Mum gave me Annabel Crabb’s cookbook “Special Delivery” for my birthday, and I’ve been happily marking recipes that I want to try – this chickpea and haloumi bake was one of the first, because a) haloumi and b) it’s really quick and easy.

ingredients:
1 red onion
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 coriander
1/4 allspice
pinch of paprika
400g can of chickpeas
250g cherry tomatoes (or chopped tomatoes)
100g fresh spinach or baby spinach leaves
2 tbsp chopped parsley
250g haloumi (I only used around 180g)
juice of 1/2 lemon
fresh coriander to garnish

Roughly chop up the onion, add a reasonable glug of oil to a large frying pan, and fry the onion for around 4 to 5 minutes. Add the spices and fry for another minute or two, stirring so that it doesn’t stick.

Drain most of the liquid from the can of chickpeas, leaving a couple of tablespoons, and add the chickpeas and liquid in with the onion and spice mixture. Add in the tomatoes, spinach, and parsley, then stir until the spinach is just wilted. Preheat your oven to 180C.

Pour the mixture into a shallow baking dish – I used a 20cm square pyrex dish because I didn’t want to overwhelm everything with haloumi. Slice the haloumi and layer it on top. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until the haloumi is golden around the edges.

In Special Delivery Annabel suggests serving this with couscous (which would be great to soak up the tomatoey liquid). I’m planning on eating leftovers reheated because I like haloumi even when it gets a bit squeaky and chewy, but for more discerning palates this might be best served and eaten straight out of the oven.