Chickpeas, Lentils & Split Peas

Ravenous, a food column by Jennifer Brizzi

Feel your pulses

Ran in the Kingston Times and Mid-Hudson Post-Pioneer, April 13, 2006

Four months ago in this space I covered beans but omitted a whole category of dried legumes that are just as tasty, cheap and nourishing. Chick peas, lentils and split peas have been sustaining the world's poor and not-so-poor since ancient times; it's unfortunate that much of our own nation's poor subsists on processed junk food instead of simmered pulses, which are the easiest thing to prepare-just add water and cook. Their inimitable, versatile flavors range from the hearty rich nuttiness of chick peas to the soothing earthiness of lentils to the creamy smoothness of split peas.

Although they are underrated by most Americans, we grow much of the world's chick peas and most of its lentils and dried peas, in the Palouse region of eastern Washington and northern Idaho. But most of it is banished, packed into 100-pound bags and shipped out of the country on big barges that travel down rivers and into the Pacific Ocean.

Healthy, low-cal and full of protein and vitamins, these legumes are also full of good old-fashioned roughage, which not only flushes out our arteries like Roto-Rooter but make us feel full and happy and less likely to reach for seconds, thirds or chocolate cake.

Dried chick peas look like tiny roast chickens, with tan bodies and unique wrinkly shapes. Between a pea and a bean botanically, the chick pea is neither but rather its own species.

In prehistoric times chick peas from Southwest Asia traveled to Sicily and Switzerland, and now they're the most widely eaten legume worldwide, especially loved in the Mediterranean, Middle East and India. The original chick pea was small and dark (a variety still found in India today) and was eventually bred to be bigger and paler.

Dried chick peas have to be soaked overnight and take a long time to cook, so I usually just open a can. I love them plain, straight out the can with just a quick rinse, but they're great embellishing a salad or as a centerpiece of their own salad, perhaps with cucumber, yogurt and garlic, or with provolone, diced salami and black olives.

Chick peas add heartiness and protein to an all-vegetable mélange in a soup or curry. And they're the backbone of the ubiquitous and often mediocre hummus dip. Look for (or make) a good one, with good fresh tahini and plenty of garlic. It's best with dried chick peas rather than canned, but I admit I never make it this way although I know I should.

In Italy they adore their little ceci, pronounced “chetchy.” When a French force occupied Palermo in the thirteenth century, a Sicilian folk story goes, a French soldier was too free with his hands as he frisked a local girl, getting all the French kicked out of the city. To check if men were French or local, Sicilians would tell them to say “ceci.” If it sounded more like “sheshy,” they were killed.

In Sicily they eat a street food called panelle made of crispy fried chick pea flour batter, similar to France's socca. In other parts of Italy they like their pasta e ceci or zuppa di ceci with tomatoes and rosemary. Or they roast them up crunchy and snack on them like nuts.

In Spain garbanzos flesh out cocido, a hearty stew of an astounding variety of meats, sausages and vegetables.

In the Middle East you'll find them in crispy falafel sandwiches, in an Algerian soup with bulgur and lemon, or an elaborate Moroccan chorba with lamb, chicken and saffron.

According to Madhur Jaffrey, there is an Indian saying that if you eat ten chick peas a day you'll never have a heart attack. Whether that's true or not, they do love them there, with red, black and brown versions and a huge variety of wondrous dishes around the country that feature them.

Unlike chickpeas, tiny flat lentils don't need to be soaked before cooking but can go right into the pot. The lentil goes back 9000 years, and although they are related to beans they are actually the seed of a grass. They are an excellent source of iron, especially when eaten with Vitamin C-rich foods like tomatoes, green peppers or citrus.

Lentils can't decide whether they are highbrow or lowbrow. While chefs in fancy restaurants sit fine meats on beds of lentils, in a play by Aristophanes a guy says about his nouveau riche friend that "Now he doesn't eat lentils anymore."

I love to make simple vegetarian lentil soups like the Turkish one with bulgur, tomatoes and spinach from Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant (Fireside, 1990). Another Turkish soup pairs the tiny red variety of lentil with rice, mint and hot peppers. And then there's the Sicilian lentil soup with ditalini and parsley that we enjoy on New Year's Day for prosperity, the lentils symbolizing tiny coins. It never works, but the soup's great.

In Ethiopia they stuff brown lentils into savory pastries called sambusas. And I love to make misr alecha, an easy garlicky Ethiopian dish with the red ones, which fade to yellow when cooked.

In France the fancy Le Puy lentils, tiny marbled emerald green or blue, arrive on the table under a saddle of roasted game or are tossed with slices of garlic sausage in a salad.

In Saudi Arabia they eat a lentil soup with zucchini, lemon and cumin, and in Syria one with red lentils and lamb. In Burma they drink a watery room-temp red lentil soup with meals.

Some say that the smaller the lentil, the better it tastes, the sweeter and less earthy, but I say they're all good. But pick them over carefully before you cook them; tiny rocks like to hide within.

Split peas are not beans but have a similar flavor and like them, are good keepers. Split peas are made from field peas, not our sweet garden peas, and have been found in 12th dynasty Egyptian tombs. A staple of the poor for centuries in Europe, peas were never eaten fresh until the aristocracy went gaga over fresh petits pois in the 16th century.

Split peas are the classic soup pulse. In James Beard's American Cookery (Little Brown, 1972), he said that the “greatest of all cold soups” was a split pea puree with fresh mint and cream.

Every winter at least once or twice I have to make split pea soup with a ham bone or smoked hocks, sprinkled with freshly made tiny croutons. It's a dish I never had as a child (even pre-Exorcist) but I love it now.

Yellow split peas cook faster than their green counterparts. A rich yellow split pea soup is much loved all over Scandinavia, eaten every Thursday night by some Swedes, topped with unsweetened whipped cream and eaten with hearty rye bread, brown mustard, pickled vegetables and pancakes with berries.

Then there is the luscious dal that accompanies many Indian meals. Dal can mean any legume that has been split, so all split peas and many kinds of lentils qualify. I love to make a simple one with yellow split peas that came to me via The Frugal Gourmet on Our Immigrant Ancestors by Jeff Smith (William Morrow, 1990), which he got from Julie Sahni. It makes a fine addition to any Indian meal, is easy to cook and totally delicious. It serves 2-3 with other dishes.

Yellow Split Pea Dal with Garlic Butter

3/4 cup yellow split peas, rinsed

2 and 1/2 cups water

1/8 teaspoon turmeric

3/4 teaspoon coarse sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper

2-3 tablespoons chopped cilantro

2 tablespoons butter or ghee (clarified butter)

3/4 teaspoon whole cumin seeds

2-3 cloves garlic, peeled and sliced

1 small dried whole red or green pepper (optional)

In a medium saucepan, simmer split peas in water with turmeric and salt for about 45 minutes, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon. Remove from heat and stir again vigorously to break up the peas. Add black pepper and cilantro, and cover pot to keep dal warm.

In a separate little frying pan heat the butter and add the cumin seeds, sliced garlic and optional dried pepper, cooking until the garlic is soft and golden. Pour the mixture over the dal and stir. Season to taste.

Jennifer Brizzi | P.O. Box 48 | Rhinecliff, New York 12574 | U.S.A.

jenniferbrizzi@yahoo.com