Let's start with the ingredients:
1/2 cup chickpea flour
1/2 cup white flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/3 cup chopped onion or scallions
1/2 cup raw shrimp, chopped, or scallops or other shellfish or fish
2 to 3 tablespoons chopped chives, parsley, thyme or cilantro
Olive oil
I knew I didn't have chickpea flour or fresh seafood, so I headed to the local grocery store. Bittman's video presentation says you can find chickpea flour at an Indian market, a health food store, or even a supermarket. I have both a health food store and a good (but smaller) grocery store in my neighborhood (Harris Teeter). I chose the grocery store since I could also get the seafood there. If I read the recipe a bit earlier, I could have gotten fresh seafood at Eastern Market (my Washington DC neighborhood's fresh food market) and then hit the health food store, which is located about a block away from the market. But I didn't get started until after 5 p.m. on Sunday, so it was off to the grocery store. Success in the seafood section! They had a nice selection of fresh, large, wild caught head-on shrimp...on sale. The shrimp look good (much better than the previously frozen, farm-raised shrimp that are my other option), so I got about a third of a pound. Then I headed to the flour aisle and started to recognize the error of not going to the health food store -- a few specialty flours, but no chickpea flour. I also tried the "international" food aisle -- lots of prepared Indian food, but no staples such as chickpea flour. At this point, I figured that chickpea flour is probably made by grinding dry chickpeas, so I grabbed a bag of dried chickpeas and head home.
Once I was home, I put some chickpeas in my magic bullet, and after about a minute, I had chickpea flour. Later, I spoke with an Indian friend, and she confirmed that her mom makes her own chickpea flour by grinding dry chickpeas. So I feel a bit better about that choice. (And yes, I'm admitting to owning a magic bullet blender from those TV infomercials a few years ago. My dad got me one for Christmas, and after an initial cringe, I found it's very useful as a spice blender, coffee grinder, and smoothie maker, but not for anything else. The chunky salsa demonstrations had to be a hoax, because the machine completely mangles fruits and vegetables.)
I prepped the shrimp and froze the heads and shells to make stock later...but in all honesty, it's more likely that they'll stay in my freezer for months, become unidentifiable, and be purged in a future freezer reorganization. I'm now on to the flavorings. When I was originally looking at the recipe, I did face a moment of indecision about which onion-herb combo to use. I'm not a scallion fan, so I went with white onion. But which herb would go best with the onion? While I suspect that parsley might be the best pairing, I decided to go with chives, because I had a nice fresh bunch in my patio pot (the first herbs of the season!).
So all my ingredients were prepped, and it was time to get cooking.
1. In a bowl, combine flours and baking powder with salt and pepper. Add a little more than a cup of water and stir to combine; consistency should resemble pancake batter (if batter is too thick, add more water, a little at a time). Stir in the onions, chopped seafood and herbs.
This step is fairly easy, and I got the thin pancake batter. While the recipe doesn't say anything about letting the batter rest, Bittman's article says that many recipes "suggest refrigerating the batter for an hour or more before cooking" although he doesn't think it's necessary. Because I got a phone call near the end of my prep, I actually let the batter rest for about 30 minutes. I would not recommend doing this -- the flours soaked up the liquid, and I had to mix in more water to get the batter back to the thin consistency. 2. Put a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat and film its bottom generously with olive oil. When oil is hot, pour in half the batter until it fills center of pan; spread gently with a spoon to form a large pancake.
I faced another choice here. I have a really large nonstick skillet (about 14 inches) or a 10 inch cast iron. I chose my cast iron -- it's well seasoned and works great for almost anything, and the nonstick skillet just seemed too big.
3. Cook about 3 minutes, or until pancake is set around edges; flip pancake and continue cooking for another 3 minutes, then flip it again and cook for another 30 seconds or so, until it is crisp on outside but still moist inside. Remove from pan and serve immediately, while remaining batter cooks.
Even though I used a fair amount of olive oil, by the time the edges crisped up, the pancake had stuck to the cast iron skillet in a number of places and broke up when I tried to turn it. It was also a uniform brown, instead of the spots of crispiness that Bittman's had. Needless to say, the first pancake did not look or taste good. So I used the remaining batter to make a 2nd pancake in the very large nonstick pan. I still didn't get the nice crisping that Bittman seemed to get, but the pan produced a nice pancake. Instead of eating this as an appetizer, I had it as my main course with some fresh steamed green beans on the side. It was a nice spring meal -- the flavor of the shrimp and chives could come through the thin batter, but the batter also had some flavor and texture.
I think I'll add tortillitas to my list of simple, summer entrees. I think they'd work really nicely with some white fish and thyme and a simple salad on the side, or with some scallops and cilantro and a salsa on the side.
Looking back, I think the batter consistency in the pan was more important than the pan itself. I added too much batter for the first pancake, so it was too thick and stuck and browned heavily on the bottom before the rest of the batter could cook through. The key is to have a thin batter spread thinly in the pan. Next time, I'll try this in a slightly smaller pan (the All Clad 12 inch should be arriving any day now!) and see if I can get those nice crisp edges.
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