Quick Smashed Spanish Chickpeas

I love this recipe because it quickly turns a can of chickpeas into something special. I usually make this for lunch or dinner along with some quinoa, salad and cultured radishes, but you could also use it as a bean dip on a Friday night with a glass of wine. I haven’t done that yet but now that I’m thinking about it, I’m excited to try :)

This takes about 10 minutes to make so it’s definitely busy weekday friendly. It can easily be scaled up to use more than one can of chickpeas for a larger group.

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Quick Smashed Spanish Chickpeas
Adapted from the Smashed Chickpeas recipe (pg 51) in Jamie Oliver’s Food Escapes.

Note: I start with an unsalted can of chickpeas in this recipe. If you’re working with a can that already contains it, I would hold off on adding the salt and then salt to taste at the end.

Olive oil (Spanish if you have it, NO worries if you don’t)
1 large garlic clove, finely chopped
14.5 oz can chickpeas with the liquid
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/4 teaspoon smoked paprika
1/2 tablespoon raw apple cider vinegar

Pour a glug of olive into a small skillet or saucepan over medium heat and add the garlic. Let it sizzle for a couple minutes, stirring every 30 seconds or so, until the garlic is fragrant and just barely starting to brown around the edges.

Pour in the chickpeas and their liquid and bring to a simmer. Let cook for a couple minutes then remove the pan from heat.

With a potato masher (or something along those lines) coarsely mash the chickpeas, then add the sea salt, oregano, smoked paprika and vinegar. Stir well.

Finish with a drizzle of olive oil and sprinkling of smoked paprika for presentation, and people will probably think you labored over this for much longer than you actually did :)

Serves 2

Spanish Kale

This is what I call Spanish kale, one of my favorite go-to dishes. It comes together really quickly and requires minimal fuss. I’ve written measurements below, but I seldom actually measure anything. I toast a handful of pine nuts, then add a glug of olive oil, generously shake in some smoked paprika and toss in the kale. It’s a wonderful addition to lunch bowls with some grain, protein and hummus, but it goes with so many different things. It’s shown here with some Banza gluten-free mac ‘n cheese (boxed) because I’m slowly learning that sometimes kids need an element of fun added to their plates (it’s only taken me 7 years :). This meal has been a summer lunch favorite at our house, kale and all.

You’ll see when you make this that the kale cooks down very quickly. This recipe is written for one bunch, but our family can easily eat two bunches in one sitting so feel free to scale up. And stock up on kale :)

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Spanish Kale

Note: The only two “tricks” to this recipe are to not let the pine nuts burn, and to have your kale chopped and ready before adding the olive oil and smoked paprika. I toss the kale into the pan immediately after the olive oil and smoked paprika and stir right away to cool things down so the olive oil doesn’t smoke and the paprika doesn’t burn. Also, I generally use Lacinato kale here (also called Tuscan, black or dinosaur kale), but it can be made with curly kale with good results.

Handful of raw pine nuts
Glug of olive oil
1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
I bunch Lacinato kale, de-stemmed and sliced into 1/4 inch ribbons
Sea salt to taste

Heat a large skillet over medium heat and toss in the pine nuts. Dry toast, stirring every so often, for several minutes until they are darker in color and smell nice and toasty. Turn the heat down to medium-low, add in a glug of olive oil and the smoked paprika, then very quickly toss in the kale and give everything a good stir. Season with sea salt and continue to sauté, stirring continuously, for a minute or so until the kale collapses just a bit and is evenly coated with olive oil and smoked paprika. Taste and adjust seasoning if needed. Serve alongside whatever you like and enjoy :)

Serves 2-4