Add chickpea nuggets to your Christmas spread

As a Stir It Up! alumni, I joined a group of peer educators to prepare a Christmas spread, guided by Healthy Cities health promotion officer Manami Henderson. One of the dishes we prepared were these chickpea nuggets, an easy and cheap alternative to chicken nuggets. The recipe is from the Healthy Cities Cook, Chill, Chat program.

Ingredients

Serves 4

Chickpea mix

• 1 x 400g can chickpeas, drained and liquid reserved
• ½ cup rolled oats
• ½ tsp onion powder or ½ small onion, grated
• ½ tsp garlic powder or 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 1 tsp cumin powder
• 1 tsp coriander powder
• ½ tsp salt

For crumbing

• ½ cup flour
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1 cup breadcrumbs

Method

Drain chickpeas and reserve liquid. Place chickpeas, rolled oats, garlic, onion and spices in a blender. Pulse, adding enough liquid, until combined. Don’t make it too wet as it needs to be moulded into a firm nugget shape.

Prepare 3 shallow bowls for crumbing. Place flour in first bowl, eggs in the second and breadcrumbs in the third. Shape chickpea mix into small balls, coat in flour, dip in egg and cover with breadcrumbs. Repeat until all pieces are evenly coated. Spray or brush nuggets with olive oil and back for 25-30 minutes until golden.

Serve with a yoghurt tahini sauce – use half and half yoghurt and light tahini with a little lemon juice and water.