Does anyone remember the concept “Star of the Week” from elementary school? For those unfamiliar, it involved one chid in the class being picked each week to be the ‘star’. Along with being assigned ‘special’ classroom responsibilities such as being the line leader, the star would often also create & share an “All About Me” poster telling about him/herself. For example:
I thought I would do something similar but with a twist…
Star of the Week: The Foodie Edition
*****Chickpea Flour******
a.k.a socca flour, chana dal flour, gram flour, besan, garbanzo bean flour
What Is It?
- As the name suggests, it is flour made from dried chickpeas and has a slightly nutty taste. Although it seems to be recently gaining popularity in the west given the rise of gluten intolerances, chickpea flour has been a staple in Indian kitchens for centuries (India-1, Rest of the World-0 🙂 )!
Why You Want To Eat It?
- Chickpea flour is probably one of the most underrated and underused flours. While I am tolerant of gluten and wheat, I still want to incorporate more chickpea flour into my everyday diet. The flour’s 3 USPs, in my opinion, are its protein, iron, and fibre content:
- It also stands tête à tête with whole-wheat flour: both are 110 calories but chickpea flour has 2g more protein and 1g more fiber!
How You Can Eat It?
- Other than the usual Indian recipes for dhoklas, pakoras, chilla, dosas, idlis , my intake of chickpea flour is still fairly minimal. I’ve read that chickpea flour can be used as a thickener, as a base for batters, as a wheat flour alternative in baking, or even mixed with water as an egg substitute. After seeing a recipe on Nada’s blog for socca pizza, I knew I had to try it.
It was absolutely delicious, easy, refrigerated well (hello, cold leftover pizza!) and I highly recommend you try it out. If you’re somewhat doubtful, ask yourself this: when has the combination of marinara sauce and cheese ever been a bad idea?
What’s the latest ingredient/food you’ve tried?
You’re absolutely right…my mom’s been cooking with chickpea flour for years! I love dhokla! YUM!
I’m definitely going to try this pizza out. I love experimenting with different crusts.
I love dhoklas, especially with coconut chutney- so tasty!
Yummmmm!!! I really want to get chickpea flour, it looks so versatile! 🙂 latest food thing I’m loving is coconut flour, it’s amazing.
Have a great day! 😀
I need to get my hands on some coconut flour- I can imagine how great it would be in pancakes!
I just don’t understand why there has to be so many names for this flour (at least in english) 😉
I love besan. I want to experiment making pie crusts with it 🙂
I’m way too obsessed with socca. Or maybe just obsessed enough? It’s a good five out of seven dinners a week for me.
Have u tried in sweet dishes like pancakes?
I’ve never heard of socca before, so thanks for sharing! I’ll have to search for it the next time I go shopping….I would love to make pizza crusts out of it!
I was shocked at how well it made as pizza crust- lemme know what u think!
Please make me a socca pizza and Fed Ex it over! That sounds delicious! I love socca, but never cook with it really…usually just keep it to the Indian foods I eat. But yum yum yummm!
Oh and I remember Star of the Week! God, that week fed my ego like no other.
Haha for real..it’s all about me b1tchess :D..however having a blog is kinda like a 24/7 “all about me”
I heard of socca but I haven’t had the chance to try it out yet. It looks interesting!
Definitely worth a shot!
I love chickpea flour! It was the first “exotic flour” I ever used, in fact!
Is it easily available in the US?
Are those all dishes that you made? They look amazing!
I did! The pizza was fab 🙂
Oh wow, I need to get some of this stuff for myself! I love that it’s so versatile
It really is good stuff!
Hmmm, newest thing I’ve tried? Rice flours, I think?
Rice flour is also used a lot at home but I tend not to as it’s from white rice.
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