Such a great and flavoursome dish, vegetarian-friendly, healthy, cheap to make, and you can prepare these in advance. Inspired by my trip to the Falafel man at the food market in Copenhagen, where I first fell in love with these crispy nuggets of joy. You can also enjoy these with a good sprinkling of rock salt and a hefty serving of hummus.
Ingredients (makes x 6-8 Falafels):
1 x 400g Can of chickpeas
Harissa Paste
Plain Flour
1 x Lemon
1 x Fat clove of Garlic
Fresh Mint
Olive Oil
Red Cabbage
Rock Salt
Black Pepper
Tzatziki (or you could really use any sauce/dip of your choice, hummus works well)
Method:
To make the Falafels grab your blender, drain and wash the chickpeas and chuck them into the blender, to this add 1 good tbsp of Harissa Paste, 1 tbsp of plain flour, the zest of 1 x lemon and a little of the juice, a fat clove of garlic finely chopped, a good handful of fresh mint (no stalks) and a little drizzle of olive oil. Give this a generous season with rock salt and black pepper.
Blitz these up in your blender and pulse until you have a well-mixed paste. Now the fun part, dust your hands with a little flour and roll the mixture into balls, roughly the size of a small golf ball. you should get 6 - 8 falafels out of the mix.
Pop these into a tray, cover with clingfilm and pop in the fridge. These are good for several days, so you can easily prepare them in advance and I regularly make a batch at the weekend to get me through the week. Whilst these are chilling in the fridge, grab your red cabbage and roughly grate half of this with a box grater into a bowl. Add to this rock salt, black pepper, half a lemon (juiced) and a good handful of finely chopped mint, and mix roughly.
Set this aside, take your falafels from the fridge, add some sunflower or veg oil to a pan and shallow fry the falafels on a medium heat for 6-8 mins, turning every minute or so. They should be golden, crispy and brown on the outside and soft and fluffy on the inside.
You can deep fry your falafels to ensure they are extra crispy, to do this you want to fry them at around 170-180c for 3-5 mins.
To plate the dish, sprinkle the warm falafels with a little rock salt. Take your Tzatziki and pop a small tsp of this onto the plate wherever you want to sit your falafels, gently push your crispy falafels onto the Tzatziki, which will spread out the sauce. Finally, take your grated red cabbage and add a generous amount of this to the plate, finish with fresh mint and a wedge of lemon.
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