Fried ChickpeasFries made from chickpea flour are made glamorous with Manchego cheese and truffle oil. Basil oil is used as an optional garnish.
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August 2009

Product Reviews / Main Nibbles / Vegetables

Recipes: Vegetable Fries

Page 2: Alex Ureña’s Chickpea Fries

 

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Chickpea Fries

This recipe is by Alex Ureña, chef/owner of Pamplona restaurant in New York City, which features modern Spanish cuisine. Yields 8 servings.

Ingredients

Guindilla Aïoli

Aïoli is garlicky mayonnaise-type sauce that originated in the Provence region of France. It is made by combining eggs, garlic, lemon, and olive oil. There’s a bit of garlic in this Spanish version, but this is a hot chile mayonnaise, based on guindilla chiles.

Guindillas are medium-hot chiles, originally from Spain’s Basque County (you can buy seeds and grow them here). They have the heat of a banana pepper, with a much richer flavor. Look for fresh green guindilla chiles in a Spanish market, or substitute banana chiles or other medium-hot red chile. In Spain, pickled guindillas are a popular snack and tapas ingredient, picked when small, young and green, and marinated in white wine vinegar. You can find them in jars in gourmet shops and online.

  • 3 whole eggs
  • 2 cups guindilla chiles, puréed
  • 1 garlic clove, minced
  • 2 tablespoons sherry vinegar
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • 4 cups vegetable oil
Chiles
Photo of green chiles by Rajesh Dangi | Wikimedia Commons.

Tomato Salpicon

Salpicon means different things in cuisine; in Mexico it refers to a brisket cooked with vegetables. In French culinary parlance, it is a mixture of finely diced, cooked ingredients bound with a sauce that is used to stuff canapés, roulades, timbales, vol-au-vents, etc. This salpicon is a small dice of vegetables bound in olive oil, used as a sauce for the fries.

  • 1 large beefsteak tomato, small dice
  • 5 pickled sweet garlic cloves, small dice
  • 1/2 cup green olives, pitted, small dice
  • 3 guindilla chiles, small dice
  • 1 tablespoon olive oil, small dice
  • Salt and pepper to taste

Chickpea Fries

  • 3 cups milk
  • 2 cups heavy cream
  • 3 cups chickpea flour
  • 1/2 cup Manchego cheese, grated
  • 1/2 teaspoon truffle oil
  • Salt and pepper to taste
  • 8 guindilla chiles (1 per serving as garnish), optional

Preparation

  1. To make aïoli: Place all ingredients except oil into a bain marie. Slowly add in oil with a hand blender on high until it is the consistency of mayonnaise.
  2. To make salpicon: Mix all ingredients together.
  3. To make chickpea fries: Bring milk and cream to a boil. Whisk in flour slowly. Add cheese and truffle oil. Add 1/4 teaspoon salt and pepper to taste. Spread mixture onto a 1/2 sheet tray, cool. Cut into squares. Deep-fry until golden brown.
  4. Remove seeds and sauté any extra chiles; salt and pepper to taste.
  5. Chickpea FriesTo assemble: Top squares with salpicon; add optional cooked chiles. Top with aïoli and serve immediately.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Recipe copyright Alex Ureña. Other material Lifestyle Direct, Inc.  All rights reserved.  Images are the copyright of their individual owners.