Baked Chickpea Fritters
on Mar 14, 2025
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These easy baked chickpea fritters prove that you don’t need oil and a frying pan to make fantastic fritters with golden crispy edges. Healthy and full of flavor, I bake my fritters on a sheet pan in the oven. I mash the chickpeas with red onions, cumin, cayenne pepper, garlic and chopped parsley and stir in crumbled feta. To go with the fritters, I whisk together a lemony tahini sauce for dipping or drizzling. They can be an appetizer, a side or a vegetarian dinner.
If you’re looking for more baked veggie fritter recipes, try these zucchini corn fritters or these sweet potato fritters.
Table of Contents
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
It is so much easier to bake fritters in the oven instead of frying them in a skillet. Besides being healthier, there isn’t the mess of all that oil that you would need for them to be pan fried. Also, the oven is more reliable for consistent temperature and hands-off cooking. Plus you can make them at the same time.
Canned chickpeas are one of the best pantry ingredients. Convenient and incredibly versatile, I always keep them stocked in my kitchen. I like this change of pace mashing the chickpeas rather than leaving them whole and eating them in a salad or something else.
You can think of fritters as more than just an appetizer. Serve this chickpea fritter recipe as a healthy snack, a side or pair them with a salad to turn them into a main dish.
The Ingredients
This is what you need:
For fritters
- Chickpeas: The recipe calls for 2 15-ounce cans of chickpeas (also known as garbanzo beans). Drain and rinse them in a colander. Then pat off the water with a towel and pull off all the skins. This will make them mash better.
- Red onions give the fritters a sharp accent. They are my first choice over white or yellow onions.
- Dried spices: I season the fritters with cumin, cayenne pepper, kosher salt and black pepper.
- Garlic: To go with the spices, I also stir in 2 minced garlic cloves.
- Parsley: You can substitute with cilantro or use a mix of both fresh herbs.
- Feta: When you bake feta it mellows out some of the saltiness, but it still layers in another flavor into the chickpea fritter mix.
- Egg: A lightly beaten egg is the liquid that binds the ingredients together.
- All-purpose flour is the dry ingredient binder. It also helps them crisp up on the outside as the fritters bake. To make them gluten-free, swap with almond flour.
For sauce
- Tahini is sesame seed paste. You can find it in the international food section at the grocery. Soom is one of my favorite brands. After you open a jar, you should keep it in the fridge. I take it out 15 minutes before I am planning to use it and stir it really well before making the sauce.
- Garlic: The sauce has a finely minced clove.
- Lemon juice adds citrusy freshness and thins out the tahini.
- Water also helps the sauce get to the right consistency, thick but pourable. I use it instead of all lemon juice, so citrus doesn’t overpower everything else.
- Kosher salt: Just a pinch will bring out all the flavors in the sauce.
How To Make Baked Chickpea Fritters
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
1. Combine the chickpeas with the rest of the fritter ingredients in a large mixing bowl. That includes red onions, minced garlic, chopped parsley, cumin, cayenne pepper, salt, black pepper and flour.
2. Smash the chickpea mixture. Doing this with a fork or a potato masher is better than a food processor because you want it to have some chunky texture.
3. Stir in the feta and egg. After this, it should feel sticky enough that you can make the patties.
4. Shape the fritters. You should end up with 12, which is about a scant 1/4 cup (not packed) of the mixture. Roll them into balls. Place them on a sheet pan and then gently press them down with the palm of your hand or the bottom of a jar.
5. Bake the chickpea patties. Give them 25-30 minutes, flipping them over halfway through baking. They should be golden brown on both sides.
6. Make the tahini sauce. Do this while the fritters are in the oven. Whisk the tahini, garlic, lemon juice, salt and water in a small bowl. The sauce should have a thick but pourable consistency.
Serving
You can plate the fitters with the tahini sauce in a small bowl on the side or drizzle the sauce over them. As mentioned, fritters can be an appetizer, a side dish or a main when you serve them with a salad such as a lemon arugula salad, a classic house salad or this roasted broccoli quinoa salad.
Another option is to treat chickpea fritters like a falafel sandwich and tuck them into pita bread with the sauce, romaine, tomatoes and cucumbers.
Leftovers & Storage
Let the fritters cool before storing them in an airtight container in the refrigerator up to 3 days. You can reheat them in the microwave or in a 350-degree F oven. To keep the fritters longer, up to 1 month, you can freeze them. It helps to put pieces of parchment paper or wax paper between them, so they don’t stick together. You can reheat frozen fritters in the oven at 350 degrees F for 10 minutes.
I also like to eat leftover fritters cold. I will break them into pieces and toss them into a salad. This is how I turn a bowl of lettuce into a meal because those chickpea bites make it more filling.
Recipe Tips
- Remove the skins from the canned chickpeas. This will make them more mashable, and the fritters will have a better texture.
- If the tahini sauce doesn’t have the right consistency, you can fix it. If it is too thick, add a little water a teaspoon at a time. On the other hand, if it is too thin, stir in more tahini.
- Even though the tahini sauce is super simple to make, you can substitute with something store-bought such as Greek yogurt, tzatziki sauce, hummus, pico de gallo, guacamole or hot sauce.
More Chickpea Recipes
Baked Smashed Chickpea Tacos
Creamy Chickpea Soup
Chickpea Cucumber Salad
Kale Sweet Potato Chickpea Salad
Sweet & Spicy Carrots, Chickpeas & Halloumi
Chickpea Spinach Pasta
Roasted Tomato Chickpea Quinoa Salad
Roasted Cauliflower and Chickpeas with Herby Tahini
Baked Falafel Salad
Baked Chickpea Fritters
Ingredients
For fritters
- 2 15 ounce cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed, skins removed
- 1/3 cup finely chopped red onions
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 2 tablespoons chopped parsley plus more for serving
- 1 teaspoon cumin
- Pinch of cayenne pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
- 1/4 cup crumbled feta
- 1 large egg, lightly beaten
For tahini sauce
- 1/3 cup tahini
- 1 garlic clove, minced
- 1/2 lemon, juice
- Pinch of kosher salt
- 3-4 tablespoons water
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper.
- In a large bowl, stir the chickpeas, red onions, 2 minced garlic cloves, parsley, cumin, cayenne pepper, 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, black pepper and flour. Smash the chickpea mixture with a fork.
- Stir in the feta and egg until everything is well combined.
- Shape the chickpea mixture into 12 balls, about a scant 1/4 cup (not packed). Press them down gently with the palm of your hand or the bottom of a jar.
- Bake the fritters for 25-30 minutes until they are golden brown on both sides, flipping them over halfway through baking.
- While the fritters are in the oven, make the sauce, stir the tahini, 1 minced garlic clove, lemon juice, pinch of salt and water in a small bowl. (The sauce should be a thick but pourable consistency. If needed, you can add more water 1 teaspoon at a time, stirring after each addition to thin it out.)
- Serve warm with the sauce on the side or drizzled on top. Sprinkle the fritters with chopped parsley.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
