This was an easy recipe to make vegan, the only substitute I had to make was the yoghurt. I opted for soya.

Everything was made from scratch except the pitta bread which I bought ready made.

Whatever you do, don’t throw away the chickpea water. It’s so useful as an egg white alternative in recipes like this no-egg meringue. In fact, I made this dish because I wanted the aquafaba and needed something to do with the chickpeas afterwards.

Serves: 4

Falafel ingredients

• 480g chickpeas, two tins drained and patted dry with kitchen paper (save the water, aquafaba, from the tin to use as an egg white replacement)
• 2 red onions
• 2 cloves of garlic, peeled
• 2 tsp ground cumin
• 2 tsp ground coriander
• 1 tsp rose harissa paste
• 4 tbsp plain flour
• 4 pitta breads
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 40g mixed salad leaves

Salsa ingredients

• 4 medium tomatoes
• 1 red onion
• 1 tsp cayenne pepper
• 1 tsp lemon juice

Yoghurt dressing

• 2 tbsp soya yoghurt
• 1 tbsp chopped parsley

Method

• Put all of the falafel ingredients, apart from the oil, salad leaves and bread, into a food processor and blend until smooth-ish. It doesn’t have to be a fine paste. Mold into 16 little balls.
  • You can use a stick blender but watch out for a mess.
• Gently heat the oil in a large frying pan. Add the falafel balls and cook for a minute before turning carefully. Be gentle until they start to firm up or they’ll break apart.
• Keep turning them every minute or so to cook them evenly all over. When done, put them in a bowl on some kitchen paper to soak up any extra oil.
• Put all the salsa ingredients into a blender and blitz until finely chopped. Place in a bowl for serving.
• Finely chop the parsley and mix with the yoghurt. Place in another little bowl for serving.
• Toast the pitta for about 90 seconds under a hot grill or in a toaster. Carefully cut along one side to make a pocket.
• Put a little salad and salsa in each pitta, add 4 falafel balls each and top with a little more salsa and some of the yoghurt dressing.