Dehydrated refried bean product and methods of manufacture

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENT Broadly speaking, the present invention is comprised generally of the steps of cooking a quantity of beans; partially drying the beans so as not to totally dehydrate the same; non-comminutely pressing the beans into flakes; and subsequently rapidly dehydrating the pressed bean flakes.
Although both preferred embodiments of the present invention the method is directed toward the production of a reconstituted refried bean product, the method is additionally suitable for use with all leguminosae such as pinto beans, garbonzo beans and peas as well as certain grains such as corn, wheat, rice, barley, triticale, oats, buckwheat and for purposes of this application, the terms refried beans, beans and leguminosae shall be defined to include the same.
Referring more particularly to FIG.
1, the first embodiment of the present invention is depicted.
Initially the beans are cleaned, de-stoned and the unsound beans are removed from use.
Following such initial screening and preparation, the beans are washed to remove any pesticides, dirt or other unpalatable elements from the beans themselves.
The beans may then be cooked by either a conventional method of pressure vessel method.
In the conventional cooking method the whole clean beans are soaked in a 2:1 proportion or ratio of water to beans for about a four to six hour period.
The soaking water is then drained and discarded.
The resulting soaked beans are then covered with fresh water and following this a two to four percent by weight of dried beans amount of common salt (sodium chloride) is added to the fresh water solution.
The resultant mixture of fresh water, common table salt and beans is subsequently boiled until the beans are soft and palatable.
The soaking of the beans is generally done since the leguminosae are generally of a dried bean variety and thus soaking eases or reduces the natural wax coating and also allows or increases the permeability of outer skin of the leguminosae and thus aids in the particular cooking of the beans