Friday, March 30, 2012

Thai chickpea patties


I love when using up remnants in the fridge results in a delicious meal. This one began with asian greens I felt like having as a side dish rather than a tofu/veg combination as we had eaten tofu the night before.  After brainstorming what to serve the greens with, I was drawn to Kari from Bite-sized thoughts recent Thai vegetarian cakes recipe.

Kari used mashed butter beans in her cakes and recommended that other white beans or chickpeas could also be a good choice. Chickpeas sounded good to me until I started mashing them with a fork! I have little patience when it comes to mashing beans so they ended up going in the food processor with the potatoes which saved me some time and sanity. I was pleased with this decision because the mixture turned out so smooth, it reminded me of mum's salmon patties which I used to eat doused in tomato sauce as I never liked seafood flavours although I did love their texture.


I swapped the lemon for kaffir lime leaves as we have a small tree growing in our garden and I love to use the fresh leaves whenever appropriate. One of the young man's favourite condiments is sweet chilli sauce so I removed this from the recipe and planned to serve it on the side instead. A few other ingredients were added in it's place to give the patties some spice and I also used some baking powder as I recalled enjoying the fluffiness that it brought to the healthy baked falafels I made from Appetite for Reduction. The pattie mixture turned out nice and firm and I had no qualms about them falling apart as they were frying.

The young man and I loved these patties, the man liked them but mentioned not being a huge fan of the kaffir lime flavour which I found odd as it doesn't seem to bother him in a Thai curry. The kaffir lime was a highlight for me and I preferred to eat the patties plain rather than with sweet chilli sauce. The man tried all sorts of condiments I thought were odd and decided that he liked them best with my tomato and chilli relish whereas the young man was more than happy with his beloved sweet chilli sauce.      


The recipe below was just enough to satisfy the three of us so I would recommended doubling it for a larger crowd. I'm sure that leftovers would taste great too!  

Thai chickpea patties (Adapted from Bite-sized thoughts)

150g small waxy potatoes
1 x 400g tin chickpeas, rinsed and drained
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon minced ginger
1 birds eye chilli, minced
2 kaffir lime leaves, minced
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup cornflake crumbs (I normally use fresh breadcrumbs)
1/4 cup fresh coriander leaves, chopped finely
olive oil, for frying

Peel the potatoes and place into a saucepan full of boiling water. Cook for 15 minutes or until they are soft and then drain. Allow to cool slightly.

Place the potatoes and chickpeas in a food processor and pulse until the chickpeas are completely broken down. Transfer the chickpea/potato mixture to a bowl and stir through the rest of the ingredients thoroughly, except for the olive oil.

Roll the mixture into patties of your desired size with your hands, place them on a plate and refrigerate for 15 minutes.

Heat some oil in a frying pan, add the patties and cook them in batches on medium heat until browned, about 3 minutes on each side. Serve with sweet chilli sauce, another condiment of your choice or enjoy them plain as I did.

8 comments:

  1. Oh, I'm so glad you made these! They look lovely and now I'm keen to try your chickpea version myself. I think I'd be the same as you though and process them electronically...they're such hard little things. The smooth texture would be a nice side effect of that too.

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    1. Thanks Kari, they were really tasty and very easy to put together (particularly with the aid of the food processor). The smooth texture appealed to me and I was surprised that I didn't need an egg replacer to hold them together either.

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  2. love the look of these - tried to comment last night but blogger was playing up - hopefully will let me today - great to see you today!

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    1. Thanks Johanna, don't you hate it when blogger plays up! These didn't seem very spicy to me with just the one chilli but you could leave it out if you wished as the other flavours are great. I had a great day at your potluck, thanks for organising and hosting it!

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  3. Love the Thai flavors in the patties! I'm going to have to bookmark for a future weeknight recipe. They look perfect to me.

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    1. Thanks Jes, they are a good one to make on a weeknight, as they aren't very time consuming.

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  4. Those look delicious. I normally buy something like these ready made, but having seen your recipe, I think I'll try these instead!

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    1. Thanks Joey, that's interesting that you can buy ready made ones like this although home-made food is always much nicer than packaged food. Still, it's great that you have good options when you need a convenient meal.

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