Chickpea "Potato" Salad

Potato salad is a grand thing to serve this time of year at picnics and barbecues. I love the texture and creamy tangy dressing.

I got to thinking that canned chickpeas have a texture not dissimilar to potatoes and decided to try making potato salad but with chickpeas instead. A major advantage: canned chickpeas don't require cooking, whereas if making potato salad, you have to cook the potatoes and allow them to cool before you can start assembling the salad. I also decided to lighten the dressing by substituting nonfat Greek yogurt for the usual mayonnaise.

Although less crumbly than potato salad is usually, the results were quite similar to potato salad as usual, just without the potato. I served them as a side to pan-seared lamb chops (pictured below).

Chickpea "Potato" Salad

2 15-oz. cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1/4 sweet onion, minced
1/2 red bell pepper, cored and minced
1/3 cup minced sweet pickles
3/4 cup nonfat Greek yogurt
1 tbsp. (heaping) Dijon mustard
1/4 to 1/2 tsp. kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Dash of paprika
1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley

Combine the chickpeas, onion, bell pepper and sweet pickles in a large bowl. Stir together the yogurt, mustard, salt, pepper and paprika. Add the yogurt mixture with the salad, add the parsley and stir until well-dressed.