F is for fritter - HHDH #6
When Jenjen of Milk & Cookies announced the theme for Hey Hey It’s Donna Hay #6 - F is for Fritter, I took it as a sign that yes, I had to take part! I love fritters of many kinds (except the deep fried mars bars as found at a certain fish’n'chip shop in Yarraville - that should be OUTLAWED!), and this event was the perfect opportunity to play around with some ideas that I’d had and try and create something new and exciting!
Now, in Korean cuisine we have a type of fritter called ‘bin-dae-dok‘, a fritter made with many ingredients, but the base is soaked and ground mung beans. The pureed beans make the entire fritter slightly chewy, crumbly and thick without giving it a cakey texture that can be found by the use of flour. Using this idea, I decided to use cannellini beans as the base for my fritters, hoping to get a similar effect. Cannellini beans hail from Italy and are large, creamy white beans that are smooth and soft when cooked, a lovely addition to pastas and stews.
When you study and work, it leaves little time for prepreparation of food, and so I decided to go with tinned cannellini beans from my local Italian deli. I knew they needed something that would provide contrast and play as the main star in these fritters as the beans only have a very subtle flavour, in the end I decided to go for simplicity and just chucked in some frozen corn to be the star of this show.
Extremely simple and fast to put together, these pack a powerful punch in flavour and are definetely going to be part of my repetoire from now on!
Chilli Cannellini and Corn Fritters
Ingredients
1 x 420g tin of cannellini beans, drained
2 cups frozen sweet corn
1 large onion, finely diced
1 tsp ground garlic
2 level tsp chilli powder
1 medium egg
1 egg yolk
1/2 cups breadcrumbs
1/4 cup plain flour
Salt and pepper to taste
Oil for frying
1. Puree the cannellini beans till they are almost completely smooth. Mix in the corn, onion, garlic and chilli, make sure the mixture is well combined.
2. Add the egg, egg yolk, breadcrumbs and flour to the mixture and mix well to combine. Check the batter, you want one tablespoon to be chock full of corn. If you it looks a bit batter heavy, then add some more corn.
3. Add salt and pepper to taste and check the consistancy of the mixture. It should be fairly thick and gloopy. If it is too watery, add more breadcrumbs or flour. Warning - adding too much flour will result in a very doughy and rubbery fritter.
4. Heat up a frying pan with some oil, then drop tablespoons of the mixture into the pan and fry till golden brown and crunchy. Flip and fry till done, then drain on some paper towels.
5. The chilli and the sweetness of the corn results in a fritter that can be enjoyed on it’s own, but if you want a dipping sauce I’d go with a sweet chilli sauce 
These fritters are crunchy and crumbly and an absolute delight. The crumbly texture of the base contrasts with the firmness of the corn, and the heat from the chilli is balanced by the sweet juice of the corn.
Technorati Tags: HHDH, fritters, corn fritters, cannellini beans, recipes
If you enjoyed this post, please consider to leave a comment or subscribe to the feed and get future articles delivered to your feed reader.
Comments
Brilynn I’m still trying to find a recipe I want to make, but I’ll definitely get mine done in time for HHDD.
Helen These look delicious! I will try to make them next week for dinner, they are sure to be Hubby approved!
Ari (Baking and Books) Your photos actually made my mouth water. These look like the perfect thing to eat on a sunny afternoon, perhaps outside at a picnic or barbeque.
peabody Next to apple fritters, corn based fritters are definitely my favorite….great entry.
Ellie MP - Definetely worthwhile, they’re the best corn fritters I’ve ever made 
Lis - Thanks hon!
Brilynn - Just saw yours, good job, they look totally tasty!
Kat - Cheers
Helen - Thanks Hope you and hubbs like them!
Barbara - My pleasure It was fun to finally take part in this event!
Ari - Aww shucks!! I think they’d definetely work well as a finger food for a picnic, the batter is crumbly so it doesn’t get tough like flour-based batters
Peabody - hehehe, glad you liked them
Gauri - They’re pretty spicy, so make sure you taste the batter as you add the chilli
Rachel - Cheers hon!
neil What a clever idea to use cannellini beans, I can practically taste them right now. Well thought out recipe with a Korean/Italian twist. Nice.
Ellie Neil - Glad you liked them They don’t provide much flavour here as there are so many other stronger flavours which dominate, but the texture and the very light nuttiness they provide is divine!
jenjen Gorgeous photo of the fritters there Ellie, i’m officially drooling. This is a recipe I must try for myself. Thanks for taking part.
ilingc hey ellie,
chilli corn fritters! yumm…. i’m not sure if i’ve ever tried cannellini beans before but your idea intrigues me so much that I might give them ago this weekend!
Ellie Jenjen - Aww shucks, thanks hon Glad you like ‘em! It was my pleasure taking part in this event, can’t wait to see the round-up!
Iling - Hehehe, corn fritters are awesome I’m glad this worked out so well as it was basically an experiment without any recipe to base it on! Don’t worry too much about the beans, they are more for the texture than the flavour, but you should give them a try sometime! Mild, nutty, creamy and delicious 
Bron These sound and look great Ellie,
and I reckon they’ll be perfect for my brunch this Sunday!
kathryn I always think fritters make a really good easy meal - and you’ve made it even easier by using tinned beans and frozen corn. Good ideas - means it’s something you can easily make at the end of a busy day.
Ellie Kathryn - fritters are quite an easy meal, though not necessarily the healthiest if they’re fried like these However, you’re right in that this is something you can whack together pretty quickly at the end of the day when you want something quick and hassle-free!
that looks really tasty. i’m looking forward to trying this one out.