Today England plays Tunisia in the Group games at the World Cup. So, I’ve decided to take advantage of the excitement surrounding this event, to re-start cooking for my Taste the World challenge. I’m delighted I’ve done this, because I’ve found some very interesting Tunisian recipes, including Ghraiba. These cookies have a different texture, chewy, like a cookie dough. The flavour is intense, also because for 20 small cookies I’ve used only 50g of sugar. I will make them again, because I love the taste and they don’t need a lot of sugar, making them a better option.

Ghraiba are made with a mix of white flour and chickpeas flour. As I love trying out new types of flour, I was excited to have a recipe that requires a flour I haven’t used before. I went to the International shop I usually go to in search for chickpeas flour. Well, after my husband and I looked at all the flours available, twice, including some strange sounding ones, we gave up and asked a shop assistant if they stock any. They do, but chickpeas flour is also called gram flour, that is why we’ve missed it.

I think the gram or chickpeas flour is versatile and I’m going to use it when I’ll make burgers instead of flour, or for falafel.
Depending on the flour used to make them, Ghraiba are called Ghraiba homs, made with chickpea flour, Ghraiba bidha, made with wheat flour, and Ghraiba droô, made with sorghum flour.

Ingredients for 20 Ghraiba cookies:

– 120g chickpea flour
– 45g plain white flour
– 90g soften butter, at room temperature
– 50g icing sugar
– 1 spoon of oil, if needed

Put the chickpeas flour, white flour, and icing sugar in a bowl. Toss in the butter, cut in cubes. If the butter is not very soft, put it for 5-10 seconds in the microwave to soften a bit more. Rub the butter into the dry ingredients until it resembles breadcrumbs. Tip the mix onto the worktop and start kneading until it forms a dough. If the dough needs a bit more moisture, add a spoon of oil. I didn’t need to add it.

Preheat the oven at 140C or 120C for fan assisted ovens. Line the baking tray with baking paper.

Now you can form the cookies while the oven is heating. I’ve weight in the dough and divided it in 20. I made a ball in my hands, flatted it on the worktop and made three indents with a knife. I’ve transferred the cookies on the baking tray.
Another way to make them is to make a long roll, and cut slices of it, flip the slices on a side, and make the indents with the knife.

Put the cookies in the oven and bake them for 15 to 20 minutes. As you can see in the picture, they need to have a light colour, hence make sure you don’t over-bake them.

Were you familiar with Ghraiba cookies? Let me know in the comments.