The present invention discloses a method of sterilizing whole nuts comprising the steps of: pre-cooking said nuts in a pre-cooking unit (1) to a core temperature T1 at a pressure P1 for a time tl transferring said nuts to a sterilizing line (2), said sterilizing line (2) adapted to permit the transport of said nuts through a sequence of process elements, said sequence of process elements comprising a reservoir (3), at least one feed pump (4), a consecutive arrangement of heat exchangers (5,6,7), and a filling machine (8) and/or an aseptic tank, and sterilizing said nuts in said sterilizing line (2). It is suggested that figure 1 is printed with the abstract.
