Roasted Chickpea Salad

This chickpea salad packs in the best of all worlds; it’s healthy, nutritious and most importantly, very, very yummy. Serve it with some toasted bread and you have a lovely meal right there; or serve it as a side.

Serves: 2 to 4

Ingredients:

• 1 can chickpeas (drained weight 240 g)
• ¼ tsp. salt (for roasting the chickpeas)
• 2/3 tbsp. olive oil (for roasting the chickpeas)
• ¼ tsp. turmeric powder
• ¼ tsp. red chilli powder (or to taste)
• ¼ tsp. cumin powder
• 1 cup chopped cucumber
• 1 cup chopped tomato
• 1 cup chopped yellow bell pepper
• 1 small onion
• ¼ cup chopped coriander leaves
• 3 tbsp. olive oil
• 2 tbsp. vinegar
• 2 tbsp. honey
• ½ tsp. salt (or to taste)
• ¼ tsp. ground black pepper (or to taste)

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees Celsius.
2. Rinse and drain the chickpeas, then pat them dry by using kitchen paper. Arrange the chickpeas in a single layer on a baking tray. Sprinkle ¼ tsp. salt and 2/3 tbsp. olive oil on to the chickpeas and mix well.
3. Place the tray on the medium rack of the preheated oven and bake for 30 minutes. At 15 minutes, take the tray out of the oven to toss and redistribute the chickpeas so that they cook evenly.
4. When done, remove the tray from the oven and sprinkle the chickpeas with the turmeric, red chilli powder and cumin powder. Give it a good mix and set aside.
5. Chop the cucumber, tomato and bell pepper (we cut everything into quarters and then chopped them into ½ cm thick pieces). Mince the onion and chop the coriander roughly. (You can actually do all the chopping while the chickpeas are in the oven; you’ll probably be able to prepare the dressing as described below too.)
6. Make the dressing by combining the olive oil, vinegar, honey, salt and black pepper in a small bowl. Do a taste test and adjust to your liking.
7. Add the chickpeas, all the chopped veggies, and coriander to a mixing bowl. Add the dressing and toss gently to combine.