Chickpea flour is flour made from dried chickpeas (garbanzo beans). Also known as garbanzo flour, gram flour and besan, chickpea flour is a staple of Indian, Pakistani and Bangladesh cuisines. In Morocco, garbanzo flour from unroasted chickpeas is used to make Kalinti, a quiche-like dish often sold as a street food.
Chickpea flour can be found in Asian and Middle Eastern markets, but you can make your own at home from dried chickpeas. You'll need a food processor and coffee/spice blender.
You can roast your chickpeas lightly before grinding to yield gram flour or besan, but for many recipes that step is unnecessary.
Difficulty: Easy
Time Required: 10 minutes
Here's How:
- Place 250 g of dried chickpeas in a food processor. Cover, and process on high speed for two or three minutes until a powdery flour forms. Cover the top of the feed tube so that chickpea flour doesn't waft out while the machine is running.
- Sift the mixture into a bowl to separate the fine flour from the hard bits of chickpeas which did not grind.
- Use a spice grinder to process the remaining bits of chickpeas to a fine, powdery flour. Do this in batches of one or two tablespoons at a time.
- When all of the chickpeas have been ground to flour, sift again to remove and discard any remaining pieces of chickpeas which did not process.
- Proceed with using the chickpea flour in a recipe, or store in an airtight container until needed.
What You Need
- 250 g of dried chickpeas (or any quantity desired)
- food processor
- coffee/spice grinder
- sifter
