Seven ingredients. I love it. It’s like one of those awful cookbooks for lazy people that come in handy once in a blue moon when you’re desperate and horribly uncreative or understocked. Or, you know, alone on a desert island with a can of tuna and/or a fishing rod, bait, and gumption.
Wow, that was a strange aside. Back to kimchi.
So I have a friend who calls me “kimchi” despite the fact that I am not:
1. Korean
2. Red-headed
3. Spicy (debatable)
But I do eat/make a lot of kimchi. And I’m always looking for ways to use it. The nice thing about the Korean salty, hot and sour ferment is that it loves sweetness. And nuttiness. So when I’m not into cooking rice (which is slightly sweet and nutty, and wonderfully cooling and soft compared to the hot crunch of kimchi), I’m looking for another starchy-sweet bed for my kimchi. I also happen to have tons and tons of swiss chard from my garden right now, and I’m also always looking for more recipes to wilt that to soft, slightly bitter goodness.
Along came socca, aka savoury chickpea pancakes, and my culinary prayers were answered. And the thing about socca is it’s Italian, so it sounds fancy, but really it’s just a mixture of chickpea flour and water with a little salt. Optional egg whites for fluffiness. No thanks. Not when you want a quick and easy meal. So this is my dosa without fermenting, my crepe without wheat or buckwheat, my sweet nuttiness without nuts or sugar. The only thing about chickpea flour, though, is I find it really hard to digest. So I cut it with brown rice flour. You could use any gluten-free (or glutenous) flour.
Here’s what you do:
Socca Tarts
1/2 cup chickpea flour
1/2 cup brown rice flour
pinch salt
2 cup water (or 1 cup water and 1 cup milk. I used unsweetened almond but even sweetened would be fine and make it a bit more well-rounded umami-wise with the kimchi)
1 tbsp oil
Toppings
2 cups swiss chard leaves (you can also use spinach, kale, collards, mustard greens or other leafy greens. Collards will take more time to cook)
3 cups kimchi (or less if you don’t love kimchi as much as I do. Try to find unpasteurized kimchi. Commercial brands are all pasteurized…Or, make your own!)
Whisk together flours and salt. Whisk in water until crepe-like consistency. If you’ve never made crepes, just whisk in the 2 cups. You’ll be fine.
Bring a pot of water to a boil and add the swiss chard leaves. Return to a boil, reduce the heat, and simmer 5 minutes. Drain and rise with cold water until cool. Drain well, pressing the water out with your hands.
Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the oil and when hot add 1/2 cup of the batter, swirling the pan to spread it evenly over the bottom. Reduce heat to medium and cook until brown on the bottom. Flip and cook about 5 minutes more, until brown on both sides and cooked through. If the middle isn’t cooked by the time the outsides are brown, lower the heat for the next one. To salvage the first, either transfer it to the oven (350°F) until cooked through (max 10 minutes if the oven hasn’t had time to warm up. Around 5 if it has).
Cook remaining socca tarts, brushing the skillet with oil if necessary between batches. Don’t turn up the heat and turn it down again though. Just leave it on medium or medium-low. If you make thinner tarts (with 1/3 cup batter at a time), it will cook through faster and more easily too. So find a quantity that works for you. You can keep the socca tarts warm in a 200°F oven if you want to cook them all before eating. Or just top them with a little swiss chard and a bunch of kimchi as they come off the skillet.
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