Prediction of cooking times of freshly harvested common beans and their susceptibility to develop the hard-to-cook defect using near infrared spectroscopy

The cooking time of common beans is influenced by genotype and storage conditions. This study aimed to use near-infrared (NIR) spectra of milled, freshly harvested (fresh) beans to predict their cooking times and their susceptibility to develop the storage-induced, hard-to-cook (HTC) defect. The physical characteristics of bean accessions, from two different seasons, were evaluated. The cooking times and susceptibility to HTC (determined by aging under standard adverse conditions) of the aforesaid beans were correlated to NIR spectra to develop calibrations using variable selection and partial least squares regression. The beans exhibited diverse physical characteristics, cooking times and susceptibility to HTC. The models predicting cooking times of fresh beans sufficiently overcame genotype and seasonal differences (R2P = 0.73, RMSEP = 4 min). The susceptibility of fresh beans to HTC was also successfully predicted (R2CV = 0.8, RSECV = 64%). NIR spectroscopy has high potential to rapidly identify beans with short cooking times and low susceptibility to HTC at harvest. •Bean type had a significant effect on the physical characteristics of the accessions.•Cooking times of fresh beans were predicted from NIR spectra of their flours.•PLS-R models were robust against phenotypic and seasonal variations of the beans.•Susceptibility to develop HTC was predicted from NIR spectra of milled, fresh beans.