Warm chickpea salad

Nice salad to end a long day...:) I picked up this recipe from Les Recettes d'Orangette, Warm Chickpea salad with Shallots and Red wine Vinaigrette. Pretty easy to do if you use canned chickpeas. However, in SG, it's so much cheaper to buy dried chickpeas and cook it yourself than to buy canned garbanzo beans which can't be found in your usual mom-n-pop shops.
I soaked the dried chickpeas overnight and cooked for more than an hour till soft. You can do this step safely a night before, ie, soak them in the morning, cook in the evening, and use them the next evening. Just reboil or microwave the chickpeas before use to heat them up. The flavour develops with heat, I conclude. I added a whole red onion even though my chickpeas wasn't that much according to the recipe. This is a recipe which you can alter the quantity easily and won't affect the final output. Other than the salt in the onion mixture, I did not add any additional salt as teh vinegar taste is good enough. Lots of black pepper helps.
I did not have rice last night, just half of a plate of this... :) Feel healthy and satisfied.

Tzatiki & Salsa

Was in the mood for some Mediterrenean food recently. Searched a few websites and recipes books and made these 2 on Friday night. Grilled some nice baguatte to go with it. Nice, comfort food.
Tomato Salsa
3 tomatoes, diced
3 stalks of coriander, finely chopped
1 small red onion, finely chopped
1 clove of garlic, minced
Dressing:
3-4 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil
1.5 tbsp of red wine vinegar
juice from half a green lime (Thailand type which is bigger, not the local small ones)
pinch of salt
Whisk all the dressing ingredients with a fork and set aside. Add in all the chopped ingredients and toss. Set the salsa in the fridge for at least an hour to let the flavours develop.
Tzatiki
300g of unflavoured yogurt ( I used Pauls. Just make sure there's no sugar, starch or other funny ingredients in the yogurt)
1 medium cucumber
3 cloves of garlic, minced.
Dressing:
1 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil
1 tbsp of red wine vinegar
Juice from half a green lime (Thailand type which is bigger, not the local small ones)
Some dried oregano
Grate the cucumber and add some salt. Let it sit for 15mins and squeeze out all the water, leaving behind a compact mass. Whisk all the dressing ingredients and add the minced garlic. Add in the yogurt and the cucumber. Mix well, and set it in the fridge for at least an hour. The longer you leave it in the fridge, the stronger the garlic flavour. So, if you are not a garlic fan, you can choose to omit it. :)

Hummus...anyone?

Yes! I did made hummus today! Was surfing the blogs on Friday and saw this recipe from the Wednesday Chef. Bought a 250g pack of dried chickpeas from the supermarket on Sat, and decided... what the heck, so do it... Well, there are alot of recipes lying around which I want to do, alot of office work to clear, and things in the kitchen pantry waiting for me to use up before they expire. And of course, things to blog about. :)

So, whatever, this is my first attempt in making hummus. Boy, am I glad I did it. No more store-bought hummus after this time. All that cleaning up of the food processor was worth while, when I saw W's eyes grew big after his first taste of the hummus. We are fans of Mediterrenean food; tzatiki and hummus being 2 of the popular dips we love when we were in Greece for our honeymoon.

Thanks Luisa, for this wonderful recipe. It's really a keeper! Basically, it made my Sunday! :)