The Kitchen: Salt and vinegar roasted chickpeas [low FODMAP, GF, vegan]

I’ve always been a lover of savoury food - cheesy, salty, vinegary, chilli, you name it! Unless I’ve baked it myself (or a friend or colleague has done so) I rarely indulge in sweet things, just pass me the cheese and biscuits and be done with it. Since cheese doesn’t especially agree with me (we’ll save the cheese feasts for when I’m seriously prepared for over-indulgence) and I was getting a little bored of popcorn (N.b. this is a sin in itself, popcorn should never be boring – I just wanted something a little different), I was itching to reach for something else. I wanted something a little more nutritious than a packet of crisps (although those who know me will know I’ll always be reaching for salt and vinegar) and with that can of chickpeas sitting on the naughty shelf of the cupboard I thought I’d have a hunt around for a recipe.

In the world of FODMAPs, legumes are – in general – given a bad name due to GOS (galacto-oligosaccharides) which broke my heart when I was venturing out into the big ol’ world of FODMAPS (or should I say, lack of). What was a girl to do when she lived on the things?!

Then a wonderful, wonderful thing happened – I’d done my research.

FODMAPs are water soluble.

So? This means that canned legumes (namely lentils and chickpeas, I’m not sure about other ones) are usually safe to eat in certain amounts as long as the liquid they’re in is discarded and the legumes are washed thoroughly (yes, this means that the chickpea water ‘aquafaba’ is a no-no). YES! My prayers had quite literally been answered and that poor can of chickpeas that had previously been banished to the naughty shelf could come down.

I stumbled on quite a few recipes for roasted chickpeas, some more exotic than others, but what I really craved was a real punchy hit of salt and vinegar with the crunch and satisfaction that you’d get from your favourite crisps (but with a little more goodness). So, without further ado, here’s a very simple recipe for some roasted chickpeas – ever-so-slightly adapted from Oh She Glows.

Salt and vinegar roasted chickpeas 

Ingredients:

• 1 can of chickpeas (drained and rinsed thoroughly)
• Approx. 2 cups of white vinegar (NOT malt if you’re following a low FODMAP diet)
• 1 teaspoon of salt (table is perfectly fine here)
• 2 teaspoons of olive oil (no need to dig your posh EVOO out from the cupboard, but not the light stuff). 

Directions:
1. Line a baking tray (we use those reusable non-stick baking sheets – no waste!)
2. Add chickpeas and vinegar into a pot and bring to the boil before taking off the light and leaving for 20-30 minutes – uncovered (keep in a well-ventilated area for this and open up a window, boiled vinegar is strong stuff!)
4. Preheat oven to 200C.
5. Drain your chickpeas and discard the vinegar. Place into baking tray and massage the oil and salt so that each chickpea is covered.
6. Roast for a good 30-45 minutes (oven dependent). They’ll be OK up to the 15 minute mark but from then on I checked on them every 5/10 minutes and gave them a shake. Make sure they don’t burn, basically, as they tend to go a bit bitter.
7. Leave to cool slightly and tuck in! Enjoy with a glass of vino and your favourite movie.

Getting enough fibre on a low FODMAP diet can be a bit of a challenge (unfortunately a lot of high fibre foods are also high on the FODMAP scale too) but a safe-serve of chickpeas will give you approximately 2.5g of fibre!