Most of the kids tried something new with this recipe, as falafel was something that only a few of the students had eaten before! While the recipe we made was not the traditional deep fried that you might find at a typical falafel street food vendor or restaurant, this one was just as yummy and fresh tasting when paired with the tahini salad we made and pita. We decided to pan fry this falafel, which just made the chickpeas warm and golden brown rather than the traditionally hard outer shell on falafel.

The recipe was unbelievably easy! For the falafel we used:

• 2 cups canned chickpeas (or fava beans for authentic Egyptian falafel!)
• ¼ cup chopped yellow onion
• 1 clove garlic, smashed
• ¼ cup packed parsley leaves and stems
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin
• ½ teaspoon ground coriander
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons olive oil

And for the salad:

• 1 cup chopped romaine lettuce
• ½ cup chopped tomato
• ½ cup chopped cucumber
• 1 lemon, juiced
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 1/2 cup tahini (sesame seed paste) mixed with some water to get it to a bit more of a liquidy consistency

We did chopped the vegetables for the salad and put them aside in their own bowl. Then we loosely chopped the parsley, garlic and onion by hand, before throwing it all into a hand-blender to get it to the super mashed consistency that we wanted before forming it into little cookie-dough-esque balls.

Once our falafel balls were formed, we put them in the pre-heated pan, on medium-high heat, with about 2 tablespoons of olive oil. We let them cook for about 8 minutes total, rotating them to cook evenly along all sides.

We then mixed our salad with the dressing and carefully placed a handful of salad on top of each piece of pita, with a falafel on top. Some kids ate it like a taco, while others ate it like flatbread. Overall everyone was very excited to try it and loved the hand-forming part of the process. So easy, healthy, and tasty — the trifecta!