Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Scrambled chickpea flour

I've made this dish before, but unknowingly used black chickpea flour (kala chana besan), which is grainier and heavier than regular chickpea flour (chana besan).  The dish is much lighter and better with regular chickpea flour.

I have a hunch that both kala chana besan and chana besan are made from black chickpeas (kala chana)--a relative of white chickpeas (kabuli chana), which are commonly found in Western cuisines--and that the difference between the two flours is simply that the chickpeas in kala chana besan are unskinned.  Based on experience, I believe that both of these flours are quite different from Italian chickpea flour (farina di ceci), which is made from white chickpeas.  Once, I tried to make Italian farinata with besan, and it came out terrible.  I blame my suspected flour mix-up.

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