by This one-pan, super quick to make Marry Me Chickpeas recipe is my vegetarian spin on the viral Marry Me Chicken recipe, and I promise, it’s just as delicious! We’re using canned chickpeas to help this recipe come together even faster and full fat coconut milk for that classic flavor and richness!
Friends… It’s not often that I’m lost for words, but I seriously don’t think I’ve ever made a more delicious recipe than this one. It’s creamy, comforting, and bursting with sundried tomato basil flavor!
Oh, and did I mention this easy vegetarian main dish takes, like, 20 minutes to make?! AND it’s well balanced with protein and fiber from the chickpeas, plus healthy fats from the coconut milk, which makes my Registered Dietitian heart very happy!
I love serving it with naan bread, but rice is also delicious with it, too!
Once you fall in love with the chickpea version of this dish, graduate to make it with tofu in my Marry Me Tofu!
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Time to Get Cooking!
Okay, this recipe seriously couldn’t be easier, which is part of the reason that I love it!
Healthy Marry Me Chickpeas with Canned Chickpeas
Ingredients
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 yellow onion, diced
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 tsp oregano
- 1/2 tsp chili flakes
- 540 ml chickpeas, I used canned, drained and rinsed
- 1/2 cup sundried tomatoes, sliced
- 400 ml full fat coconut milk
- 3 tbsp tomato paste
- 1 tsp salt, or to taste
- 1/2 tsp pepper, or to taste
- 1 cup baby spinach
- 14 g basil, julienned
Optional
- 4 pieces naan
Equipment
Instructions
- Start by sautéing your onion in the olive oil in a large pan over medium heat until translucent, which is usually about 3-4 minutes. Add your garlic, oregano and chili flakes and sauté for another 1-2 minutes.
- Add your chickpeas, sundried tomato, coconut milk, tomato paste, salt and pepper to the pan, and bring the mixture to a low simmer. Once it's simmering, reduce the heat to low and let simmer for 10-15 minutes.
- Add the basil and spinach and stir in to wilt. Serve with naan, on its own or with another grain of your choice and enjoy!
A forgiving recipe and very tasty. Used chickpeas cooked from scratch, didn’t have sun dried tomatoes subbed in tomato
paste, no fresh basil used dry, no coconut milk subbed in a bit of Grace creamed coconut, dropped in a few cubes of frozen spinach and it was terrifically good! Thanks for posting this great recipe.
Those substitutions sound amazing, Ellen! Thank you so much for letting me know you loved it!
Terrific recipe! I added some lemon to this. The chickpeas were a little hard at the end so I felt like I needed to leave it on quite a bit longer, which took away a lot of liquid. Any suggestions? Thank you
Different brands of canned chickpeas typically have different softness, so it may just be the brand you were using! You could sauté the chickpeas for a few minutes with the onion and garlic to soften them a bit more before adding the liquid ingredients so it doesn’t reduce too much. Let me know if you try it!
This is so good and easy to whip up. I’ve been wanting to make this again since I first made it a few weeks ago. I didn’t have spinach, but I had swiss chard so I substituted that and it worked just fine.
Thanks for a great recipe Lauren!
Oh that’s so great to know that swiss chard works too, Jean! Thank you for leaving a review 🙂
Deliciouos! And if you squeeze some lemon juice just before serving, they are even better.
I love doing this too! Thanks for leaving a review, Diana!
My new go to busy weeknight dinner recipe! I’ve been making it for months and absolutely love it 🙂 I sometimes add in some extra veggies I have lying around like a red pepper and fry with the onions and garlic.
Yay I’m so glad you love it Kirsten!!
This recipe is easy to make and tastes really delicious. Thank you. I think next time I will add shiitake mushrooms as well. It was easy to make and quickly ready to eat.
I’m so glad you loved it! Mushrooms would be amazing in it, I’ll have to try that, too!
Delicious. I skipped the spinach and basil, and blended about 50% of it to make it a creamy soup.
I’m so glad you loved it, Alyssa! I actually have a Marry Me Gnocchi Soup that you should definitely try next if you like this blended as a soup!
So tasty. Cooked it twice under one week. That good and fast. Thank you.
Wow that makes me so happy, thank you for letting me know, Maya! 🙂
Really enjoyed this recipe. Definitely going to put it into the meal prep rotation.
I’m so glad you loved it, Cassandra!
This looks great, I’m going to try it on the next couple of days. Can you tell me how many cups the 540 ml of chickpeas comes out to? Thanks!
Hi Lizzie, it’s one standard sized can of chickpeas, or about 2 cups!
Big hit from the family: tasty, filling and so easy to make. Definitely on the weekly menu.
I’m so happy to hear that, Simone, it’s one of my family’s favorites too!
I will try it again! May have got a measurement wrong.
Keep me posted how it goes!
Mine is very runny, have I missed something?
Most likely, yes! It should be thickened and scoopable, like in the photos. Did you use extra coconut milk? Or forget to drain and rinse the chickpeas? Or did it not simmer for long enough? Did you cover when simmering so they couldn’t reduce? Some of these things could have contributed!
I omitted the onion – no hands for chopping while holding a nursing baby, and threw everything into the instant pot and it was phenomenal. I am pretty addicted to heavy cream and generally scoff at the idea that it could possibly be replaced by coconut milk- but dang that was delicious. Very light coconut taste, I think the tomatoes really help to cover it. I had it over pasta and will for sure add it to my rotation.
I’m so glad you loved it Abby!! It is surprising how good it tastes without heavy cream- It really isn’t too coconut forward and I’m so glad you agree!! I actually have a recipe for ‘Marry Me Pasta’ as well that you might like!
Hi is tomato paste tomato puree?
Hi Maria, no, they aren’t exactly the same! Tomato paste is a much more concentrated form of tomato puree. It can be found in the canned food section of the grocery store, close to where the canned tomatoes are. If tomato puree is all you have on hand, it will likely still work, but keep in mind that the flavor won’t be as concentrated so you’ll have to use a bit more. I hope that helps!
Thankyou xx
My pleasure, I hope you love it!
This is phenomenal! I was shocked at how delicious for a pretty easy recipe.. I’m putting this in my rotation – so so good.! Thanks for sharing!!
Hi Anna, I’m so glad you loved it! It’s definitely in my weekly rotation, too!
This was really great. I always have a jar of sun dried tomatoes in our pantry as fresh ones are very expensive in NZ in winter. I also like to use all our food in the fridge so I added some ham of the bone chopped very small. I will try again as just veggie as I love both. A great recipe.
I’m so glad you loved it, Denise! Those adjustments sound really delicious, too!
I followed the recipe exactly, but found that one onion was just too much. Also, the sundried tomatoes added a sweet flavor to the dish that I found to be overpowering.
Hi Nina, thanks for your comments! The onion flavor might have been too much if it wasn’t cooked down enough to soften, or if your onion was large. The sundried tomatoes do add a little sweetness which I’ve found pairs great with the herbyness of the dish, but it’s totally personal preference!
Is there a way to have the ingredients in tsp, cups, oz, etc.? I can Google ml switch, but it would be easier if there was an option within the recipes. Thanks for considering. This looks really good, and a nice start to a dietary change.
Hi Ann, I’ll look into adding this as a functionality, thank you for the feedback!
Thank you so much!
My pleasure, Ann!
I just made this tonight for me & my husband and it was SOOO delicious!!!
Very forgiving recipe, as I had to make some substitutions, I thought I had a can of coconut milk but upon opening it realized it was rancid despite being within expiry, yuck. So, I used unsweetened vanilla bean almond milk and added 2 tablespoons of coconut oil to infuse some coconut flavor. And instead of chili flakes (which I also didn’t have) I used 1/4 teaspoon of Cayenne. Good balance of savory and slightly sweet. We really enjoyed it and it will go on our “Meatless Mondays,” dinner rotation going forward 🙂
Hi Agness, I’m so glad you loved the recipe and that the substitutions that you made worked well for you, it sounds delicious!
So delicious!
Hi Angelli, I’m so glad you loved it, thank you for letting me know!
Very rich and satisfying!
Hi Brittany, it really is! Thanks for letting me know 🙂
What can I use instead of coconut milk?
You can try using unsweetened soy milk instead, but I’ve never tried this personally so am not sure whether the taste, texture, etc will be the same!
amazing!!! easy and cheap for a uni student!
I’m so glad you loved it, Cate!!
I cooked this dish today. I am not a gourmet cook by any means. This delicious. I will deinitely make it again and again.
Hi Muneerah, I’m so glad you loved it! It’s definitely in my weekly rotation as well 🙂