Socca Recipe: The French Appetizer from the Riviera (2024)

FAQs

What is socca from nice? ›

When Jack and I visited Nice, France, I ate two things as much as I could: Niçoise salad and socca. If you're not familiar with socca, it's a savory chickpea pancake with crisp, golden brown edges and a moist interior. It's popular throughout southern France and northern Italy, and once you try it, you'll see why.

Socca is also known by the names of fainá or farinata (coming from Argentina and Italy, respectively), but they are all essentially the same recipe using chickpea flour, olive oil, and water — and all have a crispy, nutty flavor.

Socca, a chickpea crêpe cooked in a pizza oven, is a simple specialty with a big presence along the Mediterranean.

Known as “farinata”, “cecina”, “5 e 5”, “socca” and with many more different names depending on the single town or region, the Italian chickpea flatbread is a traditional specialty widespread along the Italian west coast, from Tuscany to France and Nice.

One can eat socca in many different ways. Traditionally it is served piping hot with a drizzle of olive oil. You can walk around the streets in Nice and see it made in farmer's markets. You can also find it in Italy, however they call it “farinata” there.

Real Dishes Locals Love in Nice

You'll be able to taste Ratatouille and Niçoise salad, the world-famous dishes originating from Nice.

History of Socca

Legend has it that the recipe for socca was discovered when the Turks attacked the city of Nice in 1543. When they ran out of ammunition, the Niçois mixed hot oil with chickpea soup and poured it down off the top of the walls and onto the heads of the invaders.

The difference between socca and panisse is in the cooking method. "They're really quite different," says Rosa Jackson, a Canadian expat, food writer, and owner of Les Petit* Farcis, a cooking studio in the Old Town of Nice. "Socca is baked in the oven, and panisse is cooked first in a saucepan then fried."

Socca, a specialty of Nice, France, is a thin pancake made from chickpeas with a crispy exterior and a soft, creamy interior. Its origins lie in Genoa, Italy, where it's typically called farinata.

The name "chickpea", earlier "chiche pease", is modelled on Middle French pois chiche, where chiche comes from Latin cicer.

Where is socca popular? ›

Socca is popular not just in southern France, but also in Italy (where it's called farinata). The traditional—and best—way to cook it is in a wood-fired oven (mobile or otherwise), but you can easily make do with your home oven using a skillet or pizza pan.

Besan flour, gram flour, and garbanzo bean flour are all chickpea flours; they're just made from different varieties of chickpeas. Chickpea flour or garbanzo bean flour is milled using whole white chickpeas (garbanzo beans). Besan or gram flour is made by grinding split brown chickpeas (chana dal) into a fine powder.

Socca is a large thin pancake made of chickpea flour (aka garbanzo bean flour), water, olive oil, and salt (perhaps with a touch of herbs or spice). It's popular in southern France, but also in Italy, where it's called farinata.

Other Names: Garbanzo beans, ceci beans, chana. Popular Uses: Hummus and falafel. Yield: 1 cup of dried chickpeas equals approximately 3 cups cooked.

Pasting properties of both the flour of legumes were significantly different (P < 0.05). Chickpea flour had a lower pasting temperatures and the peak, final, and setback viscosities than dried green pea flour. These characteristics seem to be related to the increased fat content of chickpea flour than green pea flour.

The Legend of Térésa, the Socca Queen of Nice

In 1928, an enterprising Niçoise named Térésa, set up a kiosk in the Cours Saleya market, a gregarious woman who talked to everyone and was always ready to give her opinion about anything and everything, whether it was solicited or not.

It is hard to pinpoint the exact origins of socca, or soca as it is spelled in the Niçard dialect, though the modern version is likely to have crossed borders from Italy where it is known as farinata. Wikipedia mentions a possible origin story of a group of Roman soldiers cooking chickpea flour on a shield.