Make your own Chickpea flour Tofu. 10 min Non soy tofu made with Chickpea flour or Besan / gram flour. Easy Homemade Burmese tofu. Vegan Gluten-free Soy-free Tofu Nut-free Recipe. Pin this post! Jump to Recipe

Burmese (chickpea) tofu is made by cooking split pea flour or chickpea flour and water batter until it thickens and can set. One of the other methods is to soak the split chickpeas, blend and use that batter. I make my chickpea tofu with chickpea flour and with less liquid so it is a sturdier, and quick version of Burmese tofu. This recipe makes about 2.5 to 3 cups cubed tofu which can be stored for a few days refrigerated.

The tofu can also be made with Chickpea flour (which is ground garbanzo beans (white chickpeas), pure besan / gram flour (which is flour of brown chickpeas (kala chana) or split brown chickpeas (chana dal)), or mixed flour besan which can have 2 different types of chickpea / split pea flour, or yellow split pea flour. Each of the flours need different amounts of liquid. Besan (gram flour) is also ground finer than white chickpea flour. Because of these differences, chickpea flour generally makes a thicker batter and needs more water to achieve the similar consistency as besan batter if the recipe was written with besan. Besan will need less liquid to make an equally sturdy tofu as Chickpea flour tofu. The tofu recipe below made with any of the flours, without adjusting the recipe will still be usable wherever needed. Depending on the flour used, the resulting tofu cubes might be soft or firm. Use less water for firmer and more water for softer chickpea tofu.

Chickpea flour is mixed with water to form a smooth batter. The batter thickens into a thick custard like consistency which sets and can be easily sliced. I use these properties of chickpea flour in many recipes, like this nut-free Nacho cheese slice, these chickpea flour pasta noodles and more.

This recipe is adapted from the spiced chickpea tofu in my book. You can use it as a substitute for soy tofu in many recipes. It does well in curries, tossed in dressing, in wraps, salads, also makes a great morning scramble, or egg salad!, breaded tofu etc. It also sticks to the pan like regular tofu while stir frying, if your pan isnt good ;).





Made these Buffalo Tofu Wraps with Chickpea flour tofu tossed in buffalo hot sauce.

More chickpea flour recipes from the blog

This tofu might not absorb marinades as quickly. So I generally prefer to flavor the tofu itself while making it. Mix in herbs, spices and flavors into the batter before cooking it. That way the tofu is already infused with a profile depending on where you are using it. I usually add garam masala and cayenne when using in curries and some soy sauce and lemon when adding to asian fusion, some italian herb blend for other uses like a mashed up marinated tofu salad.

Blend the chickpea flour water and spices into a smooth batter. Cook over medium heat. the batter will start to get lumpy after a minute or so.

Keep stirring frequently. The batter will eventually thicken evenly and become custard like.

Cook for another 2 minutes so the chickpea flour is cooked through. You can taste the mix carefully at this point to ensure that the chickpea flour doesnt taste raw and adjust salt if needed. the mixture will also start to come away from the pan.

Transfer the custard to a parchment lined container. Cool for 10 minutes then refrigerate for about an hour.

Remove from parchment, cube and use.

Keep refrigerated for upto 4 days.