Chickpea Stew

Today I tried another recipe from "Eat Clean". This was a fun recipe because I had never used dried chickpeas (garbanzo beans) before. The recipe said to soak the beans overnight, but I decided to do this recipe early this morning. I drove to Fred Meyer, bought some chickpeas from the bins, hurried home and started soaking the beans. They had 7 hours to soak before I started to cook them. This seemed to be just about the right amount of time.

The recipe didn't call for any salt. When I tried it at the end it was quite bland. I added a scant teaspoon of celtic sea salt and it was much better. The stew had a mild curry flavor and was quite delicious. We served it over rice. Mark says this is another keeper.

Chickpea Stew

1 cup dried chickpeas

4 Tbsp coconut butter or EVOO

3 Tbsp chopped fresh rosemary

1 tsp ground turmeric

2 tsp curry powder

1 yellow onion, peeled and coarsely chopped

3 carrots, peeled and cut into chunks

2 firm good-sized potatoes, cut into chunks

4 stalks celery, cut into chunks, leaves included

4 cloves fresh garlic, passed through a garlic press

Pinch cayenne pepper

½ cup raisins, soaked for one hour in hot water then drained, reserving liquid

1.            Place dried chickpeas in a large bowl. Cover with about six inches of water. Place a large plate over the bowl and let soak overnight on the counter

2.            The next day drain the chickpeas and place them in a large stockpot with plenty of water. Cook until tender – about one hour. Remove from heat and let the chickpeas stand for an hour. Drain, reserving the cooking liquid. Rinse well. Repeat.

3.            Combine soaking liquid from raisins with a minimum of two cups of the reserved cooking liquid from the chickpeas in a large measuring cup. Stir and set aside.

4.            Place half of the cooked chickpeas in a blender and sue half of the reserved chickpea/raisin liquit to blend the chickpeas to a uniform smoothness. Place half of the coconut butter or oil in the blender along with the chickpeas and add rosemary, turmeric and curry powder. Blend again. Set aside.

5.            Heat remaining coconut butter or oil in the soup pot. Add onion and cook for several minutes, or until onion becomes soft and translucent. Add remaining vegetables and cook, stirring all the while. Add a bit more coconut butter or oil if the pan is too dry. Add remaining chickpea/raisin liquid. Cover the vegetables and let cook for another several minutes.

6.            Add remaining ingredients and stir well. Add chickpea mixture from blender and stir again. Cook, covered for 20 minutes.

7.            Serve over hot couscous or rice.

Nutrition information:  Yields 8 x one-cup servings, 171 calories each