Lemony Chickpea Casserole
This lemony chickpea casserole is the perfect balance between hearty comfort food and bright, vibrant flavour. It’s light enough to enjoy year-round, but still filling and full of goodness.
And my favourite bit: there’s no pre-cooking required! Just mix all the ingredients together, and pop it in the oven. It couldn’t be easier!
I’ll admit, the ingredients list is a little longer than most of my recipes, but it really doesn’t make much difference when all you need to do is chuck everything into a bowl and mix.
I served this chickpea casserole with some salad and garlic bread, and it made a perfect summery dinner. If you’re in a colder part of the world, it would also be great served with some roast potatoes or roasted vegetables.
❤️ Why You’ll Love This Recipe
- The recipe couldn’t be easier to make, with no pre-cooking required! If you can mix ingredients, you can make this chickpea casserole.
- Lemon and parsley is such a classic combination, and they bring a bright, zesty flavour to the chickpea bake.
- Chickpeas are a great form of vegetarian protein, and they’re also full of fibre and a good variety of vitamins and minerals.
- You can customise the recipe with your own choice of vegetables, if you’d like to – just make sure you choose veg that can bake without needing any pre-cooking, e.g. spinach, tomatoes or frozen peas.
🥗 Ingredients
Here’s what you’ll need to make this recipe. You’ll also need a few cupboard staples, like salt and pepper. See the printable recipe card below for detailed ingredient quantities.
- chickpeas. I always use tinned chickpeas in my chickpea recipes, since they are so convenient, and don’t need any pre-cooking or soaking.
- leek. Leeks are a milder alternative to onions, and they also fare better when not pre-cooked.
- mushrooms
- lemon – bottled lemon juice would also be fine.
- parsley
- egg
- milk
- pumpkin seeds – or, pine nuts would be a great alternative.
- breadcrumbs
- parmesan cheese (make sure you find a vegetarian version, as ‘real’ parmesan is made with animal rennet)
Becca’s Top Tip
I find that ripping mushrooms in my hands (rather than chopping them with a knife) works just as well, and saves even more time on prep!
📋 Instructions
Here’s how to make this recipe – see below for the printable recipe with detailed ingredients and instructions.
Step 1: Add almost all of the ingredients to a large mixing bowl, and combine thoroughly.
Step 2: Transfer the mixture to a baking dish. You can mix the ingredients straight into the dish if you prefer, but I find it much easier to mix in a bowl!
Step 3: Sprinkle the mixture with some breadcrumbs and parmesan cheese.
Step 4: Bake until crispy, then serve.
💭 Recipe FAQs
If you’d like to prepare the dish in advance, I would recommend assembling it, then storing it in the fridge for a day or so, until you’re ready to cook it. Alternatively, you can cook the dish in its entirety, then reheat later.
Yes! The casserole reheats nicely in the microwave. If your baking dish isn’t microwave-safe, you’ll need to dish up portions onto plates first.
Sure – just swap the breadcrumbs for a gluten-free version, or skip them entirely, and just use parmesan in the topping.
Lemony Chickpea Casserole
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Print Pin CommentIngredients
- 1 medium leek, sliced (~ 170g / ~ 6 oz)
- 2 x 400g tins chickpeas, drained (480g, or ~ 2 1/2 cups, in total when drained)
- 4 medium mushrooms, diced
- 1 egg
- 125 ml (~ 1/2 cup) milk
- 2 Tablespoons lemon juice
- Few sprigs fresh parsley, roughly chopped
- 1 Tablespoon pumpkin seeds
- 1 teaspoon minced garlic
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
- 40 g (~ 1/4 cup) breadcrumbs
- 40 g (~ 1/4 cup) finely grated vegetarian parmesan-style cheese
Instructions
- Heat the oven to 180°C (Gas Mark 4 / 350°F).
- Add all of the ingredients, except for the breadcrumbs and parmesan, to a large mixing bowl. Mix well to combine, especially making sure that the egg is thoroughly mixed through the other ingredients.
- Transfer the mixture to a suitably sized baking dish (mine measured approximately 8 x 8 inches), and press down to form an even layer. Sprinkle the breadcrumbs and parmesan cheese over the top.
- Bake, uncovered, for around 40 minutes, or until the mixture is piping hot and the topping is crispy. Serve warm.
Nutrition
Nutritional information is approximate, and will depend on your exact ingredients. Please calculate your own nutritional values if you require accuracy for health reasons.
this looks yummy and i’m wondering if i could i leave out the egg and use non-dairy parm to make this vegan?
thanks.
Hi Jacquie, you’ll need to use vegan milk as well :) If you leave out the egg you may find the sauce is a bit thinner and less creamy, but as long as you don’t mind that, I don’t see why it wouldn’t work!
Perfection
Thank you Graeme!
Grocery shopping day is coming up tomorrow (a very pleasant experience thanks to online ordering) and that means my cupboards are basically empty. But this recipe is so amazingly simple and devoid of hard-to-find or exotic ingredients that I managed to gather everything I needed except for the pine nuts:
*Always-in-my-cupboard can of chickpeas (I’m a recent convert)
*Always-in-my-cupboard veggie stock cube
*Bottom of bottled lemon juice
*Parsley (frozen)
*Onion (frozen)
*Last slice of sandwich bread (2 days past expiry date, glad I didn’t throw it away), blitzed
*Last egg
*Bottom of milk bottle (expires tomorrow)
*Bottom of grated Swiss cheese pack
And it was divine! Light and filling at the same time. I didn’t even feel guilty going back for seconds. Will definitely make it again with all-fresh ingredients.
I’m glad you enjoyed it Estelle, and found it so handy to use up cupboard ingredients! :)
Looks like a great dish to make with chickpeas, my favorite! I love autumn and winter. As the days are getting shorter, the evenings cooler, I really start craving warm comfort food, too.
I gave this a try today, only I substituted almond milk and rice cheese. It ended up a little bit dry, but otherwise delicious! I’m actually in the process of baking a second casserole now, only this time I doubled the amount of egg and milk. Hopefully, that will make it a little more moist. Thanks for the recipe!
This looks like something I’m going to have to try! IT LOOKS SO GOOD!
yum! really awesome recipe. i love anything chickpea! brilliant.
xo
http://allykayler.blogspot.ca/
I’m actually drooling. Dribble.
I saw this on FG. looks awesome.
this looks really easy and delicious! and it is full of thing my meat-eating boyfriend loves!! i have to make this for him!