Socca

When I was heading to Bangladesh back in February, my mom asked me what I could/couldn't eat as I would have been on the Whole Life Challenge during my visit. I sent her my list and she said to me, oh, you can have gram flour. I had totally forgot about gram flour - which is basically flour made from chick peas. It's actually the main ingredients to one of my favorite dishes that my mom makes for me, which was a total bonus for my trip home.

It's been many, many years since I've used gram flour in any of my cooking/baking. The fact that it's gluten free and vegan added to its appeal. I decided to give it a go. I'm definitely pleased with the outcome.

You can easily make gram flour at home by taking 2 cups of dried chick peas and putting them through a food processor and then running them through a sieve to separate any large chunky bits. You can also pre-roast the dried chick peas in the oven (200 C for 15 min) before putting them in the food processor.

I always associated the use of gram flour with traditional Bangladeshi dishes. However, one of my friends forwarded me an article about Socca which is basically a gram flour based pancake. It's incredibly simple to make.

Ingredients
1 cup of gram flour
1 cup of water
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 tablespoon of extra-virgin olive oil - plus extra for the pan

Directions
1. Pour the gram flour and salt in a bowl
2. Gradually whisk in the water and olive oil
3. Heat a pan and add some EVOO, enough to coat the pan. Add some of the socca batter. Cook for 6-7 minutes then flip and cook the other side for around 5 minutes.

I did a couple of variations of this.

My 1st attempt: pouring 3/4 cup of the batter and making a single pancake.

My 2nd attempt: I added some spices to the batter - 1/2 teaspoon each of cumin, garlic, ginger, and turmeric powder. I mixed the batter again to combine all the spices. I then put smaller dollops of the batter in the skillet -- about 2 tablespoons of batter for each. This turned out smaller pancakes.

mini socca pancakes

My 2nd attempt was definitely tastier. I guess it all depends on what you want to garnish the socca with. I added slices of avocado and sweet cherry tomatoes -- it was delicious!

I found the meal to be quite filling and hearty. I'm sure you can experiment with different combinations of ingredients - both to add to the batter as well as for the toppings.

Nutritional info (for the entire batch - makes about 20 small pancakes - based on the original socca basic recipe and not including the extra oil for frying)

475 calories
20.6 g. protein
53.2 g. carbohydrates (9.9 g. fiber)
20.2 g. fat (2.6 g. sat fat)