Pasta with chickpeas and vegetables in tahini sauce

I have just suggested 'Pasta' for his recipe, because it will really go with just about any short pasta.  Indeed, if you make more sauce, it would also successfully coat a longer type of pasta.  While I've suggested specific vegetables, this is essentially a meal that can be made using ingredients you’d have in your lockers, with whatever vegetables you have to hand. There is, however, one proviso to this: I suggest sprinkling black sesame seeds over the meal when it’s served: white sesame seeds can be used as a substitute, but the black ones look and taste great!

 

Serves 2

 

Ingredients

1/2 cup of chickpeas, soaked and cooked

olive oil

1 onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

about 4 button mushrooms, sliced

1/2 red pepper, chopped

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp chilli flakes, or to taste

about 6 florets from a head of broccoli

4 handfuls of pasta, such as fusilli

2 tbsp tahini

reserved water from the pasta

salt and pepper

1 tbsp black sesame seeds

 

Method:

• Cook the chickpeas in the usual way and set aside.
• Add olive oil to a large saucepan over a moderately high heat.
• Add the onions and garlic and cook for a few minutes until the onions are softening, stirring frequently to ensure nothing burns.
• Add the mushroom and red pepper and sprinkle with salt, stir into the onions and garlic and cook for a few minutes until there is some colour on both the onions and red peppers, then lower the heat. Add in the chilli flakes, stir well and cover. Leave over a low heat while you cook the pasta.
• Bring salted water to boil in a saucepan and throw in the pasta. Stir well to ensure that it doesn’t stick together. Bring back to the boil, cover and lower the heat so that it doesn’t boil over. Set the timer for 5 minutes
• When the timer rings, add the broccoli florets and cook until both pasta and broccoli are just not soft. If you like crunchy broccoli, wait a bit longer before adding it.
• While this is cooking, put the tahini into a small, together with generous amounts of salt and pepper. When the pasta and broccoli are done, remove them from the water, using a slotted spoon, or drain the water into a jug, and add them to the vegetables.
• Add a tablespoonful or so of pasta water to the tahini and mix to a smooth consistency. Tahini varies tremendously in how thick it is, but you want to end up with a sauce that pours easily and will coat the pasta and vegetables. Mix with a butter knife or mini whisk until it becomes a creamy colour, then add to the pan.
• Stir gently until everything is mixed and serve.

Garnish with a generous amount of black sesame seeds.

 

Note:

• If you have no black sesame seeds, substitute with white.
• I'm not sure the pasta water has the same effect when used with gluten-free pasta, but it can't do any harm!
  

Variations: 

• Use white beans instead of chickpeas.
• Replace the broccoli with cauliflower florets.
• For a voyaging variation, use chopped cabbage.
• Add green beans or asparagus with or instead of some of the other vegetables.
• Replace the red pepper with carrot.
• Add a couple of tbsp of freeze-dried peas with or instead of some of the vegetables.
• Use bulgur wheatinstead of pasta. In this case you will have to cook the broccoli separately.
• Add chopped fresh herbs, if you have some.

Chickpeas and fusilli in tomato sauce

 

 

This is an old favourite of mine. Incredibly simple to make, but astonishingly good to eat. Moreover, this is perfect voyaging food, because it is made from ingredients that you will have in your lockers. I prefer it with fusilli – spirals – but of course it will go with whatever pasta you have on board.

Serves 2

Ingredients

1/2 cup of chickpeas, soaked and cooked

a good glug of olive oil

1 onion, finely chopped

2 cloves of garlic, crushed or diced

425 g/14 oz can of tomatoes (See Notes)

a little wine

about a dozen black olives

1 tsp capers

1 tsp Annie's Mixed Herbs

up to 1/4 tsp chilli flakes

salt and pepper

4 handfuls of fusilli

Method:

• Cook the chickpeas as usual.
• Pour the olive oil into a large saucepan over a medium heat. Add the onion and cook until softened and translucent. Add a little salt to speed things up, if you want.
• When the onion is almost cooked, add the garlic and cook until it’s soft.
• Now add the tomatoes and rinse out the can with wine, if you’re using it. If you’re using whole tomatoes, break them up with your spoon.
• If you’re using them, stone and halve the olives. Add the drained capers.
• Season with herbs andchilli flakes - which give a nice lift - and a generous amount of black pepper. Taste and add salt if it can take it.
• Bring to the boil and add the chickpeas.
• Lower the heat and cook until the sauce has become quite thick.
• When the sauce is almost ready, cook the fusilli until it reaches the consistency you like.
• Remove it from the cooking water with a slotted spoon, or drain it into a jug (you may need some of the water to thin down the sauce) and add it to the other pan. Cook for a few minutes longer. Check the seasoning and serve.

Add Parmesan (vegan, if you prefer) at the table, if you like it.

Notes:

• Ideally, use chopped tomatoes in purée, but if you don’t have those, any others will do. It’s worth using better quality tomatoes in this recipe (most recipes for that matter!) for the extra flavour. They seem to be less watery, too.
• Substitute dried, cooked chickpeas with a can

Variation

• Use cannellini or butter beans.
• Add finely diced celery if you have some.
• Try this with pasta shells, or similar. You want a pasta that will hold the sauce.

Italian chickpea Soup

This is a substantial and well-flavoured soup, suitable for winter lunches or a main meal. It would go very well with sun-dried tomato bread. The ingredients are not really voyaging vegetables, but they keep reasonably well and you would still be able to make this soup a week into your passage.

 

Use 1/3 seawater to 2/3 fresh, if the sea is clean, and leave out the salt.

Serves at least 8 as a starter, 2 or 3 for a main course

Ingredients

 

3 large sticks of celery

1 leek

1 cup chickpeas, soaked

5 cups boiling stock or water

2 bay leaves

1½ tsp oregano

3/4 tsp rosemary

1/4 tsp chilli

14 oz/400 g tin of diced tomatoes

 handful of finely chopped fresh basil or parsley, or 1 tsp dried basil

2 tsp balsamic vinegar

salt and pepper

Method:

• Thinly slice the celery.
• Trim the leek, removing the root end and any discoloured outer leaves; trim the top. Slice thinly, washing any slices that have grit or soil lodged in them.
• Drain the chickpeas and put them in your pressure cooker, together with the water/stock, celery, leek, bay leaves, oregano, rosemary and chilli.
• Bring to pressure over a high heat and then cook at high pressure for 20 minutes. Reduce pressure naturally.
• Remove the bay leaves and discard. With a slotted spoon, take out 4 or 5 spoons of chickpeas and put them in a bowl together with half the tomatoes. Mash together to thicken the soup.
• Put the tomato/chickpea mix back in the pressure cooker together with the parsley or basil and the vinegar. Season with salt and pepper.
• Simmer for a further few minutes so that the tomato flavour permeates the whole and serve hot. 

Variations:

• Add (vegan) Parmesan cheese at the table.
• Try using butter beans instead of the chickpeas

Minestrone soup

The name ‘Minestrone’ has become something of a catch-all for a tomato, vegetable and pasta soup. I don’t pretend that the following version is any more authentic than most, but it certainly is attractive and full of flavour. I usually use black-eyed peas, because they enrich the colour of the soup, but it’s equally good made with whole lentils or chick pea(s).

Use 1/3 seawater to 2/3 fresh, if the sea is clean, and leave out the salt.

 

Serves 4 to 6 as a starter, 2 for a main course

 

Ingredients

2 tbsp olive oil
2 onions
2 garlic cloves
1 carrot
1 stick celery OR 1 tsp celery seed
4 cups water
1/4 cup black-eyed peas
1 cup chopped cabbage
a piece of Pamesan cheese rind

14 oz/400 g tin of chopped tomatoes

2 tsp Annie's Mixed Herbs

about 20 lengths of spaghetti

salt and pepper

 Parmesan cheese

Method:

• Heat the olive oil in the pressure cooker.
• Chop the onions and garlic and cook over a fairly high heat until they’re starting to brown. 
• While this is happening, dice the carrot and the celery (seed). Add to the other vegetables. 
• Pour in the water, add the black-eyed peas and bring to the boil. Pressure cook for 10 minutes. Reduce pressure gradually. 
• When you can safely remove the lid, add the chopped cabbage to the pan. Return it to the flame. If you’re using the Parmesan cheese rind, cut this into small dice and add. 
• Empty the tomatoes into the pan and mix them in.
•  Now add the herbs and stir thoroughly. 
• When the soup is boiling once more, lower the heat to a simmer, break the spaghetti into 25 mm (1 in) lengths and add this. Stir to separate the pieces of pasta.
• Add salt and pepper. Minestrone responds well to ½ tsp of cracked black pepper. Taste after a couple of minutes to see if it needs more salt.
• Cook until the spaghetti has softened – you can bring it back up to pressure for 3 minutes if you wish.
• Serve with chunks of bread and, if you have it, plenty of Parmesan cheese.

Variations:

• Use cannellini beans instead of the black-eyed beans. These will need soaking first. Or you could use a can.
• Replace the cabbage with kale
• Add 2 tbsps of freeze-dried peas
• Add chopped pepper to taste
• Replace the celery with 1 tsp celery seed
• Use chopped tomatoes in purée for a thicker soup.
• Add 1/4 tsp dried chilli flakes
  

Note:

• Vegans can use home-made vegan "Parmesan" cheese!

Hummus (chickpea)

This is another very popular middle-eastern recipe that nowadays appears in almost every supermarket. I prefer to make it myself, because I don’t like hummus to be too smooth or light. Ideally, you make it with a very full-flavoured olive oil.

 

Serves 4 as a starter

 

1/2 cup dried chickpeas, soaked and cooked OR 400 g (14 oz) can chickpeas

1/2 tsp dried, minced garlic

1 tbsp olive oil

2 tbsp tahini

1 tbsp lemon juice

salt and pepper

extra olive oil

paprika

Method:

• Cook the chickpeas for five minutes longer than usual and drain, reserving the liquid. If using a can, drain that and reserve the liquid.
• Put the chickpeas into a mixing bowl and mash with a fork or potato masher.
• Incorporate the garlic, olive oil, tahini and lemon juice. Combine thoroughly. You should have a thick paste. If it’s too thick, mix in some of the reserved cooking liquid. If you prefer a more commercial-style hummus, mix further with a wire whisk, adding extra liquid to produce a lighter, smoother purée.
• Season – carefully if you’ve used canned chick peas, which may already be salted.
• To present the hummus attractively, scrape it into a crockery bowl, smooth it down and then make little ridges with a fork. Dribble olive oil over the top and then sprinkle with paprika.

Variations:

• Add 1/2 tsp ground cumin when you mix in the garlic.
• Add 1/4 tsp cayenne or dried chilli flakes, when you mix in the garlic.

 

Crispy fried chickpeas

These make a change from peanuts and can be as hot as you like!

Serves 2

1/2 cup dried chickpeas, soaked and cooked

1 tbsp coconut or olive oil

1/4 tsp salt

3/4 tsp garam masala

3/4 tsp garlic powder

1/4 to1/2 tsp cayenne, or to taste

1/4 tsp turmeric powder

1/2 tsp dry mango powder OR 1/4 tsp kala namak (black salt)

 

Method:

• Drain the chick peas.
• Add them to a bowl and then add all the spices and mix well. 
  
• Heat the oil until it’s hot. 
• Tip in the spiced chick peas and fry until they’re crisp and golden all over.
• Add more salt if you want and serve.