Too Hot to Cook: Chickpea Salad Sandwich

Too Hot to Cook is a summer cooking series at The Attic on Eighth where we share our favorite summer recipes for those long, sultry days where turning on an oven or letting stovetop dishes heat up your home feels like much too much. We’ve brought cooking free dishes to the table in the past, and we hope that by the end of summer 2020, to have shared many more. In this second volume of the year, Contributor Corinne Elicone shares a scrumptious chickpea salad sandwich.

The celebrated chickpea salad sandwich. All photography by Corinne Elicone.

Reader, it’s nearly 100°F (38°C) degrees outside and I feel like I’ve melted into my couch. My apartment has no central AC and so every meal is a precarious dance between my ferocious gas range and my window unit air conditioner. It seems as though, no matter what I do, every time I turn on my stove to make a meal, the temperature in my house rises by 8 degrees. It’s a cruel and unusual punishment and the price I pay for a home-cooked meal in the summertime. Enough is enough. It’s time to share one of my favorite “no-cook” recipes. 

Chickpea salad is one of the most versatile dishes you can make in your modern kitchen. If you don’t like one ingredient, it’s easy enough to substitute it for another. It’s vegetarian, and very customizable, with short prep time, inexpensive ingredients, and best of all it won’t jeopardize your carefully crafted climatized environment. Although, my version is a bit spicy, so things might heat up on your palate even if they don’t in your home. 

Without further ado, here is my recipe for a summertime chickpea salad sandwich! Have it for dinner or have it for lunch, there are no rules anymore!!! 

Ingredients: 

1 15oz can Chickpeas (drained and rinsed)

2 Celery sticks (finely diced)

½  English cucumber (diced)

1 Shallot (finely chopped)

⅓ Cup feta cheese (crumbled)

1 Teaspoon of lemon zest (grated)

1 Poblano pepper (coarsely chopped)

¼ Cup mayonnaise

2 Tablespoons lemon juice

2 Tablespoons olive oil

Salt and Pepper to taste. 

Special Equipment: Food Processor

Process

Poblano Mayo

Poblano mayo in preparation.

Step 1: Add mayo, lemon juice, and olive oil to a food processor.

Step 2: Remove the seeds from the poblano pepper. Coarsely chop the flesh of the pepper and add it to the ingredients in the food processor. 

Step 3: Process on high until the pepper is fully blended into the mayo. 30-40 seconds. 

Step 4: Taste and season mayo with salt and pepper. 

Step 5: Pour poblano-mayo into a small bowl and refrigerate until ready to use. 

Step 6: Wipe out and reserve food processor for chickpeas.

Roasting the poblano pepper.

Optional Pepper Roasting

If you’re lucky enough tof you’re lucky enough tof you’re lucky enough to have a gas range you can quickly char your poblano pepper to get a smokier mayo dressing. Simply turn on the flame to high heat and place your pepper directly on the rack. Turning frequently with a pair of tongs, wait for the pepper to look charred and black all over this should take about 2-3 minutes. Then using a paper towel remove the charred exterior (it should slide right off) and continue on with the recipe!

Chickpea Salad

Pulsed chickpeas.

Step 1: Pulse drained and rinsed chickpeas in a food processor. 10 seconds. Don’t overdo the pulsing, the chickpeas should retain their form and not become hummus-like. Pour processed chickpeas into a large bowl

Chickpea salad assembly.

Step 2: Add diced cucumber and celery to the bowl along with the finely chopped shallot, lemon zest, and crumbled feta.

Step 3: Drizzle poblano-mayo over the ingredients to desired consistency--some prefer wetter, others prefer dryer! 

Step 4: Using a rubber spatula gently mix all the ingredients together. Season to taste with salt and pepper. 

Sandwich composition is largely up to you! I will say I enjoy this particular salad on toasted 7 grain bread, with spinach, tomatoes, and avocado.

From my kitchen to yours - enjoy!

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Corinne Elicone is an Event Coordinator and Crematory Operator at the historic Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She curates Mount Auburn's "Death Positive" programming and can often be seen roaming the cemetery in search of fascinating epitaphs for her next historic walking tour.