-roasted Chickpeas and should be decidedly cheaper.

I feel another post coming on. It may be about making Chickpeas and all other pulses more suitable for making fast meals on the trail.

Tim