Читать книгу Dry Beans and Pulses Production, Processing, and Nutrition - Группа авторов - Страница 10

Preface

Common beans and other pulses are diverse food sources of high nutritional value (protein, energy, fiber, and vitamins and minerals) with broad social acceptance. These legume crops demonstrate global adaptability, genotypic and phenotypic diversity, and multiple means of preparation and dietary use. Beans and pulses are produced in regions as diverse as Latin America, Africa, Asia, and North America. Traditionally, these food crops have not been afforded their due importance to a scale similar to some other crops such as soybean and staple crops, such as wheat, corn, and rice. However, in recent years, pulse crops have gained increased importance due to their value as plant‐based proteins and meat alternatives. Moreover, pulse flours and ingredients are finding new uses in diverse food applications with enhanced nutritional and sensory properties.

Numerous factors influence utilization of grain legumes, including type and cultivar selection, cropping environment and systems, storage conditions and handling infrastructure, processing methods, and final product preparation. Further, nutrient content and bioavailability are dramatically influenced by these diverse factors. In recent years, beans and pulses have been cited for imparting specific positive health potentiating responses, such as hypocholesteremic response, mitigation of diabetes and colorectal cancer, and weight control. Enhanced dry bean utilization focused on improved dietary health is an opportunity within both subsistent and developed populations.

This revised book edition provides a contemporary source of information that brings together current knowledge and practices in the value chain of bean/pulse production, processing, and nutrition. This work provides an in‐depth coverage on a wide variety of pertinent topics: breeding, postharvest technologies, composition, processing technologies, food safety, quality, nutritional profile, significance to human health, and food security. An experienced team of over 50 contributors from North America, Asia, and Africa has written 21 chapters. These contributors come from a field of diverse disciplines, including crop sciences, horticulture, food science and technology, food biochemistry, food engineering, nutritional sciences, Culinology®, environmental sciences, and agricultural extension.

The book is divided into three sections. Part I, Overview, production and postharvest technologies of beans and pulses, contains 5 chapters. Topics include global production and consumption; breeding and production technologies; market classes and physical and physiological characteristics; postharvest handling, packaging and distribution; and storage induced quality defects. Part II, Composition, value‐added processing, and quality, has 12 chapters, which cover composition of processed beans/pulses; hydration, blanching, and thermal processing; canning and canned products; extrusion processing and products; processing of flours and fractions; optical sensing technologies for nondestructive quality assessment; utilization of dry beans and other pulses as ingredients in diverse food products; cowpea processing and products; faba bean processing and nutrition; chickpeas and lentils processing and nutrition; utilization of beans and pulses in Africa; and other common pulses, including mung bean, black gram, pigeon pea, lupin, moth bean and Indian vetch. Part III, Culinology®, nutrition and significance in human health, and food security, has four chapters, which include culinary perspective of beans and pulses; nutrition and human health benefits; health implications and nutrient bioavailability of bioactive compounds; and roles of dry beans and pulses in global food security. Overall, this value‐chain approach to the presented topics is a distinctive feature of this book.

The editors acknowledge many individuals for their support from conception through final development of this book. Foremost is our sincere thanks and gratitude to all authors for their contributions and for bearing with us during the review and finalization process of their chapters. Thanks are due to Imaad Thasin for providing library and literature search support. We are grateful to our family members for their understanding and support, enabling us to complete this work. We dedicate this work to the worthy contributions of the numerous researchers and students throughout the world for their decades‐long devoted efforts to improving the quality and utilization of dry beans and pulses.

Muhammad Siddiq

Mark A. Uebersax