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If you’re looking for the authentic flavors of Falafel but can’t go to Israel to get it, here’s a recipe for Homemade Falafel! Here’s a way to make Homemade Falafel using canned chickpeas that tastes like you bought it in the Machaneh Yehuda Shuk. This falafel has the flavors even a Sabra would love!

Homemade Falafel

Name: Homemade Falafel
Prep time: 15 min
Cook time: 20 min
Total time: 35 min
Cuisine: Gluten Free
Ingredients: 1 ½ (15-ounce) cans chickpeas, drained; 1 ½ onions, chopped; ¾ cup chopped fresh parsley; 3 cloves garlic, chopped; 2 eggs; 1 tablespoon ground cumin; 1 ½ teaspoons ground coriander; 1 ½ teaspoons salt; 1 ½ teaspoons lemon juice; 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder; 1 pinch ground black pepper, or to taste; 1 pinch cayenne pepper, or to taste; 1 ½ cups (gluten free) bread crumbs (I used Jason brand gluten free plain panko crumbs); 1 tablespoon olive oil, or as needed; oil for frying; 1 baby carrot (optional); 6 whole (gluten free) pita breads; Assorted Salads (see below)

Middle Eastern foods taste incredible, but sometimes it seems that the only way to get the authentic taste is by going to restaurants. Especially those savory, flavor packed falafels with crispy falafel balls and authentic Israeli salads inside. I found a way to make Homemade Falafel using canned chickpeas that tastes like the real-deal. All you need is a blender or food processor and a skillet and you can have a falafel with flavors a Sabra would love.

Can you tell I LOVE Homemade Falafel???

Where I found the recipe for Homemade Falafel

I love falafel, but it can be difficult to find it gluten free. I stopped ordering it because I couldn’t chance that I’d get “glutened”. The other issue was finding gluten free pita, although that’s less of an issue as you can find some now in stores that are pretty good.

Finding or developing a glute free falafel ball recipe was challenging, until… I found a recipe on allrecipes.com under Falafel with Canned Chickpeas. It’s a great recipe and fairly easy to make. While the recipe includes using a blender, I think you could easily make it using a food processor (which might even work better).

Here is how my raw gluten free Homemade Falafel batter turned out using a blender.

How I changed the original recipe

There were a few steps and ingredients in the original recipe that I changed to make it gluten free as well as easier to make.

Making Homemade Falafel Gluten Free

The original allrecipes.com recipe calls for traditional bread crumbs. I used Jason brand “panko” crumbs and they worked extremely well. You need to allow the final mixture to rest a few minutes in order for the bread crumbs to absorb all the liquid and stiffen a little before frying.

It’s important to let the gluten free Homemade Falafel batter sit so the crumbs can absorb all the liquid.

Using a blender

I used my pretty powerful blender, but it had a little trouble blending the first ingredients because they were too dry. Rather than adding the eggs and lemon juice after blending the chickpeas, onions, parsley and garlic by themselves, I added them while blending and the mixture blended much more easily. This ended up with a mixture that was a little more smooth than the original recipe probably intended. Using a food processor might have worked better in chopping the ingredients and getting a slightly coarser texture.

My trick still worked well and the falafel patties were still incredible.

I used my blender but feel free to use a food processor.

I made the Homemade Falafel Balls half the size

The falafel ball “patties” that I made were half the size of the original recipe, which surprised me. The allrecipes.com ones didn’t seem so big, but I used my cookie scooper to scoop out the portions and they seemed to be appropriately sized. Even those I thought were a little big a patties.

Ideally, if you have a fryer, you could make the ball shape, but without one making the patties works just fine.

Homemade Falafel (Gluten Free). Mine are half the size of the original recipe falafel patties.

Making Homemade Falafel in Gluten Free Pita

The Homemade Falafel in Gluten Free Pita included what I consider to be the traditional ingredients in an “authentic” falafel. While I made nearly all these ingredients from scratch, please feel free to purchase them ready made. I can’t stress that enough. It was kind of a job to do everything from scratch, including making the gluten-free pita.

Here’s what I did.

The Gluten Free Pita

I’m a big fan of The Loopy Whisk. I follow her on Instagram and have even purchased her latest book – The Elements of Baking. So, when it came time to look for a homemade Gluten Free Pita recipe, I immediately when to her site first.

I found The Loopy Whisk Easy Gluten Free Pita Bread recipe.

The Loopy Whisk Gluten Free Pita. Looks amazing, and it’s the recipe I used to make my gluten free pita.

I tried different methods of cooking the pita, with my pizza oven working best. Mine didn’t poof as well as hers did, but I think it will take a little practice. The other issue was that I really needed to shorten the baking time with the pizza oven, and the first pita was a little overcooked.

Homemade Gluten Free Pita in my Bella Pizza Oven!

I’ll be putting together a reel with the steps I took to make this gluten free pita bread.

Keep in mind that you’ll need to prep in advance with the ingredients. Not everyone has psyllium husks and millet flour on hand.

Another crucial tip is to actually weigh the ingredients using grams. A cup of my millet flour didn’t weigh 135g so I had to adjust accordingly.

Homemade Gluten Free Pita.

The Eggplant

In Israel you’ll often find roasted eggplant on the “buffet” for falafel fillings. I’ve found that they are often super oily, but delicious! My solution was to take a whole eggplant, dice it, toss it with some oil and basic spices and air fry it.

It was amazing!

Air Fried Eggplant is AWESOME.

The Slaw

There’s always some sort of cabbage slaw to put into the pita. The easiest way to make the slaw is to take 1/4 cup vinegar, 1/4 cup warm/hot water and 1/4 cup sugar and blend them until the sugar is completely dissolved. Add a bag of ready made coleslaw mix, and toss with the dressing, salt, pepper and a little oil.

Let it sit for a while, tossing periodically.

Done.

The Israeli Salad

I chopped up some tomato, cucumber and cilantro, added some salt, black pepper and a little garlic oil for the perfect salad. You can always make your own version or purchase a ready made version.

The Tahini Sauce

I LOVE techina/tahini. I put it on just about everything, including pizza. You can never have enough techina!

I asked Alexa for a recipe and she gave me 1/4 cup of tahini paste (pure tahini with nothing added), 2 tablespoons of lemon juice and 1/4 cup water. I added some chopped cilantro, salt and black pepper.

Perfect.

The French Fries

You can’t have a “real” falafel without “chips” – a.k.a. French Fries.

I saved some of the French fries from the previous nights dinner, then popped them in my air fryer to re-crisp. I’m a big fan of the Ore-Ida brand fries.

The Hummus and Charif

Dear Husband almost always has a tub of Sabra Supremely Spicy Hummus. It’s basically a tub of hummus with a big blob of schug in the middle.

Two birds with one stone.

Here’s the recipe for Homemade Falafel (Balls)

This is the recipe I used to make the Homemade Falafel balls/patties. I’ll include the recipes/links for the other falafel fillers in the notes below. Again, feel free to purchase any of the salads or gluten free pita if it makes your life easier.

Homemade Falafel

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Author: Sharon Matten - Kosher Everyday via allrecipes.com
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 20 minutes
Total Time: 35 minutes
Yield: 24 falafel balls/patties 1x
Category: Main Dish
Method: Frying
Cuisine: Gluten Free
Diet: Kosher

Print Recipe

Description

If you’re looking for the authentic flavors of Falafel (especially with those savory, flavor packed falafels with crispy falafel balls and authentic Israeli salads inside), but can’t go to Israel to get it, here’s a recipe for Homemade Falafel! Here’s a way to make Homemade Falafel using canned chickpeas that tastes like you bought it in the Machaneh Yehuda Shuk. This falafel has the flavors even a Sabra would love!

The original recipe for Falafel with Canned Chickpeas from allrecipes.com can be found here.

Ingredients

Scale

For the Homemade Falafel (balls/patties)

1 1/2 (15-ounce) cans chickpeas, drained
1 1/2 onions, chopped
3/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
3 cloves garlic, chopped
2 eggs
1 tablespoon ground cumin
1 1/2 teaspoons ground coriander
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 teaspoons lemon juice
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 pinch ground black pepper, or to taste
1 pinch cayenne pepper, or to taste
1 1/2 cups (gluten free) bread crumbs (I used Jason brand gluten free plain panko crumbs)
1 tablespoon olive oil, or as needed
oil for frying
1 baby carrot (optional)

For Finishing

6 whole (gluten free) pita breads
Assorted Salads (see below)

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Instructions

For the Homemade Falafel (balls/patties)

Mash chickpeas in a bowl using a masher. Combine mashed chickpeas, onions, parsley, and garlic in a blender or food processor; blend until smooth. *If using a blender and you find the mixture too thick to blend, add the eggs and the lemon juice at this point.
Mix eggs*, cumin, coriander, salt, lemon juice*, baking powder, black pepper, and cayenne together in a bowl. Add chickpea mixture and mix together.
Add bread crumbs slowly and combine using your hands until mixture will hold together when frying.
Heat oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Using a cookie scooper or tablespoon, form mixture into 24 falafel balls, then flatten slightly into patties. If using a deep frying you can leave the falafel as actual balls. When using a skillet patties are way easier.
Fry patties in hot oil until browned on both sides.

For Finishing

Cut the the top quarter off a whole pita bread, the place the cut off top into the bottom of the larger section, open side up.
Fill your falafel with all the falafel fixings (see below). Make sure to pour lots of techina on top.

Equipment

Brandless Pro-Blender

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Chosen Foods 100% Pure Avocado Oil for Cooking – 1.75L (KP)

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Cuisinart DFP-14BCNY 14 Cup Food Processor, Silver

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Goya Low Sodium Chick Peas, Garbanzo Beans, 15.5 oz

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GreenPan Valencia Pro Hard Anodized Healthy Ceramic Nonstick 10″ and 12″ Frying Pan Skillet Set, PFAS-Free, Induction, Dishwasher Safe, Oven Safe, Gray

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GreenPan Valencia Pro Hard Anodized Healthy Ceramic Nonstick 11″ Frying Pan Skillet

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HexClad 12 Inch Hybrid Nonstick Frying Pan and Tempered Glass Lid

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HexClad 14 Inch Hybrid Stainless Steel Frying Pan with Lid

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Landau Panko Crumbs”Gluten Free” Kosher For Passover 7 Ounce (Plain)

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Vitamix 5200 Blender, Professional-Grade, Container, Self-Cleaning 64 oz, Black/Grey

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