Love falafel? This tasty treat is perfect for you to try. A Mauritian street food known as gateaux piments, these fried lentil & herb balls are great as a small snack, or if you want a complete meal, served inside a baguette. They’re also relatively cheap to make: a serving of six costs approximately £4, with ingredients leftover!
Serves: 6 / Ingredients total: ~£4
Gateaux Piments Recipe:
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cup Yellow split peas, soaked overnight
- 5 spring onions, finely chopped
- Coriander (approx. a large handful)
- Parsley (approx. a small handful)
- 2 sprigs Thyme
- 2-3 Green chillies
- Cumin seeds (to taste)
- Salt (to taste)
- Sunflower oil (for frying)
- Requires: blender / food processor
Method:
- Soak the yellow split peas in a bowl of water overnight.
- Drain the peas and wash under cold water.
- Spoon the peas and green chillies into the blender/food processor in small batches. Pulse blend the peas. The consistency you want is a chopped and grainy texture, (not smooth), so be careful not to over-blend. Add a couple tablespoons of water if required when blending.
- If there are still pieces of whole peas after blending, blend twice.
- Transfer the blended peas to a mixing bowl.
- Add the spring onions, coriander, parsley and thyme leaves to the bowl.
- Rub the cumin seeds between your hands before also adding to the bowl.
- Add salt to taste – roughly just over 1 tsp, as the peas need a lot of salt.
- Mix well
- Roll the mixture into small bite-size balls.
- Heat oil in a deep saucepan and fry the balls until golden brown and cooked through.
- Transfer to a tissue lined plate (to absorb excess oil) and serve immediately as a snack or in a buttered baguette for a meal.
Many thanks to Haneefa for sending in her recipe as part of our Community Cooking Challenge, a project aiming to encourage togetherness & comfort during the difficulties and increased isolation as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
To get involved in our #ShareYourMeal campaign, post your favourite recipes on social media and tag us (twitter, facebook, instagram), &/or email them to h.alam@doctorsworldwide.org. And in the spirit of cooking for a good cause, we also encourage you to match the cost of your ingredients in donations – whilst it may not seem like a few pounds could go very far, or make much of a difference, with our Life Saving Fund, every £1 offers the provision of quality healthcare for 2 people.
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