3 recipes down, 27 more to go! See you all tomorrow for Day 4: Weird Food Combo. Missed Day 2? Check it out here. 

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Savoury Za'atar Socca

 

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Prep time

10 mins

Cook time

16 mins

Total time

26 mins

 

This savoury chickpea pancakes takes less than 30 minutes to make from start to finish- including the sauce! This dish is filling, protein packed, and delicious. Perfect for a savoury breakfast or light lunch. Top with whatever vegetables you like! In the winter, roasted vegetables would be a great toppings. Feel free to use any toppings you like. This recipe is vegan, gluten free, nut free, and soy free. This recipe makes 2 9-inch crispy soccas + extra sauce.

Author: Jessica DeMarra

Recipe type: Breakfast, Lunch

Cuisine: vegan

Serves: 2

Ingredients

• For the Savoury Socca:
• 1 cup chickpea flour
• 1 cup + 2 tablespoons water
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, divided
• 1 teaspoon za'atar
• ½ teaspoon baking powder
• ½ teaspoon fine grain sea salt
• ¼ teaspoon red pepper chili flakes + more for garnish
• 
  
• Za'atar Tahini Sauce:
• 4 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 2 tablespoons tahini
• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon white miso
• ½ teaspoon pure maple syrup
• ½ teaspoon za’atar + more for garnish
• Splash of filtered water to thin out if necessary
• 
  
• Toppings:
• 1 cup halved cherry tomatoes
• 10 fresh basil leaves, cut into ribbons
• ½ teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
• Pinch of fine grain sea salt
• Sliced avocado
• Pea shoots
• Za'atar

Instructions

1. In a bowl, whisk together the chickpea flour, water, 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil, baking powder, and salt. Whisk for about 15 seconds until it is completely smooth with lots of bubbles. Set aside while you make your sauce.
2. Add all the for the sauce ingredients to the blender and blend until smooth. Set aside until ready to dress your soccas.
3. In a bowl, mix together the tomatoes, basil, oil, and salt. Set aside until the socca is ready.
4. In a non-stick skillet over medium heat, heat ½ tablespoon oil until hot. Add ¾ cup of the socca batter and cook for 5 minutes. Flip and cook the other side for 3-4 minutes. Keep the socca warm while you cook the second one. Add the remaining ½ tablespoon of oil, heat, and cook the second socca.
5. Top with tomato basil mixture, avocado, pea shoots, Za'atar Tahini sauce, and extra za'atar.

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The post Day 3 Vegan MoFo: Savoury Za’atar Socca appeared first on Sprouts & Chocolate.

Thank you all so much from the bottom of my heart.

If you want to receive a free copy of my eBook, subscribe on the right hand side bar or at the bottom of this post. Redefining Sprouts & Chocolate was a bit terrifying and I tried to convince myself out of it. Just 12 ingredients? For ALL future recipes? Once I started making lists of the recipes, it wasn’t as hard as I imagined. Starting is the hardest part but do whatever it takes to get your ideas in motion. You got this! Minimalist living has been on my mind for a little while but I did not know how to put it into practice for my life and not just in my recipes. As I looked around my apartment, I felt burdened by my possessions but felt like I couldn’t part with them. Mark and I live in a 600 square-foot apartment so space is tight. We felt like we were outgrowing this apartment at an alarming rate but it wasn’t the square footage that was the problem, it was the stuff. Just the stuff piled onto more stuff, littered around with more stuff. On Friday, my copy of The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing came in the mail and during the weekend I read it cover to cover. After each chapter, I could feel my mindset shifting and it became easier to accept discarding my possessions. Mark and I turned our teeny apartment upside down, giving our cramped space some much needed breathing room. In a single afternoon, we managed to get rid of:

• 5- 45L bags of clothes to donate
• 4- 45L bags of junk and garbage
• 40 books (that one was tough)
• 38 old food magazines
• 35 VHS tapes
• 28 DVDs
• 2-68L Rubbermaid containers with duplicate or unused kitchen supplies
• 1 large unused cabinet

Every object Mark and I own now has a specific place instead of just cramming something wherever we could find room. This is just the start but like anything, simple living just takes a bit of habit reforming. Sure, I don’t live in one of those Tiny Homes and I did not want to part with all my books but it is a step toward something greater. If you are interested in minimalist living, start by looking around your home and see what it is collecting dust. Do you love it? Does it serve a purpose? Do you use it? If not, I suggest you donate if possible or discard the item. It became also thrilling to see the unneeded things leave my space and I hope you find the same joy. 

What is one thing you can do today, just today, to achieve your goal?

FYI: This post contains an Amazon Affiliate link but I really love Marie Kondo’s book! 

Stay connected on the daily by following me on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest.  Made this recipe? I would love to see it! Use the hashtag #screcipe on your social media. 

Buffalo Chickpea Caesar Salad

 

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Prep time

10 mins

Cook time

10 mins

Total time

20 mins

 

A revision on an old favourite! I wanted to recreate an older recipe of mine with new life, less ingredients, no oven, and that had a nut-free dressing. Sunflower seeds, when soaked and blended, are wonderfully creamy, light, and delicious. The extra oil in the dressing is needed since sunflower seeds are naturally lower in fat than cashews. The chickpeas crisp up well in a cast iron skillet, however if you do not own one, they will do just fine in a regular pan, it might just take an extra minute or two. This recipe is vegan, gluten free, nut free, and serves 2 generous salads or 4 light sides.

Author: Jessica DeMarra

Ingredients

For the Nut Free Caesar Dressing

• ½ cup raw sunflower seeds, soaked for 2 hours
• Juice of 1 lemon, about 4 tablespoons
• 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 3 garlic cloves, peeled
• 1 tablespoon nutritional yeast
• ½ tablespoon white miso
• 5 tablespoons water, or to desired consistency

For the Buffalo Chickpeas

• 2 cup cooked chickpeas, drained and rinsed
• 1 teaspoon arrowroot powder
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• ¼ teaspoon fine grain sea salt
• 4 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil
• 2 tablespoons Frank's Hot Sauce
• 2 heads of Romaine lettuce, chopped, washed and dried
• Extra lemon wedges (optional)

Instructions

For the Nut Free Caesar Dressing

1. Add all the dressing ingredient to a high power blender or food processor and blend until completely smooth. The blender is faster but the food processor will do the trick.
2. Transfer dressing to a glass jar or bottle and chill in the fridge until ready to use. You may have to add a splash of water to the dressing since it will thicken as it cools.

For the Buffalo Chickpeas

1. Dry the drained chickpeas between two sheets of paper towels. Gently roll the beans between the paper towels until the chickpeas are fairly dry. Do not skip this step! Your chickpeas will not crisp up if they are wet.
2. Transfer the dried chickpeas to a medium bowl, add the arrowroot, paprika, salt and olive oil and gently stir to coat the beans.
3. Heat up a skillet (preferably cast-iron) over medium heat. When the skillet is hot, add the chickpeas, and cooked for 10 minutes, stirring every 2-3 minutes so they do not burn. Wipe out the medium sized bowl that you dressed the chickpeas in.
4. Try a few chickpeas before taking the pan off the heat to check if they chickpeas are to your desired crispiness. I like mine just crispy on the outside but still meaty on the inside. If you desire a very crisp chickpea, add a few minutes to the cooking time.
5. Transfer chickpeas to the clean medium sized bowl and add the buffalo sauce. Toss to coat.
6. Dress the lettuce with the Nut Free Caesar Dressing, top with Buffalo Chickpeas, and serve with additional lemon wedges. Enjoy!

3.3.3077

The post Buffalo Chickpea Caesar Salad {Nut Free} appeared first on Sprouts & Chocolate.

Does anyone actually follow the serving suggestion on a tub of hummus? Two tablespoons is the serving size on most purchased hummus. Like on one pita chip right? If you follow this serving suggestion then you have a greater will power than I do but I am just a mere mortal who loves her hummus. If I feel I have been indulging a little bit more than usual or eating a lot of takeout, hummus is one of those things that help me get back into the groove of healthful eating. I know I have food in the fridge if there is hummus and I have been known to really bunker down and eat my fill of it. Can you overdose on hummus? To me, the limit does not exist. (Still love Mean Girls)

Since starting school again I have noticed my hunger levels have gone up but my brain needs to be alert, focused and fuelled with good unrefined foods. Nothing is worse than a caffeine/sugar crash mid-test or exam so it is better to get your brainpower from whole food rather than stimulates like caffeine. Traditional store bought hummus is pretty good but uses a lot of canola oil (generally the second or third ingredient on the list) so it isn’t the best kind of fat you can eat. Store bought works in a pinch if time is not on your side and you need a snack ASAP!! I call these moments Snack-Attacks when I come home from work or school and literally tear apart the fridge on a mission to find the fastest snack I can shove in face. The hunger is animal-like and nothing can stand in my way.

Cooked dried beans make the best hummus. I don’t say this lightly but it is well worth the effort to soak and cook the beans for hummus. Cooked beans take the hummus to a freshness level that canned beans simply cannot and are way less expensive, even organic beans. I buy mine in bulk to make them even less costly and store them in large mason jars on my pantry.

Za’atar is a new spice in my pantry and I find myself eating more hummus because of it. This Middle Eastern blend consists of dried thyme, sumac, toasted sesame seeds and sea salt, making it a perfect pairing for hummus. Mark and I sprinkle it onto warm naan or pita bread drizzled with olive oil. A friend of mine who was raised in the Middle East says that at the Starbucks there they serve za’atar on warm buttered croissants. Sprinkle this spice on any Mediterranean or Middle Eastern dish that you fancy but also on roasted vegetables, hot rice with a squirt of lemon juice and with this hummus.

The post Lemony Za’atar Hummus appeared first on Sprouts & Chocolate.

Halfway there! It is kind of crazy how time flies by when you are having fun or when you are stressed out about deadlines for posts but for this first time MoFo’er it has been such a great experience. I am not sick of my kitchen just yet so it is full steam ahead in the second part of this month.

This recipe is inspired by my mother and her love for old black-and-white movies. When my sister and I were growing up, we did not have cable, just the old rabbit ears with tinfoil balls on their ends so we did not watch a lot of TV. My mother only enjoyed a select few cartoons like Animaniacs or Bugs Bunny (which I know them now to be incredibly violent!) so needless to say we did not watch a lot of kid-shows either. During my teen years when all my friends were obsessed with Dawson’s Creek, Friends and Passions (yes the soap opera) however my mother had no patience for 90’s teen TV characters complaining about how everything was just so tragic. “I will show you real tragedy,” she would say as you popped in a VHS tape. So I spent most Friday nights watching Gregory Peck in the Maycomb courtroom defending a wrongly accused man while Jem and Scout watched from the balcony, Audrey Hepburn in her trench coat, soaked and looking for Cat in the rain and of course Humphrey Bogart saying goodbye to his true love all for the greater good but meeting a friend along the way.

How I love Ilsa Lund’s (Ingrid Bergman) jewelry sparkling softly in the low lighting, the way she sipped champagne so elegantly, her large brimmed hats and her amazing capability to keep a white suit stain-free and glowing.

Rick’s Café Américain is what I thought every nightclub was like: large bandstand with talented musicians in white dinner jackets, a piano player playing beautiful love songs, fancy hats and gambling underground until I actually went to one and upon arrival some pimple-faced kid barfed near me, spattering it across my shoes. That place was no Rick’s.

Casablanca is still my favourite old movie as well my mothers. I imagine Morocco’s air to be full of warm spices, gin joints to get a stiff drink and having a grand but tragic romance with my true love. But in the meantime, I will just enjoy these Moroccan Spiced recipes with a drink in hand.

 10 recipes down, 10 more to go! Woot!

The post Moroccan Spiced Chickpeas: 3 Ways {Vegan & Gluten-Free} appeared first on Sprouts & Chocolate.

The things I do miss about school are my wonderful friends, Jerri and Matt whom are supportive and kind even when I literally cried over math. Literally. Without them, school would be the most unpleasant experience. We are all fast tracking high school credits to apply to university, which is stressful and chaotic at times. Thankfully every lunch period we hang out under a tree to eat, talk about schoolwork and look up Youtube videos to help us out. One of our favourite lunches to have under our tree is on Tuesdays when Ali Baba’s has a 2 for 1 falafel wrap special. I go for this lunch every week but my stomach has taken the hit a more times than I like to admit. All the rumbles and whale noises my stomach makes in the quiet classroom can be fairly embarrassing but I just love falafels!

Making this homemade version is simple and the food processor does a lot of the work. It is fresh, lighter and gluten free so your stomach will thank you for skipping the fried stuff. Besides who likes frying at home? The heat, the mess, the potential burns, the small fires…not saying that I have set a fire in my kitchen or anything… Compared to the fried ones, these baked ones are more satisfying and will leave you glowing!

Congratulations to Jerilyn F from Waterloo, Canada who is the winner of the Sprouts & Chocolate’s Vegan Chocolate Cookbook by Fran Costigan giveaway! Your prize will be shipped to you very soon!

The post The Big Falafel Salad with Lemon-Tahini Dressing appeared first on Sprouts & Chocolate.