Recipe: Moroccan Chickpea Tagine with Garlicky Lemon Gremolata
From Beavertails to Moroccan Tagines
Let’s Make New Food Memories
When I started really leaning into eating more plants and moving away from pot roasts with gravy and mashed potatoes, I wondered what life would be like without my favourite dishes. Would I feel deprived? What about my favourite comfort foods? And what about foods for holiday celebrations?
This was the ‘meat’ of the conversation I had with my friend Cynthia this week. Both of us grew up in rural Canada hundreds of kilometers away from each other. Our Moms made meals from scratch and our families always ate together. The ultimate comfort meal was always meat heavy – maybe a pot roast with mashed potatoes together with a spoonful of canned peas; a savoury meatloaf with nary a vegetable in sight; or a fat farm-grown roast chicken with crispy potatoes roasted right in the chicken fat.
“These dishes evoke food memories,” Cynthia often tells me. And she’s so right. The thing about comfort foods is the strong emotional connection tied to them. They become special in our hearts. They don’t just taste incredible but they evoke specific memories. Along with the people with whom we share these foods and the events surrounding them, powerful food memories make us who we are.
Take for example birthdays. My mother often would make money birthday cakes, where she’d bake waxed paper-wrapped coins right into the batter. She’d always include a single dollar bill and you’d always hope you were the lucky one to get that one special money-filled wrapper.
My grandmother’s raspberry pie and her delicious iced tea will always hold a special place in my heart. For my husband Michael, he will never forget his grandmother’s pineapple braised brisket, which she made only at special holidays.
A poignant food memory for our son Ben was on a family trip to Ottawa. We had just finished a meal on a cold, very rainy evening in the Byward market. I suggested we wander over to the Beavertail hut for dessert. I ordered my favourite – The Sunrise – for us to share. This delicious Canadian specialty is heavenly. Yeast dough is hand formed into a flat oval shape to resemble a beaver’s tail. It’s dropped into boiling hot fat and cooked until crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. The moment it’s done, it’s liberally doused with cinnamon sugar and then, to gild the lily, squeezed with fresh lemon juice. That evening, standing in the cold, while the rain poured down, the three of us huddled under the umbrella and tore off pieces, relishing every last hot morsel. It was hard to speak as we savoured this special time together. It was a moment we will never forget. It’s become such a powerful food memory that Ben flat refuses to have a beavertail unless it’s raining!
So, what do you do when you’ve decided to lean into adding more plants into your diet? What about those holidays with ham and turkey? What becomes your new comfort food? All those memories are powerful and deserve a special place in our hearts. As I shared with Cynthia, who is on her own journey to become more plant-based, it’s about finding new dishes that bring comfort and satisfaction and new beautiful moments together - moments that are just as meaningful as the ones we shared over pot roast and mashed potatoes.
I had an epiphany a few years ago. If I wanted to create a plant-based holiday meal, I needed to take a fresh approach - step up my game and create dishes that popped visually, were steeped in flavour, were texturally interesting and most of all, served up maximum cravability.
Yes, it was challenging! The idea of not serving classic comfort foods at holidays was intimidating to me. Would my family be open to trying something new? Would they moan throughout the meal? Thankfully, they went along and let me explore a fresh approach to holiday eating. Together we discovered that vegetables and fruits have so many incredible flavours and express themselves in more ways than you can imagine. Meals became a journey of flavours.
Instead of mimicking traditional dishes, I focussed on variety, flavour, and texture to create a feast that stands on its own. Instead of four big dishes – meat and gravy, potatoes, a couple of side vegetables – I now go with a more tapas-style meal with six to eight smaller dishes. Sometimes even more if I’m feeling really energetic.
I always create a mix of super easy dishes and a few more challenging time consuming ones. Think of dishes like these:
Fresh tomatoes drizzled with olive oil and a scattering of crunchy salt are super easy and quick to make. Place them on a pretty platter and they look gorgeous.
Sliced cooked beets drizzled with a balsamic vinaigrette and some chopped fresh parsley are also simple to prepare. Pop them into a shallow bowl and they look so appetizing. By the way, now that we can purchase roasted beets already cooked, I’m adding cooked beets more often to meals.
A Moroccan Chickpea Tagine (see recipe below) is more complicated and requires more prep like chopping, sautéing, and braising but the effort is worth it. This aromatic dish fills the kitchen with beautiful warm sweet spices and gets more and more delicious the longer it putters away in the oven.
For regular everyday family meals, I’ve developed a growing repertoire of dishes that the whole family has come to enjoy.
Medium-firm tofu bathed in a sweet-spicy sauce is an easy dish I make almost weekly. It’s crispy on the outside and pillowy soft on the inside and the hot sweet-spicy sauce takes seconds in the skillet. This dish delivers perfect satisfaction in every bite. I serve it with a side salad or leftover vegetables from a previous meal.
Socca flatbread ‘pizza’ often appears on a Friday evening when I want something extra special. The chickpea batter, which is cooked under the broiler in a searing hot cast iron skillet, makes a delicious base which we top with all manner of fresh ingredients. We’ve each discovered that socca is more enjoyable than traditional pizza made with unhealthy deli meats and fatty oily cheese. It bursts with flavour and nutrition. And trust me when I say, moving away from cheese has been the hardest thing for our family.
A hearty rib-sticking bean and vegetable stew is another wonderful comfort meal. Especially this winter. With the recent Arctic cold snap did you know that Regina was the coldest place on Earth this past week with temperatures dipping into the -40s (both C and F)? I can tell you that tucking into a steaming hot bowl was a comforting reprieve from the cryogenic temperatures.
In the end it’s not about deprivation. It’s about creating something new, something delightful that is satisfying and wonderful.
🌱 Here are a few tips that helped me make the transition and I hope they can help you too:
Tip 1: Find new flavour-packed dishes – Look for dishes that give you the same satisfaction factor – rich, savoury and warming. Cook with familiar flavours – like adding poultry seasoning or dried sage to a plant-based dish at Thanksgiving or Christmas. I like to add a hit of freshness to heartier winter dishes to give that cravability factor – like a swirl of basil pesto in a tomato soup, or spoonful of garlicky lemon gremolata on a Moroccan Chickpea Tagine (recipe below).
Tip 2: Lean into texture – A lot of comfort-food satisfaction comes from texture. Crispy tofu, creamy soups, hearty stews. Explore different textures to make meals feel satisfying.
Tip 3: Embrace the journey – Plan ahead and figure out your menu before you start. There are lots of resources and recipes – including here on CJ’s Fresh Approach – to set you on your journey. And don’t fret, discovering new favourites can be an exciting and delicious adventure. Experiment and find recipes that your family will love. The journey is as fun as finding that perfect dish.
What comfort foods are you struggling to replace?
Have you found a new plant-based favourite that surprised you and brings you comfort and creates a new food memory?
I’d love to hear from you. Drop me a line in the comments below – maybe you have a new food tradition I can bring onto my family table.
With gratitude,
CJ
P.S. If you love what you’re reading, if it’s helpful, please consider subscribing to support my work and help me continue to create great content and recipes. This Introductory Offer of 50% of annual subscriptions expires Feb 28, 2025.
Recipe: Moroccan Chickpea Tagine with Garlicky Lemon Gremolata
While not traditional, I serve this aromatic dish over millet. Couscous is more traditional but it lacks the nutrition that you get from millet, which offers a similar texture to couscous. Also not traditional is a bright fresh garlicky lemon gremolata, which finishes the dish with flavours associated with tagines – lemon, garlic, and parsley. A spoonful atop each serving adds a fresh punch I know you’ll love!
Serves 4
1 large onion, sliced into thin wedges
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1 tbsp (15 mL) finely chopped fresh ginger
2 carrots, sliced into rounds
1 small sweet potato, diced
1 tsp (5 mL) ground cumin
1 tsp (5 mL) ground coriander
1 tsp (5 mL) smoked paprika
½ tsp (2.5 mL) ground cardamom
2 sticks cinnamon, each about 3” long
¼ tsp (1 mL) chili flakes
¼ tsp (1 mL) ground turmeric
¼ tsp (1 mL) ground black pepper
1-398 mL can (13.5 fl oz) fire-roasted diced tomatoes
1-540 mL (19 fl oz) can cooked chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 large handful whole dried apricots
¼ cup (60 mL) raisins
About 1 cup (250 mL) vegetable broth
Honey, for drizzling
Garlicky Lemon Gremolata (recipe below)
Preheat oven to 325°F (162°C). Grease a medium sized Moroccan tagine or a medium casserole dish with lid.
Heat a skillet over medium heat; saute the onion, garlic and ginger in some oil for several minutes. Add the carrots and sweet potato and cook a few more minutes. Add the cumin, coriander, smoked paprika, cardamom, cinnamon sticks, chili flakes, turmeric, and black pepper. Stir constantly for several minutes to toast the spices.
Add the tomatoes, chickpeas and vegetable broth. Stir and scape any bits from the bottom of the pan. Transfer the mixture to the tagine or casserole dish. Add a bit more liquid if required; liquid should come barely to the top of the ingredients. Cover with a lid and cook in the oven for about 2 hours. Don’t lift off the lid until it has finished cooking - tagines are meant to braise and steam while they cook. Taste and add salt, if required.
Serve in individual bowls over cooked millet or couscous. Top each portion with a drizzle of honey, which brings out the flavour, and a spoonful of Garlicky Lemon Gremolata.
Garlicky Lemon Gremolata
½ cup (125 mL) finely chopped fresh curly leaf parsley
2 cloves garlic, minced
Grated rind of ½ a lemon
2 tsp (10 mL) olive oil
Juice of ½ a lemon
Salt, to taste
Stir together all the ingredients in a small bowl. Chill until ready to use.
I can't wait to try this! On my meal plan for next week. I love a main course dish with apricots and cinnamon. Umm
A delicious journey is a destination itself !