Beans, lentils, chickpeas, peas and soybeans turn up in kitchens all over the world, cooked in more ways than any single guide could list. This page does not try to catalogue national dishes. Instead it describes, in general terms, the main forms legumes take in cooking, using the names under which the US Department of Agriculture's FoodData Central database lists them, so that a cook meeting an unfamiliar dish can recognize what it is made from and how to handle it.
How this guide describes food traditions
Food traditions are shared, borrowed and changed across borders, and most legume dishes exist in many versions. So this guide follows three rules. It does not assign a dish to one country or people. It does not call any version authentic or correct. And it describes only what its sources support: what a food is made from, how it is listed in a public database, and the cooking and safety points that apply to it. Where a dish name appears, it is the name used in FoodData Central.
Grown and eaten widely
One sign of how widespread pulses are is the way the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) collects data on them. In its handbook on food balance sheets, the FAO suggests that countries report their production of at least ten groups of pulse crops separately: common beans, broad beans, lentils, chickpeas, peas, pigeon peas, cowpeas, vetch, lupins, and a group that includes black gram and mung beans. Soybeans are left out of that list, because the FAO excludes crops used mainly for oil.
Many of those crops will be familiar from shop shelves; others, such as pigeon peas or black gram, may be less so outside the places where they are most often cooked. The cooking principles in this site's other guides apply to all of them: sort and rinse, soak the larger dry beans, simmer until tender, and cool leftovers promptly.
Whole beans, simmered
The simplest and probably the most common way to cook legumes is to simmer them whole in water or broth until tender, then season them or cook them further with other ingredients. Soups, stews and pots of beans served with grains all start this way. The method is the one in the soaking and cooking guide.
Two points from that guide matter most for slow-cooked dishes. Acidic ingredients, such as tomatoes, are best added after the beans are tender, since the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and Utah State University Extension both say acid slows softening. And dry red kidney beans must be soaked for at least 5 hours and boiled in fresh water for at least 30 minutes, as the US Food and Drug Administration advises, before they go into any long, gentle cooking.
Mashed, refried and pureed
Cooked beans are often mashed or blended into a smooth or rough paste. FoodData Central lists several of these as legume products in their own right, including canned refried beans in more than one style, a red refried bean product, and hummus, both commercial and home-prepared.
These dishes are a good use for beans that have cooked a little too soft to hold their shape. Because they are made from cooked beans, they are perishable once made: the USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service's general rules for leftovers apply, which means refrigerating them within 2 hours in shallow containers and using them within 3 to 4 days. The storage guide has the details.
Split pulses cooked soft
Split peas and lentils cook differently from whole beans. They need no soaking, according to both the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and the University of Maine, and with longer cooking they soften into a thick, spoonable dish rather than staying as separate seeds. Many kitchens around the world make soups and porridge-like dishes of split pulses, seasoned at the end with spices, herbs or a little fat.
Because split pulses skip the soak, they are the quickest way to cook a legume dish from dry. The usual cooking care still applies: rinse them, keep the pot at a gentle simmer, add water if they thicken too much, and taste for tenderness.
Flours and fritters
Dry legumes can be ground into flour. FoodData Central lists chickpea flour under the name besan, among its legume products. Legume flours are used in batters, flatbreads and thickeners in many cuisines.
Ground or mashed legumes can also be shaped and fried. FoodData Central lists home-prepared falafel among its legume products. Frying in hot oil needs the usual kitchen care, and fried food is perishable once cooked, like any other leftover.
Soy foods
Soybeans can be cooked whole, and they are also made into many other foods. FoodData Central's legume products include several groups:
- Tofu. The database lists many kinds, from soft to extra firm, each described by how it is prepared, for example with calcium sulfate or with magnesium chloride, which the database also calls nigari. It also lists fried tofu, dried-frozen tofu (koyadofu) and salted, fermented tofu (fuyu).
- Tempeh. Listed both as it is sold and cooked. The Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2025-2030 name tofu and tempeh among the protein-rich foods for people who eat vegetarian or vegan diets.
- Miso. Listed as a legume product. The Dietary Guidelines name miso among their examples of fermented foods.
- Natto. Also listed among the legume products.
Because all of these are made from soybeans, they carry the same allergy warning as the beans themselves. The FDA lists soybeans as one of the nine major food allergens in the United States.
The same safety rules everywhere
A dish's name or origin does not change the food-safety rules for its ingredients. Three points from this site's other guides travel with every legume dish:
- Red kidney beans need the full treatment. At least 5 hours of soaking and at least 30 minutes of boiling in fresh water, by the FDA's guidance, whatever the recipe calls for.
- Cooked legumes are perishable. Stews, purees, fritters and soy foods all go into the refrigerator within 2 hours, by USDA guidance, and are eaten within 3 to 4 days or frozen.
- Allergens are listed, not guessed. Soybeans, peanuts and sesame are all on the FDA's list of nine major food allergens. When cooking a dish for others, check what goes into it and tell them.
Trying a new legume dish
Unfamiliar legume dishes are easier to approach once you can see which of the forms above they belong to. A dish of simmered whole beans follows the soaking guide. A puree starts from well-cooked beans. A split pulse dish skips the soak. A soy food is handled like the soybeans it is made from, with the allergy in mind.
Example: a recipe with an unfamiliar name
A cook finds a recipe for a thick soup of split yellow pulses finished with fried spices. Reading the ingredient list, they see that it uses split peas, so there is no soak; they rinse the peas, simmer them in fresh water until they collapse, add the spices at the end, and refrigerate what is left in shallow containers within 2 hours. If the recipe had used whole red kidney beans instead, the FDA's soak-and-boil rule would have come first. This example describes no real recipe, cook or tradition.
Beyond that, the best guide to a dish is a cook who makes it often. This site can explain what legumes are and how to handle them safely; the flavors belong to the people whose kitchens they come from.
That is the end of the shelf. Return to the guide list