Apologies to the faithful Sunday readers; I told Ari I would take her Sunday and then promptly procrastinated.
Falafel Salad: the best way since croutons to get fried food into your bowl of vegetables.
Recipe: I needed a food processor, a large bowl, a spoon, a fry thermometer, a large pot to fry stuff, a cooling rack, a cookie sheet lined with newspaper, tongs, and time — it takes 16-24 hrs to soak the chickpeas.
- 2.25 cups dried chickpeas
Put the chickpeas into a large container and cover with twice the depth’s worth of water. Cover and let sit for 16-24 hours (I did mine for ~20). Add more water and stir if you check on them and find that they’ve expanded above the water level. After that, drain the chickpeas well and put it in your food processor — run the processor, redistributing during pauses, until you have something like a cous cous texture.
- 1 large onion, chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, sliced
- 1 bundle of parsley, stems trimmed, washed
- 1 bundle of cilantro, stems trimmed, washed
- 2 slices of toasted bread
Clean your food processor, and then put all of these ingredients in and process until smooth but not a mushy paste.
- 1 Tbsp ground coriander
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- 1 Tbsp dill seeds
- 1 tsp red chili flakes
- Salt/Pepper for seasoning
- 1 Tbsp sesame seeds
Put these spices, the cilantro/parsley mixture, and the ground chickpeas into a bowl and mix thoroughly. At this point you can put into a bag and freeze or…
- 1/2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- vegetable oil for frying (depends on the size of your pot. I think I used 1-2 cups)
Mix in the baking powder and soda and form the falafel mixture into walnut-sized balls with your hands. It might take a little squeezing. Heat the oil to between 310F and 340F, and keep the temperature in this range. Slowly lower the falafel 4 at a time into the oil (these did not splatter me but arm yourself with a lid just in case). Use tongs to move the falafel gently; when they float and look browned, quickly fish them out and put them on a cooling rack that has been placed upside-down on a newspaper-lined baking sheet.
- Salad
