Better then Junk Food Crispy Chick Peas

Today I'm sharing with you a chick pea recipe that I dearly love and it holds a special place in my heart.  Years ago I had the amazing chance to go the Philippines to work as a volunteer with a humanitarian aid organization.  I lived there among the people and culture for 3 months (I may chat about that experience in a future post). One of the snacks I loved while I was there was cooked chick peas that were flavoured with curry and salt. You would buy them in a clear baggie and pop them in your mouth like popcorn. To this day I love chick peas and always remember the Philippines.

Chick peas are so good for you for many reasons. They are high in protein, low in fat, rich in zinc and folic acid and a healthy source of carbohydrates.

Better then Junk Food Crispy Chick Peas

• 1 1/2 cups of raw chick peas (makes about 3 cups cooked) You can buy them in a can but they are so high sodium and honestly the raw taste so much better for this recipe. I tried them both with raw and cooked and the canned are more dense and mushier (still good just not the ultimate that they could be)
• 1 1/2 curry powder
• 1 tsp garlic powder
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 2 TBSP of olive oil for your pan
• Cast Iron pan
• Salt to taste  

                                                                                                                                   

1. First you want to take your 1 1/2 cup of raw chick peas and put them in a pot and cover them with water (no heat needed you are not cooking them yet) and soak them overnight. This is the trick to plump them up. 
2. After they've soaked overnight, rinse them thoroughly and put in a pot with water and cook  them until they are soft. 
3. After they are tender, rinse them again and put them in a clean towel for at least  10 minutes to get them as dry as possible (I wrapped them up like a mummy and kept batting them around to get them all dry.) 
4. Get your pan (cast iron work really well) with oil heated up, once the oil is hot, toss the dried off chick peas in and keep shaking them in the pan.  It takes at least 10 minutes before they start crisping up. 
5. Once they are crisped up, transfer them to a bowl. Now take your seasonings (be creative, use whatever you have on hand, I saw a recipe for blackening seasoning which would be so good but I didn't have on hand. Throw in hot sauce, whatever you want).  Sprinkle the seasoning over the chick peas tossing them to coat. 
6. Once they cool, eat (although we can never wait until they cool down, we eat them hot:)

If you don't want to crisp them in a pan you could try (after step 3) putting your chick peas in a pan and baking them in the oven or a toaster oven. I'm planning to try that next.

I'd love to hear what snacks you enjoy whipping up.

Recipes for the win,

Michelle