Falafel

Since I last posted, one of the members of my family has turned vegetarian. As a result, I've been on the lookout for vegetarian options, so falafel (little fried balls of ground chickpeas and spices) seemed like a good idea. I got this recipe from Tori Avey's Jewish food blog, with a couple of minor adaptations.

Ingredients
250g of dried chickpeas
30g water
1 onion, chopped
a bunch of parsley
2 cloves of garlic
2 tbsps plain flour (or use chickpea flour)
2 tsps of salt
2 tsps of ground cumin

1.5 tsps of ground coriander
1/2 tsp of cayenne pepper
freshly ground black pepper
the seeds from 2 cardamon pods

1 tsp of baking powder
1 tsp of water
oil for frying

Method

1. Leave the chickpeas to soak in plenty of water overnight.
2. The next day, drain the chickpeas, and combine with all of the remaining ingredients apart from the baking powder. Chop in a food processor until you have a grainy paste. (Too grainy and it will fall to bits when you fry, too pasty and it will taste ... pasty.)
3. Cover and leave to sit in the fridge for 2 hours.
4. Mix the baking powder with the water, add to the mixture and stir well with a fork.
5. Heat about 3 cm of oil to a medium heat.
6. Shape the mixture into balls, slip them carefully into the oil, and fry for a couple of minutes until golden underneath, then flip them over and finish cooking on the other side.