I started writing this blog because I wanted to give a healthy twist to those traditional dishes. Of course, since I got diabetes, I was mostly trying to find a neat solution to avoid sugar or at least finding an alternative for it. But in the end, everything is sugar. During digestion the food we eat will eventually turn into sugars. The question is how fast? My answer to this is balance. A meal that’s rich in fiber and protein, not only carbs, will rise your blood sugar level much slower and will make you feel full longer. And protein intake can sometimes be a huge problem for vegetarians. I say chickpea, people!

Chickpea is one of those superfoods for me. It has quite some carbs, to give you the energy, but also lots of fiber and protein. Chickpea flour has around 60% carbs, 20% protein and 15% fiber whereas cooked chickpeas will have round 30% carbs, 9% protein and 8% fiber.

When I first heard of Socca that funny word immediately caught my attention. For a reason. Farinata or Cade, as it is also called, is a chickpea pancake brought from Genoa to south of France, Nice and Toulon to be more precise. It’s a street food and there are some variations between the three, but the basic recipe for socca is:

300 g chickpea flour
500 ml water
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 tsp salt
pepper

The batter is poured into a large iron skillet and than baked in the oven at a really high temperature until golden brown.

So, I mixed a bit and came up with this broccoli chickpea gluten free pancakes, that are way better and certainly way healthier than the regular ones using plain white flour. The batter is less liquid so the pancakes will be slightly thicker, but they sure look nice and make a great contrast with the beet-avocado spread.

Ingredients:

for the broccoli chickpea pancakes:

• 100 g broccoli
• 75 g chickpea flour
• 2 eggs
• 140 ml milk of your choice (I used oat milk)
• 2 Tbsp oil
• 1/3 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 garlic clove
• salt, pepper

quick beet and avocado spread
(or if you have more time)

• 1 avocado
• 1 medium size cooked beet
• 1,5 tsp coriander seed
• 1,5 tsp cumin seed
• juice of half lemon
• salt

tahini sauce (optional):

• 1 big Tbsp tahini
• 1Tbsp olive oil
• 1 – 2 tsp lemon juice
• 3 – 4 Tbsp water
• salt

handful of spinach
goat cheese
roasted walnuts or hazelnuts

Preparation:

1. Put all the ingredients in the blender an mix well. Let rest in the fridge for at least an hour.
2. Finely grind coriander and cumin seeds.
3. Using a hand blender mix all the ingredients for the spread.
4. Bake the pancakes at medium heat in non-stick frying pan of 20cm in diameter until golden brown. Do not expect paper thin pancakes, they should be slightly thicker.
5. Spread the beet and avocado on half of the pancake, fill with spinach, goat cheese, tahini sauce and some roasted nuts.