Falafel

So for those of you not familiar with falafel, it is a deep fried ball or patty made from ground chickpeas.  I've had it at restaurants and it's a great vegetarian wrap.  I had never made falafel and never really thought to make it, until I ran across this recipe on Pinterest.  It just sounded so interesting to me to cook falafel, something typically crispy and deep fried, in a Crock Pot.  Usually I just cook a roast or chicken in the crock pot. Oh! Except the one day I got fancy and made Crock Pot risotto. I'll have to do that again and post it on here.

So here is what you'll need to make your falafel:

• 1 15oz can garbanzo beans
• 1/2 onion, chopped
• 1 Tbsp. dried parsley
• 2 cloves minced garlic (I bought the jarred minced kind and don't regret it one bit!)
• 1 egg
• 1/2 tsp. kosher salt
• 1/4 tsp. black pepper
• 2 tsp. ground cumin
• 1 tsp. ground coriander
• 1/4 tsp. cayenne pepper
• juice from 1 lemon (I just gave about a 4 second squirt from the bottle of lemon juice I have.) 
• 3/4 cup bread crumbs (I used seasoned breadcrumbs, but you can use whatever you have) 
• 2-4 Tbsp. olive oil

First, start by draining the garbanzo beans and placing them in a large bowl. Then smash the beans with a fork or another utensil. The fork works surprisingly well.

Then, start by chopping up a small onion, or half of a large onion. You don't need to be too precise since this is going in the food processor.

Dump the chopped onion into the food processor.  Start adding your spices.  These pictures were very hard to take, so bare with me, and with my horribly cheap measuring spoons.

Start with the parsley.

Then add the cumin.  The cumin really makes this dish.  Spices like this are so expensive at the grocery store, so if you are on a budget like me, check out drug stores or dollar stores. Their spices are a lot cheaper.

And speaking of cheap spices, I got this coriander cheap from Ollie's, and it's organic. Woot!

I got frustrated at this point with the camera. So add the coriander, cayenne, salt, pepper, garlic, lemon juice, and egg to the mixture. Then pulse til everything is mixed like so:

Add this wet mixture to the mashed chickpeas and combine.

Slowly add in the breadcrumbs until the mixture is dry enough to form into balls.

Form golf-ball sized balls and set aside.  Add olive oil to the Crock Pot. Dip each ball into the olive oil and then nestle into your Crock Pot. It's okay if they overlap or are on top of each other.

Cook on high for 3-5 hours, with the top on. Mine cooked for about 4 hours.  I kept checking on them and was very doubtful that they were going to get crispy, but they did! You can give them a turn about half-way through, but I really don't think it's necessary. I think I actually made more of a mess doing that. 

So while you're waiting for your falafel to cook in the Crock Pot, you can make a tzatziki sauce to go with.  It's just a simple cucumber yogurt dressing. It's easy to make, but I wouldn't recommend making as much as I did, because then you'll have so much you won't know what to do with it.

But here's what I did. Peel a cucumber, cut in half lengthwise and deseed (is that word?) it with a spoon. 

Then give it a good chopping. Again, this is going in the food processor, so don't get fancy.

You're going to need some plain yogurt. I think next time I'll try greek yogurt. I think it would make the sauce a little thicker.

Add the yougrt and cucumber to the food processor. Then add about 3 cloves of minced garlic, salt, pepper, and a few squirts of lemon juice.  Puree and then place in the fridge until you're ready to use it.  The longer it sits in the fridge the better.

And here is what the falafel looks like when it is done. I really was shocked by how dark and crispy they were, just from being in the Crock Pot.  You can serve these with Pita bread, but I just used whole wheat tortillas.

Add some lettuce, tomato, and your tzatziki sauce and you're good to go. The falafel is rather spicy, so the toppings really help to cool the spice down.

So you'd think that's the end of this post, but you'd be wrong.

I was really curious, what the benefits of cooking in the Crock Pot versus just pan frying were. I mean, I wouldn't have time to make this in the Crock Pot during the week. So the next night I made the same recipe, except I cooked the falafel in a pan (I still didn't want to mess with deep-frying).  It was just like frying up some meatballs.

They still got nice and brown on the outside, although I would have to say that the Crock Pot really got every inch of the falafel crispy.

Once in the wrap, it pretty much tasted the same.  I think that the Crock Pot falafel holds up better, but it's easier for me and much quicker to make it in a pan.

Go try making it yourself and tell me what you think!