Baked Falafels and Homemade Tzadaki

First of all, welcome to my blog! As you probably read in the "about me" section, this blog is all about delicious healthy eating! Who says that to be healthy you have to eat boring and unsatisfying food? Not this girl!! There is far too much life to enjoy to always eat plain salads and oatmeal and what not. Spice it up a little. Boyfriends don't like it very much when you try to feed them tofu everyday. But there are lots of delicious healthy things that you can whip up in your kitchen that will have him going "Mmmmm" and you doing a little victory dance because he thought it was delicious and you thought "Woohoo summer beach body here I come!" Best of both worlds, right?

And for all you boys out there; I will add a "Boys Addition" to each recipe.. Generally its what I make on the side (or chop up from leftovers) to complement the less satisfying meals (chick peas, tofu) so that my boyfriend doesn't look at me like I'm from another planet! He gets the added protein or carb (Because it's not like he's watching his waistline) and I still get to feel like I'm eating a healthy meal.

All right, enough talking for now. Lets get to it.

Last night, I made falafels and home made tzadiki. Falafels are traditionally deep fried (and spectacularily delicious) but for a healthier version (and because I don't even have a deep fryer anyways) we had baked falafels.

Here's what you're going to need:
For Falafels:
1 can of Chick peas, drained and rinsed
1/4 cup Cilantro, fresh, chopped
1/4 cup Onion, minced
2 cloves of Garlic (I use 3 or 4 but we're big garlic fans around here)
Spices (use what you've got.. things like coriander, parsley, maybe a little hot sauce!)
Olive oil
Pitas (Use whole wheat for the healthiest option)
Tomato
Lettuce (Romaine is the healthy pick here!)

For Tzadiki:
Yogurt, Plain (buy the greek stuff so you don't have to drain it; the more natural the better!)
Cucumber, seeded
Juice of one lemon
Dill


Make the Tzadiki first thing in the morning so the flavours have time to meld. You could even make it the day before if you're super way more prepared then me!

Start by seeding the cucumber. Simply slice it in half lenghtwise all the way down and grab a small spoon. Scoop the seeds out with the spoon starting at one endand following through all the way to the opposite end. The seeds will scoop on out. I tried it with a big spoon first and it was too wide. Small spoon it is!
Then grate your cucumber with a cheese grater. Cheese cloth or paper towel the grated cucumber until it is as dry as possible (the more water there is the runnier your tzadiki will be)

Then mix the one cucumber with approximately 1 cup of yogurt. Depending on your cucumber you may need a little more (my cucumber was abnormally large and I used about a cup and a half)
Pour lemon juice and about a teaspoon of dill (or to taste) and mix. Cover and store in refridgerator. (Trust me on this one. Tzadiki is one of those things that slowly gets better and better. Try it when you're done making it and then six hours later, you'll see what I mean!)

All right, now it's getting a little closer to dinner time. If you don't have a food processor, you're muscling it like I did. Now that I've done it once, I think I'll buy a food processor! They turned out good but I think the finished product would have been a little more complete if it had been mixed just a little better!

Preheat is to 350 degrees

You drained and rinsed your chick peas, minced your onion and garlic and cilantro. Now you're going to mash it all together to form almost a paste. Mmm. Chick pea paste!

Form the paste into balls and squish lightly. Place on pan, brush both sides of each falafel with olive oil. Bake 20 minutes each side. They will be lightly golden crisped when they're done.

Now you take your falafel, lay some tzadiki on it, some lettuce and tomato, four or five falafel balls and you roll it up. If you luck out and get sturdy pitas you can cut them in half and stuff them but I find as a general rule, the healthier the pita, the more it tends to fall apart so we roll them up like a wrap! I put a little piece of parchment paper on the plate first and wrap it around the pita so it holds it together. Then you can slowly rip the parchment paper off as you eat. No mess, no fuss, only delicious!

"Boys Addition"
We had falafels at a restaurant once and my boyfriend jokingly suggested that it would have been better with chicken. So last night I cut some chicken up and heated it right before the falafels were done. He made one falafel one chicken/falafel and one plain chicken pita. And he didn't complain about being hungry once! So for the boys, chop up some of their favourite meat to add to at least one pita. Then you can have them try your crazy healthy food and still have something satisfying to keep their tummy from grumbling too much!

Finished Product Note:
The falafels were indeed a teensy bit dry. This was solved by heaping the tzadiki (which was home made and therefore there was no guilt involved in the heaping) but I think next time I'll try to find a way to add a little moisture(maybe an egg?)

Experiment with the spice and herb combination! I'd love to grow herbs this summer to have fresh ones. I saw the neatest shoes organizer herb closet on Facebook the other day, it was quite nifty! If I end up giving that a go, I'll make sure to keep everyone posted.

Tonight.. well I'm not quite sure what the plan is yet! I imagine tomorrow you will find out!

Here is a picture of the finished product!
Happy Healthiliciouless Eating!