Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Adventures in Chickpea Flour

So -- aside from crepes and pancakes, I've discovered that chickpea flour is also great as a breading, like in my tofu sandwich.

However, last night I was deeply upset to discover that the thickener for VwaV chickpea gravy is all-purpose flour. I know a lot of people like to say it's the devil, and maybe it is, but all I can tell is that it's low in nutrients and has pretty empty calories. I struggled with what to do about this for a while-- I'm really trying to keep Andrew's diet nutrient packed and healthy. No calorie should be wasted. I could have used arrow root or corn starch-- but those all seemed to have the same problem as all-purpose flour. When I googled whole wheat as a thickener, that got mixed reviews. But then -- in a stroke of genius, I read the label of the chickpea flour and realized I could use that. The flavor was perfectly intact [[ of course it is a CHICKPEA gravy, so there's that ]] -- but if you ever want to improve the nutritional value of your gravy, simply sub in some chickpea flour. And coincidentally, would be a great gluten-free sub.

For a complete nutritional analysis, go here.

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