Felafels

Inspired by the fabulous felafels we got in Galway market weve been experimenting with recipes. Some have been too dry , others too cakey and others fell apart. . We recycled our deep fat fryer years ago so we neded a recipe that would  stand up to being flipped in a frying pan  or could be baked . After much research on the net I  managed  to come up with a fairly good  basic recipe. I handed the recipe over to Alex to try . He’s 15 and a bit of a foodie  and an awfully fine cook . He tried out a few variations and came up wiith this .

Felafel Recipe

Chickpeas or garbanzo beans (soaked overnight  or for at least 12 hours)

for every 2 cups of  soaked chick peas you need

2 cloves of garlic

1/2 onion

1 t cumin

1 t coriander seed

1/2 t chili powder

1t salt

1t pepper

3 T or small handful of fresh coriander

whizz the uncooked chickpeas in a food processor untill the consistency of cous cous add all the rest of ingredients and whizz up for a few seconds untill combined.

make  about 8  patties out of the resulting mix and either fry in vegetable oil for about 15 mins  or bake  at 180 on a greased baking tray  for 15 -20 mins.

Serve with salsa , salad greens, coriander pesto , yougurt, hummus and pitta bread.

We used uncooked chickpeas to give a drier felafel . If you use canned or cooked chickpeas  the mix is mushy and hummus like , so you will need to counteract this with flour which leads to cakey felafels .

Alex made about 80 of these for a party we had last week . He managed  to produce them in about 2 hours and they still tasted great when cold. Even the comfirmed meat eaters scarfed them down  so we figure we’ve got a good recipe there.