Thursday, November 27, 2008

My Evening Meal

There are two ways to make felafel. There is the wrong way, and there is my way. Here is my way:
Ingredients:

1 x cup of dried chickpeas, soaked overnight (Don't use the tinned variety, for fuck's sake, and resist any urge to cook the soaked chickpeas beforehand - they must be used "raw".)
A fistful of fresh parsley, finely chopped with a mezza luna or similar
3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped 1 medium onion, finely chopped
3 tsp cumin
2 tsp cayenne pepper
6 tbsp chickpea flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
2 tsp baking soda
Pan of vegetable oil

Method:

Put the chickpeas into a food-processor, together with the parsley, garlic, onion, cumin, cayenne, salt, baking soda, and pepper. Process, but not until pureed or anything like that, or you will regret it. (Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon, and for the rest of your life.) You want a sort of granular consistency. Once this is done, put into a bowl, add the chickpea flour, and stir thoroughly. When you have, place the mixture into a fridge for about an hour. This done, roll out the mixture into balls, each about the size of a ping-pong ball. Then fry in a pan of hot oil at least three inches deep, about half a dozen at a time. When they're cooking properly, they'll bob to the surface. Leave to fry until brown, then place onto kitchen rolls so as to soak up any excess fat. Eat in pitta bread, with salad, tahine, and chilli sauce.

Result:

My felafel is so fucking good that, when I fart afterwards, it no longer sounds like a fart. Instead, it sounds like Placido Domingo singing De' miei bollenti spiriti from La Traviata. Which, of course, is a bit hard on Placido Domingo when he does sing De' miei bollenti spiriti from La Traviata because members of the audience are likely to say "Do you mind!?", "Can someone open a fucking window, please?", and "Fuck me! What a stench!" But that's a small price to pay for having my arse play classical music. My only regret is that I have just one arsehole, rather than two, so I can only enjoy it in mono, and not stereo. Additionally, the sound can be a bit hissy, I suppose, but I'm soon going to have Dolby-B noise reduction fitted to my arse to deal with this problem. Such, anyway, is the Perfection of My Evening Meal.

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