Hummus: It's all about that paste

Hummus served with hot pita, fresh salad, smoked paprika, chillies and summac

My boys love hummus so much that we've ended up making our own, in industrial quantities that we freeze and take out when needed. In fact, so much do they love it that I can really identify with the mother in this spoof video, "It's all about the paste": http://goo.gl/VLjYLJ.

Like anything that you cook, as opposed to bake, however, you can add more or less garlic, or more or less lemon, to taste. So I do strongly advocate that you play around with the tastes and textures and find something that works for you. On the other hand, you need some kind of a structure from which to work, and hence I have supplied some idea of the kinds of ratios that we work with.

The main ingredient is: Time.

Oh, and chick peas.

Hummus Recipe 

1 kg bag of chick peas (2 pounds)
180 to 350 grams (or ½ to 1 bottle) of tahini (also known as tahina or sesame seed paste)
2 or more lemons
1 bulb garlic
Olive oil
Salt, to taste

A 1kg bag makes at least five meals. Yes, you do need to add extra soaking time in at the beginning, but - really - it's easier, cheaper and best of all - tastes better than using the chick peas in tins.

Soak the chick peas overnight (throw out the first batch of water in which they are soaked), bring to boil, skim off the foam, then let simmer until soft.

You want them to do like this when done, all plump and hydrated as opposed to tiny and dehydrated:

Some people add a bit of salt to the pan when cooking them, I prefer just to add salt at the end - I've tried both ways and it doesn't seem to make a whit of difference to how it tastes, but that way you add at tasting time rather than maybe plonking in too much during the cooking time.

I often bring the chick peas to the boil, switch off the pot when hot, then switch it on and off again during the day. It's time that's the major softener, given that there is a set time to how long it will take for anything to hydrate and there's not much you can do to speed this up. Also, that way you use less gas or electricity. Most importantly, when making large quantities, you don't want to spend all day checking that the bottom layer isn't catching or burning.

When the chick peas are soft so that they mash up easily with a fork, blend into a fine pulp. I find that a stick blender is perfect. You could use a potato masher instead, but the blender makes it wonderfully smooth. Blend with some of the water in which it has been boiled, but not all of it. I usually take out most of the water and add it back in as and when needed.

We like our texture fine-grained, not lumpy, so blend it well, but again, it's to your taste. Our girl-child, however, strenuously objects to artisanal chunkiness, so we do the blend until very, very smooth approach:

Hummus dished up with olive oil, smoked Spanish paprika, and chopped-up chillies

We then add liberal amounts of high quality oil oil, finely chopped up garlic - enough to slay any vampire silly enough to stray into our household, tahina, lemon juice and salt - basically, to taste. We put in a bit, then taste, put in a little more, than taste again.

What we do find when blending is that sometimes it looks great and then it dries out again. So, you do always need to add more water than you think. You can also add quantities of olive oil, but that can make it too oily and bitter (if you use the really good stuff) so we tend to blend first with the water and then add the oil for flavour at the end.

We make batches of 1kg of chick peas at a time, and to these we add the juice of one to two lemons, about half a jar of tahini, a good half clove of garlic (lots of bulbs), salt to taste and liberal dousings of olive oil. But it's all about how you want it to taste, in the end.

It freezes beautifully, defrosts quickly and we always have pita bread in the freezer that we pop into the toaster for a quick-and-easy, healthy, vegetarian supper.

However, it is how you serve it that makes all the difference.

First, it helps if the dish in which you serve it is ensure that the dish is superb:

Men bearing hummus in a Carrol Boyes dish

We were fortunate enough to receive this Carrol Boyes dish as a present and it works perfectly for popping the hummus in.

Secondly, one thing I learnt in the Middle East is that you always, but always, serve your lunch with a healthy salad; cucumbers, tomatoes and carrots are obligatory, while the more greens you can add, the better. The addition of a leafy green salad, full of flavours and hopefully freshly picked from your garden is what turns this from a fast-food snack into a gourmet delight.

Leafy greens are obligatory to serve with your hummus

Finally, it is best to serve with paprika (both sweet and hot) or sumac,  or chillies (or a combination of hot paprika and chillies, as I have done here:

Smoked spanish paprika (sweet and hot), chillies and sumac to serve with hummus

I keep the sumac in the freezer; for that matter I keep the smoked Spanish paprikas (both sweet and super-hot) in the freezer too, since spices are comprised of volatile oils, and this way their flavours are preserved. I have my Lebanese friend, Maya, to thank for that tip.

In Saudi, they would also serve it with pickled carrots, onions and gherkin, but we find the fresher flavours work just fine in South Africa. The trick is to make little pockets from the pita, scoop up some hummus, add your salads, sprinkle on your spices, and then pop it in your mouth! Delicious.

Pita filled with hummus, sumac and leafy greens