Chickpea and flour are not two words I ever thought would go together. We first tried it just as an experiment, to see how it tastes. Now it is common in our home to make everything with chickpea flour. We eat chickpea flour waffles, pancakes, yeast bread, muffins, cookies, birthday cake, pizza crust, pie crust. Basically anything that calls for flour, we replace with chickpea flour.
When we started we would grind our own chickpeas in the vitamix to make flour. This is very time consuming. It works, but everything we own ends up with a fine dusting of chickpea. We shopped around for the best prices and we found that on average chickpeas cost about $1.50. Sometimes .99 and sometimes $2, it varies. Chickpea flour is more difficult to find. Some grocery stores will carry it and most health food stores. It comes in small packages and usually costs close to $5 for less than a pound.
I did some internet searching and found it for $4 per pound from nuts.com, but when you buy a 25 pound bag, that brings the price down to $1.99 a pound. That’s nearly the same price as grinding your own, but without the mess.
Grinding grains (or chickpeas) in the vitamix can cause it to overheat. You need to put in very small amounts at a time. I would start with chickpeas that had been in the fridge so they are cool to begin with. I would do no more than ¼ a pound at a time, usually a bit less. Grind it until it’s a fine powder, then put it in the freezer to cool it off while finishing the rest of the pound. Once it’s all ground and cooled, do it a second time. It makes a huge difference in the texture of baked goods when it is ground twice.
I would usually do about 10 pounds at a time and it would take several hours to grind, cool, grind and clean up. And doing it myself really only saved me a few cents per pound. I have been very pleased with my 25 pound boxes that come in the mail.
Whether you want to try it as an experiment, are gluten free looking for options, or are trying to increase your soluble fiber intake, have an open mind. It’s not going to taste like wheat flour. At first I wasn’t impressed. Now I eat it daily. It’s the only flour we use. It will grow on you and it’s really not that bad once it’s cooked. But the most important rule you must never forget….Don’t eat the cookie dough!
