Za’atar Cabbage Fritters

How impossible does it sound to crave a dish based on cabbage and chickpeas for three days in a row? Especially coming from this gal, who doesn't want more than three servings of the same dish in a week?? Well, it happened and I am pretty darn excited to share!

I will keep this brief, but I barely had Sugar & Splice up and running when I was accepted into the Virginia Commonwealth University's Master in Genetic Counseling program. I learned so much more academically than I thought possible, and, somehow, an even greater amount about myself. Long story short, I fell in love with genetic counseling in 2011, right after starting a PhD program in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology. The hardest decision of my life was walking away from a fully funded degree to pursue such a niche field. Grad school rocked my world a bit (ok, a Lot) somewhere between being terrified of somehow messing up my chance to enter the career I had dreamed of for eight years, a marriage put on long-distance for a second time, oh- and a pandemic. Now that I am on the other side of many stepping stones, I am so thankful for all the support I had from everyone in my life to get here and I am looking forward to giving and amplifying that type of support with my patients!

Now, back to business. Towards the beginning of the pandemic I had an idea to use up some cabbage that had been sitting around with a "waste not, want not" mentality due to our less than once a week grocery runs to minimize exposures. We have always taken pride in wasting very little food- leftovers and perishable foods are prioritized over cooking a new meal or getting takeout (most of the time, we're human!). Buuuuut, this was old cabbage (at the time), so I knew we wouldn't want it raw in a slaw or salad. I ended up thinking the flavor profiles of broiled cabbage wedges and socca/farinata could be a really nice base for a dish. So I mixed up some socca batter and shredded my cabbage and the wheels started turning- I added green onion, whole cumin, nigella, and salt. Fried up in a very small of oil and topped with yogurt- they were fabulous! I have been riffing on the idea ever since and when I struck gold with trying za'atar this holiday weekened, I knew it was time.

If you've never cooked with chickpea flour- it has several names! Chickpea flour (garbanzo bean flour) by Bob's Red Mill is probably the easiest to source. Besan/gram flour at Indian grocers will be far cheaper. I won't say you can't make this recipe with wheat flour, or other flours, but chickpea flour has pretty strong binding and your fritters may not stay together as well. I also prefer the nutritional profile (more protein! more fiber!) of chickpea flour over wheat flour.Pre-heat non-stick pan over medium heat.

1.Place a good non-stick pan over medium heat while you prep.
2. Core the red cabbage and shred three cups (or measure packed cups of pre-shredded cabbage/cruciferous mix) and place in a mixing bowl. Put the rest of the cabbage away in the fridge for other uses

3. Sprinkle 2 tbsp za'atar, the chickpea flour, and salt over shredded cabbage. Mix. Add water and mix until smooth. Batter should be slightly runny, like pancake batter.

4. Add 2 tsp cooking oil to hot pan (more if you are not using a non-stick pan). Stir cabbage and batter mix just before scooping each fritter. Add 1/4 of cabbage and batter mix to hot pan, flattening the scooped cabbage and shaping the side ofcook each fritter before adding the next.

5. Fry for at least 5 minutes before checking to see if the first side is well-browned. Once browned to your liking, flip over to cook the other side. If your burner and pan cook faster in the middle, you may want to rotate the fritters so that the end closer to the middle (usually hotter and browns faster) to the outside of the pan to have more even browning. Once both sides are browned to your liking, move to plates or keep warm in the oven on a rack or paper towels if you are still preparing other dishes for the meal.

6. Sprinkle the other tablespoon of za'atar across the finished fritters. Slice your avocado and top (or mix up the tahini-yogurt to tope), and =/or add your favorite pickles! I like to add something sweet on the side too, usually steamed sweet potato with the tahini yogurt but I also sometimes grab fruit.