Cookbook:Socca (Italian Chickpea Flatbread)

| Cuisine of France | Cuisine of Italy

Socca (French), torta di ceci or farinata (Italian), is a type of flatbread made from chickpea flour.

See also: Calentita

Ingredients

 * 300 g (2 cups) chickpea flour
 * 500 ml (2 cups) water
 * 2 tbsp olive oil
 * 1 tsp salt
 * Black pepper to taste; 2–3 decent grinds of a grinder should do

Equipment

 * Oven
 * Something to cook the socca on; traditionally, a 50cm (20 inch) copper plaque is used as it spreads the heat evenly to all parts of the socca, but a good cast iron pan will suffice if preheated in the oven first.

Procedure

 * 1) Heat oven as high as it can go—around 300°C / 570°F is traditional, but do whatever your oven can manage that gets close to this. If using a cast-iron pan, get it into the oven at the start so that it is hot when the batter goes into it.
 * 2) Whisk all the ingredients together well, ensuring there are no lumps. This should make a very thin, easy-to-pour batter.
 * 3) Once the oven is up to temperature, pour some of the batter into the hot pan or onto the plaque, and put into the oven for 8–9 minutes at 300°C / 570°F, or 13–15 minutes at 250°C / 480°F. With a 50 cm plaque or pan, cook half the batter at a time—the batter should cover the plaque or pan very thinly.
 * 4) Remove from the oven and cut into triangular wedges. Serve hot.
 * 5) Repeat for the rest of the batter.