Hummus!

The Perfect Pot Luck Food

So this weekend my co-habitant and I are going camping with some buddies. I was brainstorming a good, transportable camp snack when I remembered my old friend, hummus. Flavorful, protein packed, and relatively shelf stable I am almost certain this will be a camp hit.

Hummus and I have a history. When I was vegan, up to 30% of my diet was hummus (not recommended). When I worked at the co-op, we had a hummus making work-shift where some lucky member would make a 5-gallon bucket of hummus for the house each week. We got some very creative flavors like Spicy Peanut Butter and Shroomy-Bloomy Mushroom, but for me a classic garlicky, lemony hummus stands alone as a perfect food.

When I moved out of the co-op and into my job as the Sierra staff cook, I thought I knew how to make hummus. Then I met Itamar. Itamar is an Israeli outdoor educator and Middle Eastern food enthusiast. One day he imposed himself upon me as I made hummus, and offered his uninvited critique of my process. At first I was resistant, but he knew his stuff and helped coach me to new levels of chickpea mastery. Here are a few of the pointers he gave me:

1. Cook those chickpeas for a LONG time. They should literally fall apart.
2. Use lots of tahini. FYI: American tahini is different from the stuff available in the Middle East, something about the processing of the sesame seeds. So don't tell your Israeli or Syrian friends that you've made an exact replica of their Grandma's hummus. They will know.
3. Use lots of lemon.
4. Blend your lemon juice, tahini and spices separate from your chick peas, and mix them together by hand.

My hummus has vastly improved, thanks to Itamar's counsel. Try your hand at this recipe for a tasty snack or an impressive appetizer for the next backyard barbeque. It yields a lot, so have some available tupperware.  And heads up, you are going to need a food processor. If you don't have one, thumb through your Rolodex for a friend who will lend you theirs, because doing this by hand will be...quite messy.

This is a time intensive recipe, which is why I make big batches. Don't be intimidated, most of the time is just spent on waiting for the chickpeas to cook. For the most part, the food processor does the rest for you.

Thank you, Modern Wonder!

Hummus

yields 8 cups

You will need:

3 cups dried chickpeas (aka garbanzo beans), soaked in water for 18 hours

                       

Before

After

Water for cooking beans

1 tablespoon Salt

2 Bay Leaves

2 tablespoons Olive Oil

4 cloves Garlic, sliced

1 teaspoon Cumin

2 teaspoons Paprika

2 teaspoons Salt

1 pinch Chili Flake

Several grinds Black Pepper

1 ¼ cups Tahini

Juice of 5 Lemons

½ teaspoon Coriander (For all of you who speak English as opposed to Amurican: I mean the powder, not Cilantro leaves)

Olive Oil (if needed)

Garnish: (mix and match) chopped Parsley, finely minced Red Onion, Olive Oil, Paprika, Zatar (mine was a gift from Itamar straight from the West Bank, and I haven't seen it in my shopping trips at home), Black Pepper, and Salt.

First drain and rinse your soaked Chickpeas. Cover with water in a nice stock pot and add 1 tbsp. Salt and Bay Leaves. Make sure you have plenty of water. In my pot, that means about 1 inch above chickpea level. Cover the pot, bring it to a boil, and reduce to a simmer...for about 4 hours. That's right, cook those chickpeas low and slow for 4 hours until they are soft and plump.

Strain the chickpeas, reserving the chickpea water and remove Bay Leaves. Allow chickpeas and liquid to cool, in their own bowls.

Heat a saute pan over Medium High heat and add Olive oil. Add 4 cloves sliced Garlic, and about 30 seconds later add the spices (Cumin, Paprika, Salt, Chili Flake, and Black Pepper). Stir and saute for another 30 seconds then remove from heat.

Add the Spice Mixture to your food processor along with Tahini, Lemon Juice, Raw Garlic and Coriander. Process until smooth. If the mixture is too stiff add a bit of Olive Oil to loosed it up (¼ cup at most). The texture should be like creamy peanut butter.  Spatula this into a separate bowl.

Add Chickpeas to food processor in batches. Add ½ to ¾ cups reserved liquid to each batch, and process. The texture should approximate what you want your final product to be. I like mine a smooth as possible, but if you like yours chunky go on ahead.  Spatula chickpea mixture into a large bowl.

Add in Tahini mixture in three parts, stirring to combine. Taste it and adjust the flavor as you see fit, and don't feel like you have to saute the corrective spices.

Set....

Ready

Hummus!

 Garnish whatever amount you are going to serve, and refrigerate the rest for later.

I will eat any form of hummus.  In this iteration I had it with a corn tortilla, some salad greens from my garden and a little cheddar cheese.