Preparation time: 25 minutes (15 minutes cooking, 10 minutes cooling)
Makes 2 lunch servings or 4 side salad servings
• 1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 heaped tsp ground cumin
• 1 x 15 oz can chickpeas, drained
• 1/2 green chili
• 1/2 red chili
• 1 tsp whole cumin seeds
• 1/2 cucumber, chopped into 1/2 in chunks
• 8 cherry or plum tomatoes, quartered, or 1 medium tomato, chopped into 1/2 in chunks
• 1/2 red onion, finely chopped
• salt and freshly ground black pepper
• handful of parsley leaves (optional)
For the dressing
• juice of 1/2 lemon
• 1 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 tbsp red wine vinegar
• salt
This salad is inspired by the delicious chickpeas at Moro and Morito in Exmouth Market, London. If you don’t have fresh chili, do not despair: a small sprinkling of dried chili flakes will still work well.
Add the oil to a pan and put it on the heat. While the pan is warming, place the ground cumin in a large bowl. Add the drained chickpeas in large spoonfuls, shaking the bowl about in between spoons to make sure that all the chickpeas are evenly coated. Add to the pan (you may want to check first that it is sufficiently hot by throwing a test chickpea in and seeing if it sizzles) and season before leaving to cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Keep an eye on the heat: you want them to crisp up but not burn. Seed and chop your chilies and add to the pan, leaving to cook for a further few minutes.
Take the chickpeas off the heat, place in a large bowl and, once cool, sprinkle over the cumin seeds.
Now make the dressing: squeeze the lemon juice into a jam jar, then add the oil and vinegar and a pinch of salt and shake.
When packing, if you are in a hurry you can transfer the chopped cucumber, tomato, red onion, and chilis into one Tupperware and the chickpeas into another and assemble these plus the dressing at lunchtime. If not, then simply add the salad to the chickpeas once they are fully cool.
Come lunchtime
Add the dressing and parsley, if using, just before eating, and mix well.