Recipe: Turmeric & Sweet Potato Falafel Bakes (Vegan & Gluten-Free!)

By  Trinity Bourne

Contributing Writer for  Wake Up World

Falafel is a traditional deep fried middle eastern dish. We enjoy a wonderfully healthy version by adding a few extra things like turmeric and sweet potato and bake them in the oven instead. I like to add turmeric, because it complements the other flavours so well and gives a gorgeous yellow glow to the plate.

Turmeric is an all round winner when it comes to health. It’s excellent at supporting the immune system whilst being great for skeletal, joint, skin and digestive system well-being too. Cumin and coriander are great warming spices that complement our health as well as adding delicate flavours that lend themselves perfectly to middle-eastern type cuisine.

Not only are these falafels gluten free and vegan, but they are filling, temptingly tasty and really nutritious.

[pro_ad_display_adzone id=”110028″]

Here’s the Conscious Kitchen version, which is an adapted variation of the original ‘Baked Falafel’ recipe that first appeared in  my book, Trinity’s Conscious Kitchen.

Falafel serves well with hummus and salad.

Turmeric & Sweet Potato Falafel

Makes:  18 balls (approx)

Preparation:  15 minutes

Cooking:  30 minutes

Ingredients:

– 240g chickpeas (or 1 tin drained)

–  300g sweet potatoes

–  2 large cloves garlic

–  1 handful fresh coriander leaves

–   ¼  teaspoon ground cardamon

–  1 heaped teaspoon ground turmeric  (or

–  1 heaped tablespoon of freshly grated)  

–  2 teaspoons heaped ground coriander

–  1 teaspoon heaped ground cumin

–  2 tablespoons olive oil

–  1 heaped teaspoon sea salt

–  2 tablespoons gram flour (chickpea flour)

–  Extra gram flour for rolling with

You will also need:

A blender (hand/immersion or jug type) or food processor  or strong potato masher

Directions:

1. Scrub and chop the sweet potato and boil until soft with skin still included (approximately 10 minutes). Then drain and place in a mixing bowl.
2. Crush garlic and chop along with coriander leaves (as small as you can) with a sharp knife.
3. Add all ingredients into blender or food processor (EXCEPT the gram flour). I find this actually works best   with a hand (immersion) blender. With a hand blender, you can apply downward pressure and get in there nicely… if you use a jug blender or food processor it will work fine if you keep scraping down the sides and loosen the mixture. Alternatively you could go for the real rustic effect and use a strong potato masher to do the job instead. Blend until most of the mixture is broken down. It doesn’t need to be totally smooth; it can be quite rustic.
4. Once blended add the gram flour and continue to mix in with a spoon. If you leave it on the side for a while (half and hour or half a day) then it will firm up a little making it slightly easier to roll. I sometimes let it stand if I have time, but that’s not essential.
5.  Chickpea moisture varies from batch to batch. The mixture should be soft and pliable, easy to roll into a ball in your hands. Take a heaped teaspoon worth of mixture and roll a small ball (this should be smaller than a golf ball). The delightful yellowness glow of the turmeric will rub off a bit on your hands. If you’d rather now yellow-out your hands then use extra gram flour to roll with. If your mixture is too soft to roll well, then add a little extra gram flour or use gram flour to roll in.
6. Place on a lightly oiled baking tray and bake in preheated oven at gas mark 6 or 7 (200ËšC to 220ËšC) for approximately 30 minutes or until tanned.
7. Enjoy!

Further articles by Trinity:

• Chocolate Paradise Coconut Bar Recipe – Vegan, Raw, Absolutely Delicious

• Trinity’s Super Cleansing Green Kale & Coriander Drink Recipe

• Make Your Own ‘Loved Up’ Raw Chocolate Brownies (Vegan & Gluten Free!)
• Top Twenty Tips for Conscious Eating

• Vegan Gluten-Free Lentil Lasagne with Cashew Cream Sauce (Yummy Recipe)

• The Spirit of the Dolphin
• You Are Enough, Exactly As You Are
• What is Success? A Spiritual Perspective
• Being an Empath
• The Spirituality of Space Clearing: Five Effective Ways to Clear Stagnant Energy
• 4th Dimensional Entities & What You Can Do About Them (Includes Audio Meditation)
• Embracing Spiritual Abundance

About the author:

Trinity is the author of ‘Trinity’s Conscious Kitchen’, a recipe book designed to inspire soul through conscious cuisine. It’s filled with simple, delicious vegan, wheat-free recipes for spiritual evolution.

Trinity’s journey into conscious eating began about twenty years ago during a profound spiritual awakening, at which point a white light surged though her whole being, dissolving everything it touched, radiating the entire field around her until there was nothing but the pure white light of unity consciousness. During this life-changing experience Trinity experienced the soul of all other sentient beings, trees, creatures, people as one pulsating energy. Transcended into a higher realm of unity and oneness, the experience imparted a divine energy that she has been sharing through spiritual work ever since.

Visit Trinity’s new website  www.trinityskitchen.com  for conscious cuisine or  www.Openhandweb.org  for a huge archive of deep insights for the spiritual journey (a website Trinity supports along with her soul-mate and husband ‘Open’).

[pro_ad_display_adzone id=”110027″]