Shelled garden peas, size-graded at 7−9 mm and 9−10.2 mm, blanched and quick-frozen within hours of picking. November to May, shipped from store all year.
No vegetable punishes delay like a pea. From the moment it is picked, a pea starts converting its own sugar into starch, and it does it fast — the sweetness that makes a garden pea worth buying measurably declines within hours, not days. A pea frozen quickly can taste sweeter than a fresh one that spent two days in transit, which is the rare case where frozen genuinely beats fresh rather than merely matching it.
So the whole operation is built around getting from field to tunnel quickly. Shelled, washed, blanched, cooled, frozen. Every hour saved is sugar kept.
Blanching is a short scald in hot water or steam before freezing, and it is the step buyers most often misread as a shortcut. It is the opposite. Vegetables carry enzymes that keep working at freezer temperature — slowly, but for months — and those enzymes dull colour, flatten flavour and produce off-notes that show up around month six of a twelve-month shelf life. Blanching deactivates them.
Fruit is not blanched because heat would destroy the texture that makes it fruit, and because fruit is usually acidic enough to hold up without it. That is the whole distinction, and it is why a frozen vegetable line and a frozen fruit line are genuinely different operations even when they sit in the same building.
Over-blanching is its own fault: too long in the water and the pea goes soft and olive-coloured before it ever reaches the tunnel. The window is narrow and it is a real skill.
Smaller peas are sweeter and more tender; larger ones are starchier and hold up better in a cooked dish. Both are legitimate and they sell into different channels, which is why we size-grade rather than sell one undifferentiated pea. Mixed is available and is usually the right call for processing where the pea is an ingredient rather than the point.
Name the band in your specification. A supplier quoting on unsized peas is quoting on the cheapest thing they can deliver.
It is worth knowing what you are entitled to demand. Codex CXS 320-2015 for quick frozen vegetables defines the quick freezing process as complete only when the product reaches −18 °C at its thermal centre after thermal stabilisation — the middle of the pea, not the air moving around it — and requires −18 °C or colder at every point in the cold chain afterwards.
Cite it in your contract. It converts a claim into an obligation, and it costs nothing to write.
Packed to order. Anything below can be changed against your spec — say what you need and we quote to it.
| Product form | Whole shelled garden peas |
|---|---|
| Grade | Grade A, size-graded. Sizes 7−9 mm, 9−10.2 mm and mixed on request. |
| Preparation | Shelled, washed, blanched, cooled and quick-frozen. |
| Retail & bulk packing | 400 g, 1 kg, 2.5 kg and 10 kg. Private label and custom cartons on request. |
| Freezing method | IQF (individually quick-frozen) after blanching. |
| Storage | −18°C at the thermal centre, unbroken cold chain from cold store to port. |
| Shelf life | 12 months from date of production. |
| Certification | BRCGS, ISO 9001:2015, GLOBALG.A.P., registered with the U.S. FDA. Halal and Kosher available. Third-party inspection accepted on request. |
| Production campaign | November to May. Frozen stock shipped year round. |
| Terms & ports | FOB and CIF. Loading Damietta, Alexandria, Port Said or Ain Sokhna. |
Tell us the size band, your volume, destination port and Incoterm — we send the spec sheet, certificates and a quote, usually within 24–48 hours.
Practical background from our side of the trade — free, no sign-up.
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See the whole IQF frozen range, or all of our buyer's guides.
