*waves hello*
Miracles do happen…I’m posting on a weekend. It takes a lot of motivation for me to post on a Sunday morning, but I simply couldn’t wait another day to share this recipe with you! It’s that good.
Today’s recipe features chickpea flour, an ingredient you haven’t seen much on this blog. Chickpea flour is high in protein (7 grams per 1/4 cup according to Cuisine Soleil) and it’s naturally gluten-free making it friendly to our gluten sensitive friends. It also boasts 3 grams of fibre per 1/4 cup. I soon found out what a filling breakfast it makes!
After having a few bad experiences with chickpea flour recipes in the past, I almost crossed it off my list forever. I find the earthy, beany flavour of chickpea flour can be overwhelming if not balanced by other ingredients and it can take some getting used to, at least it did for me. This weekend, I decided to take another crack at it and I’m so glad I did.
Meet my newest breakfast love…she’s a beaut.
In case you can’t tell by the photo, this is a huge pancake about the size of a 10-inch skillet! I had to plate it on my extra-large round plate because it wouldn’t fit on my regular round plates. Who doesn’t want to eat a pancake bigger than their head? Noooooobody! After a few trials of this pancake, I finally nailed the consistency of the batter and flavour I was going for.
Best of all, it takes only 10 minutes to whisk together the ingredients and then another 10 minutes or so to cook. I also expect it’s quite versatile so feel free to change up the mix-ins and toppings. I think a sautéed mushroom, onion, and chive topping would be especially nice, especially with some cashew cream! One large pancake has around 14-15 grams of protein; add some toppings and you can easily hit 20 grams of protein without much effort.
I topped it with avocado, hummus, salsa, red pepper flakes, and a spicy cashew cream – a tasty change up from my normal breakfasts of smoothies and vegan overnight oats. This would also make a fun lunch or dinner too!
Featuring all new, protein-packed salads, hearty toppers, flavour boosters, and dressings you'll want to drink, my new cookbook will transform the way you think about salads. Oh, and be sure to flip to the back for a surprise dessert chapter!
Jumbo Chickpea Pancake
Yield
1 large or 2 smaller
Prep time
Cook time
Total time
This dense and filling savoury chickpea pancake is packed with protein and fibre. Feel free to change up the mix-ins and toppings based on what you have in your fridge. To prevent it from sticking to the skillet, be sure to spray the skillet liberally with olive oil before pouring on the batter. Also, I suggest chopping the veggies finely so they cook faster.
Ingredients
- 1 green onion, finely chopped (about 1/4 cup)
- 1/4 cup finely chopped red pepper
- 1/2 cup chickpea flour (also known as garbanzo flour or besan)
- 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/4 teaspoon fine grain sea salt
- 1/8 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
- pinch red pepper flakes (optional)
- 1/2 cup + 2 tablespoons water
- For serving: salsa, avocado, hummus, cashew cream (optional)
Directions
- Prepare the vegetables and set aside. Preheat a 10-inch skillet over medium heat.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the chickpea flour, garlic powder, salt, pepper, baking powder, and optional red pepper flakes.
- Add the water and whisk well until no clumps remain. I like to whisk it for a good 15 seconds to create lots of air bubbles in the batter.
- Stir in the chopped vegetables.
- When the skillet is pre-heated (a drop of water should sizzle on the pan), spray it liberally with olive oil or other non stick cooking spray.
- Pour on all of the batter (if making 1 large pancake) and quickly spread it out all over the pan. Cook for about 5-6 minutes on one side (timing will depend on how hot your pan is), until you can easily slide a pancake flipper/spatula under the pancake and it's firm enough not to break when flipping. Flip pancake carefully and cook for another 5 minutes, until lightly golden. Be sure to cook for enough time as this pancake takes much longer to cook compared to regular pancakes.
- Serve on a large plate and top with your desired toppings. Leftovers can be wrapped up and placed in the fridge. Reheat on a skillet until warmed throughout.
Tip:
- For the cashew cream, see this recipe. I added red pepper flakes into the blender to make it spicy.
- You can make this recipe into 2 smaller pancakes if desired.
Nutrition Information
(click to expand)
As you can see from the photo, this isn’t your regular fluffy pancake. Chickpea flour makes this pancake very dense and filling. I find the flavour can take some getting used to, but I really enjoy it prepared this way. On that note, I’m off to make another one! I’d love your feedback on this recipe if you make it.
On another note, Eric thinks he fixed the printing issue that a few of you were having with the new recipe display. It appears that those of you using Internet Explorer 8 web browser were having issues with printing, but it should be fixed now. If anyone has any further issues, please let us know! Everything looks good on our end.
I really enjoy socca too, but I find it’s only good when it’s still warm/freshly made. Not so good to throw into a packed lunch, which is a shame. However, I’ve made thin English style pancakes (or crepes) by upping the water to flour ratio and pouring less into the pan. Those pancakes work really well as wraps, even the next day. I like them best with a thin coating of cream cheese, plenty of grated carrot and some peeled roasted bell peppers. they are nice and stretchy and don’t get soggy in the way bread wraps sometimes can. It’s been a while since I had one – may have to make them for lunch tomorrow :-)
Tried doing it with canned chickpeas and pureeing them in the food processor to make a batter…..doesn’t work. I guess because they are already cooked. them I used the flour and it was great! thanks!
I’ve made these twice now– they’re delicious! I love how simple they are!
I have made this twice for lunch, and it is so good! I don’t even need any accoutrements, I just fry it in some coconut oil, and it is delicious on its own! Thanks for a great recipe. :)
This was absolutely delicious. My first try at this was not exactly picture perfect but the taste was still good which is most important. I plan to keep perfecting this. I think next time i will make smaller pancakes instead of one big one. I was feeling ambitious though. Thank you for sharing so many amazing recipes. It has made cooking fun for me.
I made this with the Cashew Nacho Cheese from this recipe (left out the millet so it was quicker to make):
veganricha.com/2013/04/grilled-cashew-millet-cheese-sandwich.html
Wow was this YUM! And it was nice to change up breakfast from my usual oatmeal or green smoothie. These would be perfect for Sunday brunch.
Thanks Angela!!
Hi Angela,
I am following your blog since I became a vegan in January this year. Any of your recipes that I tried worked out very well and tasted great. I’m an addict now :-) Whenever I have some vegetables or any other ingredients and don’t know what to cook, I check your page for some ideas.
Many thanks for sharing all your ideas and recipes with us – as you can see, they even made it to far-away Germany.
And: Thank you so much for this brilliant recipe! I made it exactly as suggested and my husband loves it (and so do I).
I am very much looking forward to buying your cookbook – hope it will be available in Germany or online as well.
Take care and all the best for your future work!
Susanne
Hi Susanne,
Thank you for your lovely comment! So happy you are enjoying the recipes so much and thanks for being excited about my cookbook. :)
Just tried this recipe this morning! They were absolutely delicious!! Unfortunately, I only had salsa to put on top but next time I am definitely slicing up avocado to place on top! Yum, Yum :) Looking forward to your next post!
that looks delicious – I love chickpea flour (though I had a rough start with it too – now I put it in baking, socca, crackers etc) but the big plate made me laugh as I imagined this being served on some cafes I have been to where the tables are tiny and we try to juggle huge plates, lots of cups and teapots and side dishes :-)
Um, YUM!!!! Eating this as I’m typing. Followed the recipe exactly, my only regret is I halved the recipe because now I want more!!!!! This is my first time trying chickpea flour and I’m sure glad I did!!!
Obsessed with this recipe! Definitely making this again and again :)
thank you SO much for this recipe, angela! I just had it with some carrot hummus, baby spinach, caramelized onions and a healthy dose of sriracha for lunch. so good and so filling and so healthy! I had a bag of chickpea flour in my pantry that seemed to ruin every recipe that I tried it in but this savory pancake turned out so good, I might have to make it again tomorrow! soooo happy right now :)
I just tried your chickpea pancake, which looks amazing. The outside burned and the inside never fully cooked. I had it on a medium heat. At first I thought I had made it too thick, but the picture of your pancake is much thicker. HELP!!!!
I made a double batch of this in preparation for my work breakfasts this week and used capsicum and celery with some chopped corriander and chives as flavour boosters. I just enjoyed one pancake with a side of asparagus and topped with chopped tomatoes and I can say that it is definitely the best breakfast I have had in a long time. Thank you so much for the inspiration!
This recipe was awesome! I used red onions instead of green, but it turned out great. My omnivore boyfriend loved them too. Spicy cashew cream on the side was yummy. I never thought chickpea pancakes would be so good.
Do you think that it is possible to make your own chickpea flour with dried chickpeas and a food processor?
I think someone linked to a post detailing how you make it at home – I would give the comment a check! Good luck.
Thank you so much Angela for giving us a wonderful recipe and putting the post on a sunday morning, wow.
I will make sure to try it also on a sunday morning. I will now go through some of the other gems you have on the blog and you will see me lot more here :)
Hi Angela!!
This looks FANTASTIC, can’t wait to try it! I love getting protein in from a natural source (chickpeas) as opposed to relying on protein powders or more processed sources.
Did you have any luck thinning these out or making them more crepe or tortilla-like at all? They look great but I do know what you mean with the chickpea flour being so thick and dense — maybe adding more/different type of liquid would make them fluffier/lighter??
Has anyone had any luck with this??? :-)
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I’ve seen other recipes make thin crepes, but I didn’t have any luck (it cracked when I flipped it), but maybe I just didn’t cook it long enough? Good luck if you try it!
For the crepes, the secret is the sitting batter in my comment. It really needs to rest and absorb the liquid :o) I always have a batch in my freezer for crepe emergencies!
Thank you so much for this post Angela. I am a huge fan of Chickpea flour since I learned a few tricks I wanted to share. You can also blend the chickpea flour in your high speed blender for super mixing and flour moisture saturation. It works even better if you blend and then let the batter rest for at least 30 minutes, or as long as overnight in you fridge. This mellows the flavour. I also add more water and make crepes out of this batter, yummy!
Delicious. Grated courgettes (Zucchini) added to the batter are a fabulous veggie addition, too.