Spiced Crispy Chickpeas

Cody is on day five hundred and twenty-nine of his sentence. The first Wednesday evening of the Tulsa Library teen writing program was Wednesday June sixth. Eleven teenagers in a classroom on the second floor of the main library, with a local poet named Marcus Wells leading the workshop — the same Marcus Wells whose reading at the Tulsa Library three weeks ago Mama and I had attended and cried at. He had us read three of his poems aloud and then walked us through how he had written one of them, line by line, decision by decision. The week-one assignment is a half-page from each of us by next Wednesday.

I am the youngest in the room. I knew this going in. I am the only seventeen-year-old; the others are eighteen or nineteen. The girl next to me at the seminar table, whose name is Iris, is going into her freshman year at Tulane in the fall. The boy across, named Antonio, is going to be a sophomore at OU. The conversation in the room is at a level I had not been in before. I held my own. The half-page assignment is in my notebook on the kitchen table now in three drafts. I am working on a fourth.

And the recipe Saturday was spiced crispy chickpeas. The recipe is from Cookie and Kate. Drained canned chickpeas dried thoroughly, tossed with olive oil and a spice mixture (cumin, smoked paprika, garlic powder, salt, a pinch of cayenne), roasted at 400 for thirty minutes until crisp. The chickpeas come out of the oven crunchy on the outside, slightly soft inside, deeply seasoned, the kind of healthy snack that fills the space at the bottom of a bag better than chips do.

The math: two cans of chickpeas $0.79 each, a tablespoon of olive oil, the spices from the rack. Total: about $1.60 for a big jar of spiced crispy chickpeas that has lasted me five days of pre-Wednesday-program snacking.

The technique is the dry-the-chickpeas step. Wet chickpeas steam in the oven instead of crisping. You drain, rinse, and pat the chickpeas thoroughly dry on a clean dish towel before tossing with the oil and spices. You roast on a parchment-lined sheet pan, single layer, no overlap, for thirty minutes, shaking the pan once at the fifteen-minute mark for even browning.

I am taking a small sandwich bag of these to the library next Wednesday for the workshop. The girl Iris will probably ask me what they are, and I will tell her, and the conversation will go where the conversation goes. The kitchen has continued to be the bridge.

The recipe is below. The trick is the dry-the-chickpeas step. Do not skip the dish-towel-pat. Wet chickpeas steam instead of crisping.

Prep Time: 5 min | Cook Time: 40 min | Total Time: 45 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

2 cans (15 oz each) chickpeas, drained and rinsed
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (adjust to taste)
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Instructions

Preheat and prep. Preheat your oven to 400°F. Drain and rinse the chickpeas, then spread them on a clean kitchen towel or paper towels. Pat them thoroughly dry — this is the most important step; moisture is the enemy of crunch.
Season. Transfer the dried chickpeas to a large bowl. Drizzle with olive oil and toss to coat evenly. Add the smoked paprika, cumin, garlic powder, cayenne, salt, and pepper. Toss again until every chickpea is well coated in the spice mixture.
Roast. Spread chickpeas in a single layer on a rimmed baking sheet — don’t crowd them or they’ll steam instead of crisp. Roast for 35—40 minutes, shaking the pan halfway through, until they are deep golden and crunchy all the way through.
Cool and serve. Remove from the oven and let cool on the pan for 10 minutes; they crisp up further as they cool. Taste and adjust salt. Serve as a snack, salad topper, or alongside soup in place of crackers.

Nutrition (per serving)

Spiced Crispy Chickpeas — The Snack for the First Week of the Writing Program