Showing posts with label chickpeas. Show all posts
Showing posts with label chickpeas. Show all posts

Thursday, February 25, 2010

falafel and yogurt sauce!

last week i thought it might be fun to make some falafel, and i got the recipe from mark bittman, once again.

this recipe is different from any others i've come across in that you don't cook the chickpeas. as in, they are kind of raw until you cook the patties. you start out the day before, by soaking a couple cups of chickpeas in a bunch of water. like this:



24 hours later, they look like this:



sometime in the middle of these two pictures, i made some sort of tzatziki / raita / yogurt sauce hybrid. you grate some cucumber...



and add it to some greek yogurt along with lemon juice, dill, and minced garlic. mmm.



while the yogurt is chilling...you turn back to the chickpeas. drain them and put them in a food processor with things like onion and cayenne and cumin and spices...



and parsley. forgot the parsley...



food processors are genius inventions. i tasted things at this point and had mixed feelings about the texture.



but it did not stop me from making little falafel patties and putting them in the oven to bake.



mmm. cooked falafel.



look! fixin's!



this was good. i think the homemade falafel was a success, but next time i might try a cooked chickpea version. also, i was a bit garlic-happy in my yogurt sauce. must remember that stuff is extra strong when its raw.


Thursday, November 12, 2009

vegetable and chickpea ragout!

i made vegetable and chickpea ragout for dinner last night. i got the recipe from the epicurious website, but this is also somehow from the self magazine website at the same time. its crazy how they do that. either way, (click here to get to it). i sort of adhered to the recipe. as in, everything you see there i did, but i used more of it.

as in, i think this is more like 3/4 of a cup of an onion instead of 1/2. oh my!



the broccoli and red pepper you see before you is also more than 1/2 a cup. i'm a rebel.



the tomato paste you see wasn't even if the recipe. yup, i'm crazy like that. but with the extra veggies, an entire can of chickpeas, etc, i needed more tomatoes, and that was what i had on hand. and to help offset the whole thing, i added a cup of veggie broth.



i was, however, very happy that the holy grail of tomatoes was on sale. we'll be happy to splurge again next time they are on sale, too:



this is what the pan looked like after 20 minutes (what mess in the bottom left corner?)...



and here are the final add-ins of peas, olives, and artichoke hearts - cooked long enough to warm...



and now for the assembly. first, the pasta. smart people have guessed that i made more than the recommended 1/2 cup, which is just silly. i made the whole box, because leftover pasta goes with everything...



ragout...



and blurry basil! this was prettier in person, and quite tasty. go TOP CHEF in the making. and speaking of my favorite cooking show, i have been re-watching season 2, and i feel marcel got a bad break. sure, he was a bit socially awkward at times, but he became the scapegoat in a strange witch hunt for no real reason that i could see. he has cool werewolf hair and he can make me foam anytime. and so can sam and elia. thank you and please have a nice day.