I’m going to be honest with you, I’ve been a bit hesitant to write this as a recipe post for a few reasons (the big one being, I ran out of chickpeas, so I haven’t tested a few other parameters that I want to look at and write about) but a lot of you asked about my technique after seeing the video I posted. I’ll share what I’ve learned so far, feel free to experiment on your own, and if you tweak it let me know by sending me an email.

I will update this post over time, once I get some more dried chickpeas to work with, so please be patient. The pandemic has made many staples especially beans hard to find.

You’ll notice that this entire post is a bit unconventional from my usual method of writing but I’m going to lay this out as an experiment, in a problem/solution format. This is how I tackle most of my recipes and any cooking problems I want to try and solve plus I don’t think this needs to be written out too formally.

The Problem/s:

Making crispy chickpeas is an interesting puzzle.

The goal is to get water inside the seed to help soften fibers and hydrate starch so it gelatinizes/thickens during cooking but once that’s done, I need to get rid of all the water inside to make it crispy enough to shatter. Water in and water out.

If chickpeas over cook or undercook, the final texture will be off.

I also do not want excessive browning during cooking so I need to reduce the probability of caramelization and the Maillard reactions.

Humidity and softness in crisped chickpeas.

Chickpeas - I’m intentionally not using canned chickpeas because canned chickpeas are treated with different agents and depending on the brand I use these agents and treatments can be different. It’s not an accurate way to compare canned chickpeas to regular dried chickpeas that need presoaking. I need to limit my variables as much as possible to make any sense of any results and have valid comparisons.

Chickpeas are a hard-to-cook seed, what this means is that they need more time to soften and cook properly till they’re edible (black beans and lentils are easy-to-cook because they need less time). Chickpeas also contain starch which needs to hydrated by water to cook and gelatinize/thicken during heating to make it tender and palatable. The four dietary fibers in chickpeas are also a source of hardness and affect cooking - cellulose, lignin, hemicellulose, and pectin. These also need to soften to make the seed cook and become palatable.

How to overcome the chickpea fiber issue:

Presoak the seeds in water to soften the coat and help water enter the seed.

To cook the seeds to the texture I wanted, tender yet firm, I cook them in acidic water by adding lemon juice. You can use bottled lemon juice here, the acid here is not for taste but for improving texture. I also add a bit of salt to soften pectin. Do not use any acid other than citric acid - lemon or lime juice work effectively here. This method is great when I want a soft yet firm texture in a bean (if I added only baking soda and no acid like I do with my dals, the beans will fall apart and turn to mush very easily). I add baking soda here to create sodium citrate which is a chelating agent - what this means is that it binds metals like calcium and magnesium and locks them up.

A second benefit of this acidic pH is that it will reduce the probability of browning from caramelization and the Maillard reaction (alkaline pH promotes these two reactions) which I do not want here. They build flavor but can become problematic if things turn brown too quickly, you can end up with a bitter taste.

Pressure cooking or Instant pot - I avoided these on purpose - these devices are great when you want a very soft texture and have a more forgiving recipe like a dal but I don’t want that here and need a balance of softness and structural integrity in the chickpeas.

Chickpea Skin - this is a personal preference - skin or don’t skin, do what you want for this. I’m lazy, I don’t want to do it and I like chickpeas with their skin on. The chickpeas with their skin left-on might pop during heating as the steam tries to escape, so you might hear them blow, the frequency on this was about 3 to 4 per cup of chickpeas. You can remove the skin off by gently rubbing the boiled chickpeas between your palms.

Equipment:

I compared roasting chickpeas in my oven to air frying them in smart oven from Breville - the results were staggeringly different. Not surprisingly the oven takes a really longer time while the air fryer function uses super convection fans which not only work ridiculously fast in comparison but the final texture was much better and so was the taste. In my observation, the ones cooked in the oven also get stale faster when left outside when compared to the ones from the air fryer. You can use my method with a regular oven but it took me on average around 2 hours to get the same degree of crispiness but it was still never close to the air fryer texture.

Humidity and Storage:

Humidity is a problem with storage, so I cook the chickpeas twice - I first drive moisture out, then let it back in, and again kick it out. This second round of air frying makes them crispier and will drive out any atmospheric water that re-entered on cooling.

For storage, vacuum sealing chickpeas is the best method I’ve used so far. If you have one of those food-safe silica gel packets that are sometimes included with your dry food packaging you can drop one in a container or bag that contain the crisped chickpeas, they will help protect against atmospheric moisture and staleness. Glass jars and airtight storage containers are great too, make sure they’re sealed well.

You can rewarm the crisp chickpeas at 300F [149C] for about 8 to 10 minutes to dry them up a bit if the storage method doesn’t work as well vacuum sealing.

Flavorings: Do not add any flavoring spices or oil to the chickpeas before they go into oven or air fryer. Instead once the chickpeas are cooked after the second round of crisping, toss them with your seasoning of choice while they’re hot, straight out of the air fryer.

Note: I’m being extra detailed here to address any questions that might pop up just in case, you’re wondering why the heck is he writing so much about crispy chickpeas.