Hummus

We are coming up on Super Bowl Sunday, which means snack time. I have two snacking ideas that are essentially diametrically opposed to each other. I am going to start with the healthier of the two.

I do like to occasionally eat something relatively healthy, and Hummus is one of my go-to good snacks. For me, Hummus is essentially a garlic delivery system. It consists of garbanzo beans, tahini, olive oil and some garlic for flavor. That’s not to discount the importance of the lemon juice and parsley.

The original version of this recipe came from… well you could probably guess… a Good Eats episode. In this episode, AB was focusing on easy recipes from the pantry, that involved beans. The original is available on the Food Network website, and is called Turbo Hummus. My only modification is to change the Peanut Butter back to Tahini. It would be interesting to try this with peanut butter.

Hardware

Hummus is a very old dish. I cannot imagine making it without a couple modern tools, though:

• Food Processor. This makes everything go together very easily.
• Microplane Grater. You can use a zester, I guess, but I always zest with my microplane grater.

Software

• 2 to 3 peeled cloves of garlic
• 1 can garbanzo beans (chickpeas), drained and liquid reserved. 15 ounce can.
• 2 to 3 tablespoons Tahini
• A handful fresh parsley leaves (about a 1/4 bunch, about half of the amount in the picture)
• 1 lemon (clean it, you will be zesting it)
• Pinch freshly ground black pepper
• Pinch kosher salt
• 1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil. This is definitely not the time to skimp on the olive oil, EVOO for sure.

Process

1. Chop the garlic finely in the food processor.
2. Add the can of beans and 1/2 of the reserved liquid. Process finely or to desired consistency.
3. Use a microplane grater to grate the zest off the lemon into the processor bowl. Be careful to not grate too deep, the white part of the rind is no fun.
4. Add the tahini, parsley, lemon  juice, black pepper, and salt. Process until it forms a paste.
5. Slowly drizzle in the olive oil while processing until it reaches the consistency of mayonnaise.

Notes

• Tahini. This is the hardest ingredient to find, and is probably why AB substituted peanut butter. I have not had too much trouble finding this at Kroger, but Dean’s Mediterranean at Findlay Market is a slam-dunk for this. They have a number of brands. They are located towards the back of the western shelf, near the coolers.
• Parsley. This is actually the ingredient I hate to get. You only need about a 1/4 of a bunch, and a bunch is the smallest amount. That’s why I typically make this in the summer when I can just pick my own parsley from my herb garden.
• Serving Suggestion. I use Sesame Toasteds mainly. But this is also, obviously, really good with pita bread. If I want to get really fancy, I’ll cut the pita into triangles and toast them.

It’s pretty simple, nothing earth-shattering, but definitely better than any store-bought Hummus I have tried. You can try a number of variations. I have done it with roasted garlic. Once I roasted garlic with a Habanero and put it in. Not my greatest creation, but may try to tweak that some more. It is really hard to beat the basic recipe, and this is one I make a lot.

Tagged as: garlic, snacks