Chef John’s Falafel

Delicious! Thank you SO much, Chef John!!! No need for another recipe!! I pan fried them in saucer shapes as Chef said you can. Made with 50/50 parsley and cilantro..as he mentioned. All else the same. And just in case this helps: I used my Cuisinart and had to stop many times and scrape and mix things up, because I noticed that the top of the mixture wasn’t rotating very well. Also, watch carefully chef John’s video..he shows you with a spatula where he presses on the mixture which gave me a good idea of the texture(because it can be confusing for it molds it in your hand, but it is a little wet..which was fine). Hot pan, then oil, hot oil, then patties, don’t fiddle till you see edge is done..then they turn easily with two spatulas. My husband and I were so happy..until we ate the last one;) Thank you again!

Followed the recipe, adding more cumin and cayenne. Made more of a patty and put them in the air frier 350* for about 5 min per side, just watched them. Turned out so good! Served them on a romaine leaf with cucumber, tomato and tzatziki sauce.

The flavor was great, although a bit salty. I would cut the salt in half next time. The big problem for me was that about 1/3 of the falafels broke apart in the oil when fried. I did use canned chickpeas, which I drained and dried with paper towels. But this would not explain why only 1/3 of them fell apart. I believe the problem is that your scooper must be tightly packed. I will make them again (with less salt and more tightly compacted) because it is a vegetarian dish that my carnivorous husband loved.

So proud of how these turned out! Made no changes to the recipe. Used about 1/2 an inch of oil to fry patties in. Ate with cucumber sauce, baby spinach, tomato slices in a pita. Delicious and looking forward to making again!

Five stars for a delicious recipe. Five stars for Chef John’s videos – he is hilarious! At almost 49 years old I still have never used a food processor – so I used a Vitamix blender on pulse and it worked out great. I hate having too many appliances and gadgets – we’ll see how long I last until i cave in. Anyway, after refrigerating for a few hours I ended up adding a couple extra tablespoons of flour as the mix seemed a little too wet. Fried them in a pan with avocado oil on level 6 (just above medium) for 3 minutes a side. Perfection! The kids loved them, and they loved the accompanying tahini sauce. We scarfed them all down and are already planning to make these regularly. Thank you, Chef John! You’re the best!

I’ve never had falafel before and I can’t say enough good about this recipe. I made it before watching the video. After watching the video I think I may have over processed mine, but honestly the taste was still fabulous. I made a Greek yogurt sauce with lemon juice, lemon zest, olive oil, garlic, parsley and some spices, and then served with diced tomatoes and Persian cucumbers marinated in lemon juice. Absolutely fabulous! I cut the balls in half to better fill out the pita pocket. I’ll be making this regularly!

Okay, I sort of made this, and sort of another recipe. I followed someone’s suggestion about drying canned chick peas, and that seems to have worked. I otherwise pretty much followed Chef John’s ingredients and directions, except I used our air fryer instead of deep frying. I doubled the proportions here and got 17 pingpong ball sized falafel. It was fun, pretty easy, and the falafel were very flavorful and delicious!

Added about twice as much lemon juice and an extra Tbsp of flour. Came out delicious and paired well with chef John’s tzatziki.

I had two batches of garbanzos lying around. Both started out as dried beans. I soaked one batch for 18 hours in cold water. After which they were still quite firm, kind of raw-tasting and had a bit of crunch to them. The second batch, I had used for hummus the day before and had been cooked to the point of being much more tender. Firmer than canned beans, but more similar. My plan was to make a load of these in my deep frier and freeze some for later. I used canola oil, heated it up to 350 and in they went! The first batch I put in were made with the cooked garbanzos. What ensued was a culinary horror show. They literally disintegrated in the oil, right before my eyes. It was like the scene in a Pirates of the Carribbean movie, where Blackbeard meets his end in the Fountain of Youth. Completely gone. I was so disappointed, I nearly shut everything down and gave up. The sadist in me, decided to put one of my soaked bean falafels in, just to see if it met the same fate. Lo and behold, it kept its perfect round shape and fried up beautifully!! In fact, my family said that these were on par with some of the very best falafels we’d eaten in NYC. To recap: *Use soaked garbanzos ONLY* *Add salt slowly.* For us, 1 tsp. of salt was perfection. I added the full 1 1/2 tsp of salt to my disintegrating felafels and felt remorse as I tasted the saltiness of the unfinished product. Made these into wraps with lettuce, fresh veggies and tzatziki sauce. My dinner table is a circus

Definitely use dried chickpeas and follow the video’s instructions – these are superb

I’ve made these several times they are the best falafel recipe I’ve found! I’ve used fresh parsley (the best), but dried parsley when I didn’t have fresh and still excellent! Just use one third the amount if using dry. They also freeze well, best warmed up in the oven to keep them crispy, but even from the microwave-delicious! I make them into the small patties so we can have them in homemade pitas with tzatziki sauce and chopped tomatoes and/or sweet red onions. You have to try these!

This tastes great and freezes very well. I like to make a double batch and freeze some balls for later. Tips: – Make sure your chickpeas have soaked are soft all the way through after soaking. I always soak them for the full 24 hours. I found that 12 was not enough for the beans I buy and I’d get some annoying hard bits after processing. – Don’t process the chickpeas for too long, or they final texture will be a bit mushy and you won’t get that nice rough exterior on the fried balls. It took me a couple tries to get this part right. – DO NOT bother with canned chickpeas. Those are pre-cooked, so you are essentially cooking them *again*, which will inevitably make them mushy.

Delicious, I’ve added leek to the mix (Egyptian recipe). I had difficulty shaping into a ball, it’ll not hold. Adding one egg to the dough and mix well did the trick.

This was wonderful. I haven’t had falafel in about 20 years and this was so good and just like I remembered, only better because I made it at home. I made tahini sauce as well and there were virtually no leftovers. I used a red onion since it was what I had on hand, and we served the falafel in pita pockets with grape tomatoes and leaf lettuce. The next time I make this, I will use the mini naan bread since naan is softer than pita bread. Thanks for another great recipe Chef John.

I’ve made this several times. great flavor and texture. Chef John never fails with his recipes.

I would not process it as well as I did, it was too smooth. Next time I will make it a little bit chunkier.

This was amazing but I used canned garbanzo which held more liquid therefore causing me to use more flour. Probably added too much because it was very doughy instead of chunky veggie how a normal falafel should look. Was worse the next day. Next time I’ll follow the recipe to the T. All the defects were definitely my fault but the flavor was DEFINITELY there!

My first attempt at homemade falafel. So yummy. I used some chopped mint and cilantro to make up the 1/2 cup herbs. Mostly parsley though. When you heat your pita in the oven, place a ball of tin foil in each half to keep them open while they heat. Much easier to fill that way. Thanks Chef John! I always check your recipes before trying anything new.

I followed the recipe, easy and delicious! I shallow fried half, and used my air fryer without oil with the other half, and far preferred the air fryer falafel. I served with warmed pita, tomato, lettuce and Tzatziki! Will definitely be making again!

Didn’t turn out as good for me as I think I processed it for too long and was more pasty and used a bit too much cumin but still tasted very good when topped with mayonnaise. Gonna try again in the future to perfect this but still good.

Outstanding recipe! Very fresh tasting, and just the perfect consistency. When you fry these babies up, they are brown and crispy on the outside, and soft and fluffy on the inside. We made delicious gyros.