The chickpea or chick pea (''Cicer arietinum'') is an annual

legume Legumes are plants in the pea family Fabaceae (or Leguminosae), or the fruit or seeds of such plants. When used as a dry grain for human consumption, the seeds are also called pulses. Legumes are grown agriculturally, primarily for human consum ...

of the

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

Fabaceae Fabaceae () or Leguminosae,International Code of Nomen ...

, subfamily

Faboideae The Faboideae are a subfamily of the flowering plant family Fabaceae or Leguminosae. An acceptable alternative name for the subfamily is Papilionoideae, or Papilionaceae when this group of plants is treated as a family. This subfamily is widely ...

, cultivated for its edible seeds. Its different types are variously known as gram," Bengal gram, garbanzo, garbanzo bean, or Egyptian pea. It is one of the earliest cultivated legumes, the oldest archaeological evidence of which was found in

Syria Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to Syria–Turkey border, the north, Iraq to Iraq–Syria border, t ...

. Chickpeas are high in

protein Proteins are large biomolecules and macromolecules that comprise one or more long chains of amino acid residue (biochemistry), residues. Proteins perform a vast array of functions within organisms, including Enzyme catalysis, catalysing metab ...

. The chickpea is a key ingredient in

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern ...

and

Middle Eastern cuisine Middle Eastern cuisine includes a number of cuisines from the Middle East. Common ingredients include olives and olive oil, pitas, honey, sesame seeds, dates, sumac, chickpeas, mint, rice and parsley, and popular dishes include '' kebabs'', ...

s, used in hummus, and, when soaked and coarsely ground with herbs and spices, then made into patties and fried,

falafel Falafel (; , ) is a deep-fried ball or patty-shaped fritter of Egyptian origin that features in Middle Eastern cuisine, particularly Levantine cuisines. It is made from ground fava beans, chickpeas, or both, and mixed with herbs and spic ...

. As an important part of

Indian cuisine Indian cuisine consists of a variety of regional and traditional cuisines native to the Indian subcontinent. Given the diversity in soil, climate, culture, ethnic groups, and occupations, these cuisines vary substantially and use locally av ...

, it is used in salads, soups, stews, and curries. In 2023, India accounted for 75% of global chickpea production.

Etymology

Chickpeas have been cultivated for at least ten thousand years. Cultivation spread from the

Fertile Crescent The Fertile Crescent () is a crescent-shaped region in the Middle East, spanning modern-day Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, and Syria, together with northern Kuwait, south-eastern Turkey, and western Iran. Some authors also include ...

eastward toward

South Asia South Asia is the southern Subregion#Asia, subregion of Asia that is defined in both geographical and Ethnicity, ethnic-Culture, cultural terms. South Asia, with a population of 2.04 billion, contains a quarter (25%) of the world's populatio ...

and into Europe through the

Balkans The Balkans ( , ), corresponding partially with the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throug ...

Historical linguistics Historical linguistics, also known as diachronic linguistics, is the scientific study of how languages change over time. It seeks to understand the nature and causes of linguistic change and to trace the evolution of languages. Historical li ...

have found ancestral words relating to chickpeas in the prehistoric Proto-Indo-European language family that evolved into the

Indo-European languages The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the northern Indian subcontinent, most of Europe, and the Iranian plateau with additional native branches found in regions such as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, parts of Central Asia (e. ...

. The

Proto-Indo-European root The roots of the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language (PIE) are basic parts of words to carry a lexical meaning, so-called morphemes. PIE roots usually have verbal meaning like "to eat" or "to run". Roots never occurred alone in the langu ...

s and that denoted both and appeared in the

Pontic–Caspian steppe The Pontic–Caspian Steppe is a steppe extending across Eastern Europe to Central Asia, formed by the Caspian and Pontic steppes. It stretches from the northern shores of the Black Sea (the ''Pontus Euxinus'' of antiquity) to the northern a ...

of Eastern Europe between 4,500 and 2,500 BCE. As speakers of the language became isolated from each other through the

Indo-European migrations The Indo-European migrations are hypothesized migrations of Proto-Indo-Europeans, peoples who spoke Proto-Indo-European language, Proto-Indo-European (PIE) and the derived Indo-European languages, which took place from around 4000 to 1000 BCE, ...

, the regional dialects diverged due to contact with other languages and dialects, and transformed into the known ancient Indo-European languages. The Old Prussian word , appearing between 1 and 100 CE, retained the meaning of the word, but in most cases, the word came to be used to denote chickpeas. In Old Macedonian, the word appeared between 1000 and 400 BCE, and may have evolved from the

Proto-Hellenic The Proto-Greek language (also known as Proto-Hellenic) is the Indo-European language which was the last common ancestor of all varieties of Greek, including Mycenaean Greek, the subsequent ancient Greek dialects (i.e., Attic, Ionic, Aeol ...

word . In

Ancient Rome In modern historiography, ancient Rome is the Roman people, Roman civilisation from the founding of Rome, founding of the Italian city of Rome in the 8th century BC to the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, collapse of the Western Roman Em ...

, the

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

word for chickpeas appeared around 700 BCE, and is probably derived from the word used by the Pelasgians that inhabited north Greece before Greek-speaking tribes took over. The Old Armenian word for chickpeas appeared before 400 CE. Over time, linkages between languages led to other descendant words, including the Albanian word , the Swedish word , the Slovak word , the Estonian word , the

Basque Basque may refer to: * Basques, an ethnic group of Spain and France * Basque language, their language Places * Basque Country (greater region), the homeland of the Basque people with parts in both Spain and France * Basque Country (autonomous co ...

word , and the Maltese word . The Latin word evolved into words for chickpeas in nearly all extinct and living

Romance languages The Romance languages, also known as the Latin or Neo-Latin languages, are the languages that are Language family, directly descended from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-E ...

, including the Mozarabic word ; the Catalan words , , , and ; the Walloon words ; the

Old French Old French (, , ; ) was the language spoken in most of the northern half of France approximately between the late 8th Modern French terms , , and . These words were borrowed by many geographically neighboring languages, such as the French term becoming in French language">Modern French terms , , and . These words were borrowed by many geographically neighboring languages, such as the French term becoming in Old English. The word ''pease'', like the modern words for wheat and corn, was both singular and plural, but since it had an "s" sound at the end of it which became associated with the plural form of nouns, English speakers by the end of the 17th century were starting to refer to a single grain of pease as a ''pea''. Other important Proto-Indo-European roots relating to chickpeas are , , and , which were used to denote both the kernel of a

and a pea. This root evolved into the Greek word , mentioned in ''The Iliad">Greek language">Greek word , mentioned in '' Historia Plantarum'' by Theophrastus">The Iliad'' in around 800 BCE and in ''Historia Plantarum (Theophrastus)">Historia Plantarum'' by The Portuguese words and ; the Asturian word ; the Galician language">Galician word ; the French words , , and ; and the Spanish language">Spanish word are all related to the Greek term. In American English, the term ''garbanzo'' to refer to the chickpea appeared in writing as early as 1759, and the seed is also referred to as a garbanzo bean.

Taxonomy

Chickpea (''Cicer arietinum'') is a member of the genus '' Cicer'' and the

family,

Fabaceae Fabaceae () or Leguminosae,International Code of Nomen ...

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné,#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. was a Swedish biologist and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the modern system of naming o ...

described it in the first edition of ''

Species Plantarum ' (Latin for "The Species of Plants") is a book by Carl Linnaeus, originally published in 1753, which lists every species of plant known at the time, classified into genus, genera. It is the first work to consistently apply binomial nomenclature ...

'' in 1753, marking the first use of

binomial nomenclature In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin grammatical forms, altho ...

for the plant. Linnaeus classified the plant in the genus ''Cicer'', which was the Latin term for chickpeas, crediting

Joseph Pitton de Tournefort Joseph Pitton de Tournefort (5 June 165628 December 1708) was a French botanist, notable as the first to make a clear definition of the concept of genus for plants. Botanist Charles Plumier was his pupil and accompanied him on his voyages. Li ...

's 1694 publication which called it "Cicer arietinum". Tournefort himself repeated the names of the plant that had been used since antiquity. The specific epithet ''arietinum'' is based on the shape of the seed resembling the head of a ram. In Ancient Greece,

Theophrastus Theophrastus (; ; c. 371 – c. 287 BC) was an ancient Greek Philosophy, philosopher and Natural history, naturalist. A native of Eresos in Lesbos, he was Aristotle's close colleague and successor as head of the Lyceum (classical), Lyceum, the ...

described one of the varieties of chickpea called "rams" in '' Historia Plantarum''. The Roman writer on agriculture Lucius Junius Moderatus Columella wrote about chickpeas in the second book of ''De re rustica'', published in about 64 CE, and said that the chickpea was called ''arietillum''.

Pliny the Elder Gaius Plinius Secundus (AD 23/24 79), known in English as Pliny the Elder ( ), was a Roman Empire, Roman author, Natural history, naturalist, and naval and army commander of the early Roman Empire, and a friend of the Roman emperor, emperor Vesp ...

expanded further in ''

Naturalis Historia The ''Natural History'' () is a Latin work by Pliny the Elder. The largest single work to have survived from the Roman Empire to the modern day, the ''Natural History'' compiles information gleaned from other ancient authors. Despite the work' ...

'' that this name was due to the seed's resemblance to the head of a ram. ''Cicer arietinum'' is the

type species In International_Code_of_Zoological_Nomenclature, zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the spe ...

of the genus. The wild species '' C. reticulatum'' is interfertile with ''C. arietinum'' and is considered to be the progenitor of the cultivated species. ''Cicer echinospermum'' is also closely related and can be hybridized with both ''C. reticulatum'' and ''C. arietinum'', but generally produce

infertile In biology, infertility is the inability of a male and female organism to reproduce. It is usually not the natural state of a healthy organism that has reached sexual maturity, so children who have not undergone puberty, which is the body's sta ...

seeds.

History

The chickpea was originally domesticated along with

wheat Wheat is a group of wild and crop domestication, domesticated Poaceae, grasses of the genus ''Triticum'' (). They are Agriculture, cultivated for their cereal grains, which are staple foods around the world. Well-known Taxonomy of wheat, whe ...

barley Barley (), a member of the grass family, is a major cereal grain grown in temperate climates globally. It was one of the first cultivated grains; it was domesticated in the Fertile Crescent around 9000 BC, giving it nonshattering spikele ...

peas Pea (''pisum'' in Latin) is a pulse or fodder crop, but the word often refers to the seed or sometimes the pod of this flowering plant species. Peas are eaten as a vegetable. Carl Linnaeus gave the species the scientific name ''Pisum sativum ...

, and lentils during the First Agricultural Revolution about 10,000 years ago. The closest evolutionary relative to chickpeas is ''Cicer reticulatum'', a plant native to a relatively small area in the Southeastern part of modern-day

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

and nearby areas in modern-day

. Initially, ancient hunter-gatherer cultures harvested wild plants that they encountered, but evidence of the cultivation of some domestic food crops from 7500 BCE and possibly earlier have been documented. Archaeological sites in modern

, such as Tell El-Kerkh and Tell Abu Hureyra, have revealed remnant traces of peas, lentils, and fava beans, along with grain legumes including chickpeas, bitter vetch, and grass peas from the 8th millenium BCE. Samples from Tell El-Kerkh have been analyzed, revealing traces of both the cultivated ''C. arietinum'' and the wild ''C. reticulatum''. Additional discoveries have been made at Çayönü in Turkey dating from between 7500 and 6800 BCE, and at Hacilar in Turkey that date from 5450 BCE. Cultivation of domesticated chickpea is well documented from 3300 BCE onwards in

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

and the

Middle East The Middle East (term originally coined in English language) is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq. The term came into widespread usage by the United Kingdom and western Eur ...

. During the

Neolithic The Neolithic or New Stone Age (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'new' and 'stone') is an archaeological period, the final division of the Stone Age in Mesopotamia, Asia, Europe and Africa (c. 10,000 BCE to c. 2,000 BCE). It saw the Neolithic Revo ...

Era, chickpea cultivation spread to the west and was established in present-day

Greece Greece, officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. Located on the southern tip of the Balkan peninsula, it shares land borders with Albania to the northwest, North Macedonia and Bulgaria to the north, and Turkey to th ...

by the late Neolithic Era. During the

Bronze Age The Bronze Age () was a historical period characterised principally by the use of bronze tools and the development of complex urban societies, as well as the adoption of writing in some areas. The Bronze Age is the middle principal period of ...

, chickpea cultivation spread to Crete and as far as upper Egypt, with specimens from 1400 BCE found at

Deir el-Medina Deir el-Medina (), or Dayr al-Madīnah, is an ancient Egyptian workmen's village which was home to the artisans who worked on the tombs in the Valley of the Kings during the 18th to 20th Dynasties of the New Kingdom of Egypt (ca. 1550–1080 BC). ...

. At the same time, it spread to the east, and chickpeas from 1900 BCE were found at Tell Bazmusian. In the

Indian subcontinent The Indian subcontinent is a physiographic region of Asia below the Himalayas which projects into the Indian Ocean between the Bay of Bengal to the east and the Arabian Sea to the west. It is now divided between Bangladesh, India, and Pakista ...

, archaeological evidence of chickpea cultivation at Lal Quila, Sanghol, Inamgaon,

Nevasa Nevasa is a city in Nevasa tehsil of Ahmednagar district in the Indian state of Maharashtra. Mohiniraj Temple The city of Nevasa is the location of a 75 - foot tall temple of Mohini, built in 1773, which houses an image of Mohiniraj (Vishn ...

, Hulas, Senuwar, and Daimabad date from between 1750 and 1500 BCE. By the

Iron Age The Iron Age () is the final epoch of the three historical Metal Ages, after the Chalcolithic and Bronze Age. It has also been considered as the final age of the three-age division starting with prehistory (before recorded history) and progre ...

, cultivation had spread as far south as Lalibela in

Ethiopia Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country located in the Horn of Africa region of East Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the north, Djibouti to the northeast, Somalia to the east, Ken ...

. The Spanish and Portuguese introduced chickpea cultivation to the

New World The term "New World" is used to describe the majority of lands of Earth's Western Hemisphere, particularly the Americas, and sometimes Oceania."America." ''The Oxford Companion to the English Language'' (). McArthur, Tom, ed., 1992. New York: ...

in the 16th century. The process of domestication involved the

selective breeding Selective breeding (also called artificial selection) is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant m ...

of plants that produced large, palatable seeds that do not require a dormancy period, plants that have seeds that are easy to separate from the pods, plants with a predictable ripening period to allow a whole field to ripen at once, and plants with desirable physical forms. This selective breeding produced several different varieties of chickpeas. In Greece,

wrote "Chickpeas... differ in size, color, taste, and shape; there are the varieties called 'rams' and 'vetch-like' chickpeas, and the intermediate forms" in '' Historia Plantarum'', written between 350 and 287 BCE. One key selection factor in the domestication of chickpeas was the selection of a spring-sown cropping season. The evolutionary relatives of ''Cicer arietinum'' grow during the Winter and are harvested in the Spring. In the Near East, more than 80 percent of annual precipitation occurs between the months of December and February, while the long summers are hot and dry. Growing in the damp Winter months made the crops vulnerable to Ascochyta blight caused by '' Didymella rabiei'', resulting in crop failures. Recorded evidence shows that by the

Hellenistic period In classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Greek history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the death of Cleopatra VII in 30 BC, which was followed by the ascendancy of the R ...

and the time of the

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...

, summer cropping of chickpeas was being practiced.

Genome sequencing

Sequencing of the genome has been completed for 90 chickpea genotypes, including several wild species. A collaboration of 20 research organizations, led by the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), sequenced CDC Frontier, a ''kabuli'' chickpea variety, and identified more than 28,000 genes and several million genetic markers.

Description

The plant grows to 20–50 cm (8–20 in) high and has small, feathery leaves on either side of the stem. It has white flowers with blue, violet, or pink veins. Chickpeas are a type of pulse, with one seedpod containing two or three peas.

Varieties

The most common variety of chickpea in South Asia,

, Mexico, and

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

is the desi type, also called Bengal gram. It has small, dark seeds and a rough coat. It can be black, green, or speckled. In

Hindi Modern Standard Hindi (, ), commonly referred to as Hindi, is the Standard language, standardised variety of the Hindustani language written in the Devanagari script. It is an official language of India, official language of the Government ...

, it is called ''desi chana'' 'native chickpea', or ''kala chana'' 'black chickpea', and in Assamese and Bengali, it is called ''boot'' or ''chholaa boot''. It can be hulled and split to make '' chana dal'', '' Kurukshetra Prasadam'' (channa laddu), and ''bootor daali''. Around the Mediterranean and in the Middle East, the most common variety of chickpea is the kabuli type. It is large and tan-colored, with a smooth coat. It was introduced to India in the 18th century from Afghanistan and is called ''kabuli chana'' in Hindi''.'' An uncommon black chickpea, ''ceci neri'', is grown only in

Apulia Apulia ( ), also known by its Italian language, Italian name Puglia (), is a Regions of Italy, region of Italy, located in the Southern Italy, southern peninsular section of the country, bordering the Adriatic Sea to the east, the Strait of Ot ...

and

Basilicata Basilicata (, ; ), also known by its ancient name Lucania (, , ), is an administrative region in Southern Italy, bordering on Campania to the west, Apulia to the north and east, and Calabria to the south. It has two coastlines: a 30-kilometr ...

, in southern Italy. It is around the same size as garbanzo beans, larger and darker than the 'desi' variety.

Uses

Culinary

Chickpeas are usually rapidly boiled for 10 minutes and then simmered for longer. Dried chickpeas need a long cooking time (1–2 hours), but will easily fall apart when cooked longer. If soaked for 12–24 hours before use, cooking time can be shortened by around 30 minutes. Chickpeas can also be pressure-cooked or '' sous vide'' cooked at . Mature chickpeas can be cooked and eaten cold in

salad A salad is a dish consisting of mixed ingredients, frequently vegetables. They are typically served chilled or at room temperature, though some can be served warm. Condiments called '' salad dressings'', which exist in a variety of flavors, a ...

s, cooked in

stew A stew is a combination of solid food ingredients that have been Cooking, cooked in Soup, liquid and served in the resultant gravy. Ingredients can include any combination of vegetables and may include meat, especially tougher meats suitable for ...

s, ground into flour, ground and shaped in balls and fried as ''

'', made into a batter and baked to make ''farinata'' or ''socca'', or fried to make '' panelle''. Chickpea flour is known as '' gram flour'' or ''besan'' in South Asia and is used frequently in South Asian cuisine. In

Portugal Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic, is a country on the Iberian Peninsula in Southwestern Europe. Featuring Cabo da Roca, the westernmost point in continental Europe, Portugal borders Spain to its north and east, with which it share ...

, chickpeas are one of the main ingredients in ''rancho'', eaten with pasta, meat, or rice. They are used in other hot dishes with '' bacalhau'' and in soups, meat stews, salads mixed with tuna and vegetables, olive oil, vinegar, hot pepper, and salt. In Spain, they are used cold in '' tapas'' and salads, as well as in '' cocido madrileño''. Hummus is the Arabic word for chickpeas, which are often cooked and ground into a paste and mixed with tahini (sesame seed paste) to make '' ḥummuṣ bi ṭaḥīna'', usually called simply hummus in English. By the end of the 20th century, hummus had become common in American cuisine: by 2010, 5% of Americans consumed it regularly, and it was present at some point in 17% of American households. In the Middle East, chickpeas are also roasted, spiced, and eaten as a snack, such as '' leblebi''. Chickpeas and Bengal grams are used to make curries. They are one of the most popular vegetarian foods in the Indian subcontinent and in

diaspora A diaspora ( ) is a population that is scattered across regions which are separate from its geographic place of birth, place of origin. The word is used in reference to people who identify with a specific geographic location, but currently resi ...

communities of many other countries, served with a variety of bread or steamed rice. Popular dishes in Indian cuisine are made with chickpea flour, such as '' mirchi bajji'' and ''mirapakaya bajji.'' In India, as well as in the

Levant The Levant ( ) is the subregion that borders the Eastern Mediterranean, Eastern Mediterranean sea to the west, and forms the core of West Asia and the political term, Middle East, ''Middle East''. In its narrowest sense, which is in use toda ...

, unripe chickpeas are often picked out of the pod and eaten as a raw snack, and the leaves are eaten as a leaf vegetable in salads. In India, desserts such as besan halwa and sweets such as mysore pak, and laddu are made. Chickpea flour is used to make " Burmese tofu", which was first known among the Shan people of

Burma Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and ha ...

. In South Asian cuisine, chickpea flour ( besan) is used as a batter to coat vegetables before deep frying to make pakoras. The flour is also used as a batter to coat vegetables and meats before frying or fried alone, such as ''panelle'' (little bread), a chickpea

fritter A fritter is a portion of meat, seafood, fruit, vegetables, or other ingredients which have been Batter (cooking), battered or breading, breaded, or just a portion of dough without further ingredients, that is deep-frying, deep-fried. Fritters ar ...

from

Sicily Sicily (Italian language, Italian and ), officially the Sicilian Region (), is an island in the central Mediterranean Sea, south of the Italian Peninsula in continental Europe and is one of the 20 regions of Italy, regions of Italy. With 4. ...

. Chickpea flour is used to make the Mediterranean flatbread '' socca'' and is called ''panisse'' in Provence, southern France. It is made of cooked chickpea flour, poured into saucers, allowed to set, cut into strips, and fried in olive oil, often eaten during Lent. In Tuscany, chickpea flour (farina di ceci) is used to make an oven-baked pancake: the flour is mixed with water, oil, and salt. Chickpea flour, known as kadlehittu in

Kannada Kannada () is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly in the state of Karnataka in southwestern India, and spoken by a minority of the population in all neighbouring states. It has 44 million native speakers, and is additionally a ...

, is used for making sweet dish Mysore pak. In the

Philippines The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an Archipelagic state, archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of List of islands of the Philippines, 7,641 islands, with a tot ...

, chickpeas preserved in syrup are eaten as sweets and in desserts such as '' halo-halo''.

Ashkenazi Jews Ashkenazi Jews ( ; also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim) form a distinct subgroup of the Jewish diaspora, that emerged in the Holy Roman Empire around the end of the first millennium CE. They traditionally speak Yiddish, a language ...

traditionally serve whole chickpeas, referred to as ''arbes'' (אַרבעס) in Yiddish, at the '' Shalom Zachar'' celebration for baby boys. The chickpeas are boiled until soft and served hot with salt and lots of ground black pepper. '' Guasanas'' or ''garbanza'' is a Mexican chickpea street snack. The beans, while still green, are cooked in water and salt, kept in a steamer to maintain their humidity, and served in a plastic bag. A chickpea-derived liquid ('' aquafaba'') can be used as an egg white replacement to make

meringue Meringue ( , ) is a type of dessert or candy, of French cuisine, French origin, traditionally made from Whisk, whipped egg whites and sugar, and occasionally an acid, acidic ingredient such as lemon, vinegar, or potassium bitartrate, cream of t ...

or ice cream, with the residual

pomace Pomace ( ), or marc (; from French ''marc'' ), is the solid remains of grapes, olives, or other fruit after pressing (wine), pressing for juice or Vegetable oil, oil. It contains the skins, pulp, seeds, and stems of the fruit. Grape pomace has ...

used as flour. In 1793, ground, roasted chickpeas were noted by a German writer as a substitute for coffee in Europe. In the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, they were grown for this use in some areas of Germany. They are still sometimes brewed instead of coffee. File:FOOD Doubles 2.jpg, Doubles, a street food in

Trinidad and Tobago Trinidad and Tobago, officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, is the southernmost island country in the Caribbean, comprising the main islands of Trinidad and Tobago, along with several List of islands of Trinidad and Tobago, smaller i ...

File:Potaje de garbanzos y collejas5.JPG, Manchego cuisine; chickpea and '' Silene vulgaris'' stew ''(potaje de garbanzos y collejas)'' File:Farinata di ceci 01.jpg, Farinata di ceci, a traditional Italian chickpea snack food File:Chakhchoukha9.JPG, Chakhchoukha in

Algerian cuisine Algerian cuisine includes multiple flavors and influences, reflecting the country's history and position at the crossroads of the Mediterranean. It is based on both land and sea products. Conquests and demographic movement towards the Algerian t ...

; freshly cooked ''marqa'' before mixing with ''rougag'' File:Choleindia.jpg, '' Chana masala'', India File:Halua of Chickpeas.jpg, ''Halua'' chickpeas,

Bangladesh Bangladesh, officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by population, eighth-most populous country in the world and among the List of countries and dependencies by ...

File:Aesthetic Fried Gram.jpg, Fried chickpea

Animal feed

Chickpeas are an energy and protein source as

animal feed Animal feed is food given to domestic animals, especially livestock, in the course of animal husbandry. There are two basic types: fodder and forage. Used alone, the word ''feed'' more often refers to fodder. Animal feed is an important input ...

. Raw chickpeas have a lower

trypsin Trypsin is an enzyme in the first section of the small intestine that starts the digestion of protein molecules by cutting long chains of amino acids into smaller pieces. It is a serine protease from the PA clan superfamily, found in the dig ...

and chymotrypsin inhibitor content than peas,

common bean ''Phaseolus vulgaris'', the common bean,, is a herbaceous annual plant grown worldwide for its edible dry seeds or green bean, green, unripe pods. Its leaf is also occasionally used as a Leaf vegetable, vegetable and the straw as fodder. Its Pla ...

s, and

soybean The soybean, soy bean, or soya bean (''Glycine max'') is a species of legume native to East Asia, widely grown for its edible bean. Soy is a staple crop, the world's most grown legume, and an important animal feed. Soy is a key source o ...

s. This leads to higher nutrition values and fewer digestive problems in non ruminants. Nonruminant diets can be completed with 200 g/kg of raw chickpeas to promote egg production and growth of birds and pigs. Higher amounts can be used when chickpeas are treated with heat. Experiments have shown that ruminants grow equally well and produce an equal amount and quality of milk when soybean or cereal meals are replaced with chickpeas. Pigs show the same performance, but growing pigs experience a negative effect of raw chickpea feed; extruded chickpeas can increase performance even in growing pigs. Only young broilers (starting period) showed worse performance in poultry diet experiments with untreated chickpeas. Fish performed equally well when extruded chickpeas replaced their soybean or cereal diet. Chickpea seeds have also been used in rabbit diets. Secondary components of legumes—such as lecithin, polyphenols, oligosaccharides; and

amylase An amylase () is an enzyme that catalysis, catalyses the hydrolysis of starch (Latin ') into sugars. Amylase is present in the saliva of humans and some other mammals, where it begins the chemical process of digestion. Foods that contain large ...

protease A protease (also called a peptidase, proteinase, or proteolytic enzyme) is an enzyme that catalysis, catalyzes proteolysis, breaking down proteins into smaller polypeptides or single amino acids, and spurring the formation of new protein products ...

, trypsin and chymotrypsin inhibitors—can lead to lower nutrient availability, and thus to impaired growth and health of animals (especially in nonruminants). Ruminants generally have less trouble digesting legumes with secondary components since they can inactivate them in the rumen liquor. Their diets can be supplemented by 300 g/kg or more raw chickpea seeds. However, protein digestibility and energy availability can be improved through treatments such as germination, dehulling, and heat. Extrusion is a very good heat technique to destroy secondary legume components since the proteins are irreversibly denatured. Overprocessing may decrease the nutritional value; extrusion leads to losses in minerals and vitamins, while dry heating does not change the chemical composition.

Production

In 2023, world production of chickpeas was 16.5 million

tonne The tonne ( or ; symbol: t) is a unit of mass equal to 1,000 kilograms. It is a non-SI unit accepted for use with SI. It is also referred to as a metric ton in the United States to distinguish it from the non-metric units of the s ...

s, led by India with 75% of the total, and Australia as a major secondary producer (table).

Nutrition

Cooked chickpeas are 60% water, 27%

carbohydrate A carbohydrate () is a biomolecule composed of carbon (C), hydrogen (H), and oxygen (O) atoms. The typical hydrogen-to-oxygen atomic ratio is 2:1, analogous to that of water, and is represented by the empirical formula (where ''m'' and ''n'' ...

s, 9%

, and 3%

fat In nutrition science, nutrition, biology, and chemistry, fat usually means any ester of fatty acids, or a mixture of such chemical compound, compounds, most commonly those that occur in living beings or in food. The term often refers specif ...

(table). In a reference amount of , cooked chickpeas supply 164

calorie The calorie is a unit of energy that originated from the caloric theory of heat. The large calorie, food calorie, dietary calorie, kilocalorie, or kilogram calorie is defined as the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of one liter o ...

s of

food energy Food energy is chemical energy that animals and humans derive from food to sustain their metabolism and muscular activity. Most animals derive most of their energy from aerobic respiration, namely combining the carbohydrates, fats, and protein ...

, and are a rich source (20% or more of the Daily Value, DV) of

folate Folate, also known as vitamin B9 and folacin, is one of the B vitamins. Manufactured folic acid, which is converted into folate by the body, is used as a dietary supplement and in food fortification as it is more stable during processing and ...

(43% DV) and

manganese Manganese is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol Mn and atomic number 25. It is a hard, brittle, silvery metal, often found in minerals in combination with iron. Manganese was first isolated in the 1770s. It is a transition m ...

(45% DV, table). Cooked chickpeas are a moderate source (10-16% DV) of

thiamine Thiamine, also known as thiamin and vitamin B1, is a vitamin – an Nutrient#Micronutrients, essential micronutrient for humans and animals. It is found in food and commercially synthesized to be a dietary supplement or medication. Phosp ...

and several

dietary minerals In the context of nutrition, a mineral is a chemical element. Some "minerals" are essential for life, but most are not. ''Minerals'' are one of the four groups of essential nutrients; the others are vitamins, essential fatty acids, and essen ...

(table).

Effects of cooking

Cooking treatments do not lead to variance in total protein and carbohydrate content. Soaking and cooking of dry seeds possibly induces chemical modification of protein-fibre complexes, which leads to an increase in crude fibre content. Thus, cooking can increase protein quality by inactivating or destroying heat-labile antinutritional factors. Cooking also increases protein digestibility, essential amino acid index, and protein efficiency ratio. Although cooking lowers concentrations of amino acids such as tryptophan, lysine, total aromatic, and sulphur-containing amino acids, their contents are still higher than proposed by the FAO/WHO reference. Raffinose and sucrose and other reducing sugars diffuse from the chickpea into the cooking water and this reduces or completely removes these components from the chickpea. Cooking also significantly reduces fat and mineral content. The

B vitamins B vitamins are a class of water-soluble vitamins that play important roles in Cell (biology), cell metabolism and synthesis of red blood cells. They are a chemically diverse class of compounds. Dietary supplements containing all eight are referr ...

riboflavin, thiamin, niacin, and pyridoxine dissolve into cooking water at differing rates.

Germination

Germination of chickpeas improves protein digestibility, although at a lower level than cooking. Germination degrades proteins to simple peptides, improving crude protein, nonprotein nitrogen, and crude fibre content. Germination decreases lysine, tryptophan, sulphur, and total aromatic amino acids, but most contents are still higher than proposed by the FAO/WHO reference pattern. Oligosaccharides, such as stachyose and raffinose, are reduced in higher amounts during germination than during cooking. Minerals and

are retained more effectively during germination than with cooking. Phytic acids are reduced significantly, but trypsin inhibitor, tannin, and saponin reduction are less effective than cooking.

Autoclaving, microwave cooking, boiling

In a 2002 study comparing germination and cooking effects on chickpea nutritional values, all treatments of cooking (autoclaving, microwave cooking, and boiling) were found to improve protein digestibility. Essential amino acids were slightly increased by boiling and microwave cooking compared to autoclaving and germination. Losses of B-vitamins and minerals in chickpeas cooked by microwaving were smaller than in those cooked by boiling and autoclaving.

Skinning

Chickpeas contain oligosaccharides (raffinose, stachyose, and verbascose) which are indigestible to humans but are fermented in the gut by bacteria, leading to

flatulence Flatulence is the expulsion of gas from the Gastrointestinal tract, intestines via the anus, commonly referred to as farting. "Flatus" is the medical word for gas generated in the stomach or bowels. A proportion of intestinal gas may be swal ...

in susceptible individuals. This can be prevented by skinning the husks from the chickpeas before serving.

Leaves

In some parts of the world, young chickpea leaves are consumed as cooked green vegetables. Especially in malnourished populations, it can supplement important dietary nutrients because regions where chickpeas are consumed have sometimes been found to have populations lacking micronutrients. Chickpea leaves have a significantly higher mineral content than either cabbage leaves or spinach leaves. Environmental factors and nutrient availability could influence mineral concentrations in natural settings. Consumption of chickpea leaves may contribute nutrients to the diet.

Research

The consumption of chickpeas is under preliminary research for the potential to improve nutrition and affect chronic diseases.

Heat and nutrient cultivation

Agricultural yield for chickpeas is often based on genetic and phenotypic variability, which has recently been influenced by artificial selection. The uptake of macronutrients such as

inorganic An inorganic compound is typically a chemical compound that lacks carbon–hydrogen bonds⁠that is, a compound that is not an organic compound. The study of inorganic compounds is a subfield of chemistry known as '' inorganic chemistry''. Inor ...

phosphorus Phosphorus is a chemical element; it has Chemical symbol, symbol P and atomic number 15. All elemental forms of phosphorus are highly Reactivity (chemistry), reactive and are therefore never found in nature. They can nevertheless be prepared ar ...

nitrogen Nitrogen is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol N and atomic number 7. Nitrogen is a Nonmetal (chemistry), nonmetal and the lightest member of pnictogen, group 15 of the periodic table, often called the Pnictogen, pnictogens. ...

is vital to the plant development of ''Cicer arietinum'', commonly known as the

perennial In horticulture, the term perennial ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the year") is used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. It has thus been defined as a plant that lives more than 2 years. The term is also ...

chickpea. Heat cultivation and macronutrient coupling are two relatively unknown methods used to increase the yield and size of the chickpea. Recent research has indicated that a combination of heat treatment along with the two vital macronutrients, phosphorus and nitrogen, is the most critical component to increasing the overall yield of ''Cicer arietinum''. Perennial chickpeas are a fundamental source of nutrition in animal feed as they are high-energy and protein sources for livestock. Unlike other food crops, the perennial chickpea can change its nutritional content in response to heat cultivation. Treating the chickpea with a constant heat source increases its protein content almost threefold. Consequently, the impact of heat cultivation affects the protein content of the chickpea itself and the ecosystem it supports. Increasing the height and size of chickpea plants involves using macronutrient fertilization with varying doses of inorganic phosphorus and nitrogen. The level of phosphorus that a chickpea seed is exposed to during its lifecycle has a positive correlation relative to the height of the plant at full maturity. Increasing the levels of inorganic phosphorus at all doses incrementally increases the height of the chickpea plant. Thus, the seasonal changes in phosphorus soil content, as well as periods of drought that are known to be a native characteristic of the dry Middle-Eastern region where the chickpea is most commonly cultivated, have a strong effect on the growth of the plant itself. Plant yield is also affected by a combination of phosphorus nutrition and water supply, resulting in a 12% increase in crop yield. Nitrogen nutrition is another factor that affects the yield of ''Cicer arietinum'', although the application differs from other perennial crops regarding the levels administered to the plant. High doses of nitrogen inhibit the yield of the chickpea plant. Drought stress is a likely factor that inhibits nitrogen uptake and subsequent fixation in the roots of ''Cicer arietinum''. The perennial chickpea's growth depends on the balance between nitrogen fixation and assimilation, which is also characteristic of many other agricultural plant types. The influence of drought stress, sowing date, and mineral nitrogen supply affects the plant's yield and size, with trials showing that ''Cicer arietinum'' differed from other plant species in its capacity to assimilate mineral nitrogen supply from the soil during drought stress.Wery, J., Deschamps, M., & Leger-Cresson, N. (1988). Influence of some agroclimatic factors and agronomic practices on nitrogen nutrition of chickpea (''Cicer arietinum'' L.). Developments in Plants and Soil Sciences, 32: 287–301. Additional minerals and micronutrients make the absorption process of nitrogen and phosphorus more available. Inorganic

phosphate Phosphates are the naturally occurring form of the element phosphorus. In chemistry, a phosphate is an anion, salt, functional group or ester derived from a phosphoric acid. It most commonly means orthophosphate, a derivative of orthop ...

ions are generally attracted towards charged minerals such as iron and aluminium

oxide An oxide () is a chemical compound containing at least one oxygen atom and one other element in its chemical formula. "Oxide" itself is the dianion (anion bearing a net charge of −2) of oxygen, an O2− ion with oxygen in the oxidation st ...

s. Additionally, growth and yield are also limited by the

micronutrients Micronutrients are essential chemicals required by organisms in small quantities to perform various biogeochemical processes and regulate physiological functions of cells and organs. By enabling these processes, micronutrients support the heal ...

zinc Zinc is a chemical element; it has symbol Zn and atomic number 30. It is a slightly brittle metal at room temperature and has a shiny-greyish appearance when oxidation is removed. It is the first element in group 12 (IIB) of the periodic tabl ...

and

boron Boron is a chemical element; it has symbol B and atomic number 5. In its crystalline form it is a brittle, dark, lustrous metalloid; in its amorphous form it is a brown powder. As the lightest element of the boron group it has three ...

deficiencies in the soil. Boron-rich soil increased chickpea yield and size, while soil fertilization with zinc seemed to have no apparent effect on the chickpea yield.

Pathogens

Pathogens are the main cause of yield loss (up to 90%). One example is the fungus ''Fusarium oxysporum'' f.sp. ''ciceris'', present in most of the major pulse crop-growing areas and causing regular yield damages between 10 and 15%. Many plant hosts produce heat shock protein 70s including ''C. arietinum''. In response to ''F. o. ciceris'' Gupta ''et al.'', 2017 finds ''C. arietinum'' produces an orthologue of AtHSP70-1, an '' Arabidopsis'' HSP70. From 1978 until 1995, the worldwide number of pathogens increased from 49 to 172, of which 35 were recorded in India. These pathogens originate from groups of bacteria, fungi, viruses, mycoplasma, and nematodes and have high genotypic variation. The most widely distributed pathogens are '' Ascochyta rabiei'' (35 countries), ''Fusarium oxysporum'' f.sp. ''ciceris'' (32 countries) '' Uromyces ciceris-arietini'' (25 countries), bean leafroll virus (23 countries), and ''

Macrophomina phaseolina ''Macrophomina phaseolina'' is a Botryosphaeriaceae plant pathogen fungus that causes damping off, seedling blight, collar rot, stem rot, charcoal rot, basal stem rot, and root rot on many plant species. Hosts, symptoms, and signs One of th ...

'' (21 countries). ''Ascochyta'' disease emergence is favoured by wet weather; spores are carried to new plants by wind and water splash. The stagnation of yield improvement over the last decades is linked to the susceptibility to pathogens. Research for yield improvement, such as an attempt to increase yield from by breeding cold-resistant varieties, is always linked with pathogen-resistance breeding as pathogens such as ''Ascochyta rabiei'' and ''F. o.'' f.sp. ''ciceris'' flourish in conditions such as cold temperature. Research started selecting favourable genes for pathogen resistance and other traits through marker-assisted selection. This method is a promising sign for the future to achieve significant yield improvements.

Gallery

File:Cicers farm.jpg, Cicers farm File:India - Varanasi green peas - 2714.jpg, Lime green chickpeas File:Chickpea in black colour.jpg, Black chickpeas

References

External links

India Pulses and Grains Association
() {{Authority control Edible legumes Faboideae Founder crops Medicinal plants of Asia Plants described in 1753 Romani cuisine