The Pantry Door household is an extremely carnivorous one I am not ashamed to say, and meat usually features somewhere in our evening meal. On the odd occasion that I make a vegetarian dish, I tend to get the response "it's nice - but it's missing something..." To this day, this is the only dish I have made that managed to satiate the desire for meat so much so that for a while, we even forgot that we hadn't eaten any.
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| Falafel |
Ever since following Paul Hollywood's 'Bread' series and pushing myself to make my own breads I haven't bought tortilla wraps, as they are so quick and easy to make at home, and taste soooo much better. The recipe given below is adapted from Paul's, as I have tweaked it to suit our tastes.
Ingredients (serves 2)
For the falafel;
1 small onion
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp caster sugar
1 400g tin chickpeas
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp coriander
1 tsp chilli flakes
2 egg yolks
a little flour
For the wraps;
125 grams strong white bread flour
125 grams strong wholemeal flour (plus extra for dusting)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon dried fast-action yeast
2 teaspoons golden caster sugar
20 grams salted butter
160 ml tepid water
a little vegetable oil
Additional ingredients;
1 block Halloumi cheese
1 red pepper
Assorted salad leaves
Houmous
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| Layered Up! Houmous, Salad, Halloumi and Falafel ready to be wrapped! |
Method
Firstly, prepare the falafel. Heat the oil in a frying pan. Finely chop the onion, and shallow fry in the oil, adding the tablespoon of caster sugar, and cook until the onions start to caramelise and brown. Remove from the heat, and transfer the onions to a sheet of kitchen towel to drain the excess oil. Drain the tinned chickpeas. Blitz the chickpeas quickly in a food processor, you want them to be chopped roughly, not puréed. In a large mixing bowl, mix the chopped chickpeas, onions, spices and egg yolks together well. Take a spoonful of the mixture, form into a ball, and roll in flour. Place the ball onto a tray, and repeat until all of the mixture has been used. Place the tray of falafel balls in the fridge for at least 2 hours.
Next, make the wraps. Sift the flours into a large bowl, and add the yeast, salt and sugar, making sure the yeast and salt don't come into direct contact. Add the butter, and rub into the flour. Add the water a third at a time, and mix well until the dough comes together. Knead the dough for 5 minutes until smooth and elastic, then return the bowl, cover with clingfilm, and leave for an hour to double in size.
Once the dough has risen, turn out onto the work surface and knock back. Divide the dough into 8 equal pieces. Heat a little vegetable oil in a frying pan. Take one of the pieces of dough, and roll out on a floured surface until 1-2mm thick. Transfer the thinly rolled dough to the frying pan, and cook for around a minute on each side. Repeat with the remaining 7 pieces of dough.
Finally, prepare the components for the dish. Deep-fry the falafel balls for around 3-4 minutes until golden brown. Slice the halloumi cheese, and grill until golden. Slice the red pepper and prepare the salad leaves.
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| Grilled Halloumi Cheese |
Serve all the components, so the wraps can be assembled at the table. Layer up the houmous, red pepper, salad leaves, grilled halloumi and falafel pieces into the wraps, roll up, and dig in!
I'm linking this recipe up to Alphabakes, hosted by Caroline Makes and The More Than Occasional Baker, as this month's letter is F for Falafel!
I'm also linking in to Made with Love Mondays hosted by Javelin Warrior as everything is made from scratch.
