Falafel
Updated April 16, 2024
Christopher Testani for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Simon Andrews.
- Total Time
- 1 hour, plus soaking
- Rating
- Comments
- Read comments
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Ingredients
1 ¾ cups dried chickpeas or 1 cup dried chickpeas plus ¾ cup dried split fava beans
2 garlic cloves, lightly crushed
½ onion, quartered
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground cayenne, or to taste; or mild chile powder to taste
½ cup chopped fresh parsley or cilantro leaves
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon black pepper, or to taste
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon lemon juice, or more to taste
Neutral oil, such as grapeseed or canola, for deep-frying
Nutritional analysis per serving (6 servings)
39 grams carbs; 336 calories; 8 grams monounsaturated fat; 5 grams polyunsaturated fat; 1 gram saturated fat; 15 grams fat; 8 grams fiber; 204 milligrams sodium; 12 grams protein; 7 grams sugar
Note: The information shown is Edamam’s estimate based on available ingredients and preparation. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
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Preparation
- Step 1
Put beans in a large bowl and cover with water by 3 to 4 inches; they will triple in volume as they soak. Soak for 24 hours, checking once or twice to see if you need to add water to keep the beans covered.
- Step 2
Drain beans well and transfer to a food processor with all the remaining ingredients except the oil; pulse until minced but not puréed; add water tablespoon by tablespoon if necessary to allow the machine to do its work, but keep the mixture as dry as possible. (Too much water and your falafel will fall apart. If that happens, add more ground beans.) Taste and adjust seasoning, adding more salt, pepper, cayenne or a little more lemon juice as needed.
- Step 3
Put at least 2 to 3 inches of oil (more is better) in a large, deep saucepan (the narrower the pan, the less oil you need; but the more oil you use, the more you can cook at one time). Turn heat to medium high and heat oil to about 350 (a pinch of batter will sizzle immediately; a piece of falafel will sink halfway to the bottom, then rise).
- Step 4
Scoop out heaping tablespoons of the mixture and shape it into balls or small patties.
- Step 5
Fry in batches, without crowding, until nicely browned, turning as necessary; total cooking time per batch will be less than 5 minutes. Serve hot or at room temperature.
Private Notes
Comments
There's a recipe I once saw on the internet that has a key tip for falafel, in my experience. The soaked beans should be processed alone to a bread crumb texture. Then the other stuff (cilantro, parsley, onion, garlic, spices, etc.) should be processed separately into a slurry. The two should then be mixed together. This prevents the overall mixture from becoming too wet and keeps a more bread-like texture to the falafel.
Great basic formula, but the mix bakes just as well as it fries (or better, if you don't like fried food). 20-ish minutes at about 375 until golden brown; not as crisp, but simple and less greasy.
Perfect recipe. Instead of deep frying, I like to make patties instead of balls, and shallow fry them on each side.
I used 1 lb of dried chickpeas and added about 4-5 heaping tablespoons of chickpea flour to get the mixture to hold together. I appreciated the recipe description saying 'don't fret about deep-frying' because I was fretting about it. But I used my 7.5 quart Le Crueset dutch oven and it worked perfectly. The recipe made 30 falafel and I was able to do batches of 8 without crowding them in the pot. Best falafel I've ever made!
Step 2: add water. How much water? Not getting this instruction at all.
Used same quantity Chana Dal instead of chickpeas soaked them overnight covered with water. Ground to fine mix in food processor then added dry spice ingredients to mix to blend. Set wall oven to convection bake 400 F and put clay baking sheet in to heat. Processed wet ingredients together with hand blender ( lemon juice, onion, garlic, chopped fresh flat parsley etc) to a slurry with visible parsley bits. Only change was to add more lemon maybe 2-3 tablespoons. Turned dry mix into large open bowl & with hands redistributed some concentrated spice mix with the ground soaked Chana Dal. Added the wet slurry to the dry in two batches thoroughly mixing by hand. On another sheet pan with silicone matt formed small balls out of mixture - they held together well. When oven hot removed clay sheet pan & dropped the flattened balls swishing them to abit less than a centimetre to 3/8 inch thick. I sprayed with avocado oil but wasn’t happy with spray so brushed with grape seed oil & returned to oven to bake for 15 minutes or golden. Flipped carefully & brushed with more oil cooking for another 12-15 minutes. Family called it a new staple!