garbanzo

noun

gar·ban·zo gär-ˈbän-(ˌ)zō

also -ˈban-

plural garbanzos

: chickpea

Examples of garbanzo in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web Remove from bowl and form into 1-inch discs, dredge in garbanzo flour and set aside. —

Sarah Blaskovich, Dallas News, 1 Feb. 2021 The garbanzo was cultivated in Turkey and the bean appears in stews across the Arab world, made with or without meat, although lamb and chickpeas are a particularly great combination. —

Minerva Orduño Rincón, The Arizona Republic, 30 Mar. 2023 Navy, garbanzo and cannellini all work well. —

Washington Post, 11 Mar. 2021 The Sonoran version includes them, as the region is a garbanzo-growing one where the legume flourishes during the mild desert winter months. —

Minerva Orduño Rincón, The Arizona Republic, 30 Mar. 2023 Use your favorites, such as black, navy and garbanzo. —

Kim Sunée, Anchorage Daily News, 23 Feb. 2023 Start with a shared appetizer of vegetable pakora – veggies fried in garbanzo batter – or chili paneer with cheesy cubes bathed in a spicy sauce. —

Lauren Saria, The Arizona Republic, 17 Sep. 2020 Instead, it's made with chicken, sweet potatoes, alfalfa meal, and fiber-rich garbanzo beans. —

Amber Smith, Discover Magazine, 23 Oct. 2022 First five ingredients: Chicken, chicken meal, turkey meal, sweet potatoes, and garbanzo beans 12. —

Amber Smith, Discover Magazine, 23 Oct. 2022 See More

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'garbanzo.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Etymology

borrowed from Spanish (earlier usually garvanço), alteration (perhaps by blending with garroba "carob, algaroba" or gálbana "kind of pea") of earlier arvanço, ervanço, of uncertain origin

Note: Recorded as arbānsuš or arbānšuš among Hispanic words in the Arabic pharmacopoeia Kitāb al-Mustaʻīnī of Yūsuf bin Isḥāq ibn Baklāriš (ca. 1106). As noted by Joan Coromines (Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico), Greek erébinthos "chickpea" is unlikely to be the immediate source; the change i > a is ad hoc, and the outcome of -th- as z/ç is questionable. The initial arv-/erv- is comparable with a widespread group of words presumably of Mediterranean substratal origin—in addition to Greek erébinthos and órobos "the vetch Vicia ervilia," there are Latin ervum "the vetch Vicia ervilia," Germanic *arw(a)-(a)itō "pea" (whence Old High German araweiz, Old Saxon eriwit, erit, Old Norse ertr), Middle Irish orbaind "grains." The suffix of the Spanish word (*-antio?) is of obscure origin.