Hummus, With or Without Preserved Lemons

So much to say today!  First, for any DC people who love to eat and also love to help others, here's a great opportunity to do both simultaneously.  Bring your appetites and your wallets to the lobby of the Washington Post offices at 1150 15th Street, NW, on Thursday, April, 26 from 2 - 6 pm,  where I, along with about 30 other DC area food bloggers, will be holding our local sale for Share our Strength's Great American Bake Sale to end childhood hunger in America.  Share our Strength's No Kid Hungry campaign works to surround kids facing hunger with nutritious food where they live, learn and play.  There will be baked goods, both sweet and savory, made by some fabulous local cooks.  Spread the word to your family and friends who work in the area!

Onward!  Recently, I wrote about Sara Jenkins, whose cookbook, Olives and Oranges, I love, and while in NY recently, Maddy and I had a delicious dinner in her East Village restaurant, Porsena. We agreed that her wilted leek appetizer, which was a special that night, was the standout of the evening. We did not have dessert there though, as we headed further east on E. 7th street to the brick and mortar Big Gay Ice Cream Shop. One "Salty Pimp" (a cone filled with vanilla soft serve, dulce de leche, and sea salt and then dipped in chocolate coating) later we rolled ourselves back over to the subway at Astor Place.

We ate a lot of vegetarian meals and even found a local vegetarian and vegan restaurant in Middletown, CT.  We've also been eating many more vegetarian meals at home.  One of Maddy's favorite foods, which she did not even care for until about a year ago, is hummus. 

I've been working on my hummus recipe for a while, experimenting with different chickpea (garbanzo bean) packaging (for you purists, I am sorry to say that I have not used dried, only packaged).  In trying to get away from BPA in cans, I have tried not only canned, but shelf-stable boxed and frozen.  I found these, as well as no salt added canned beans in my local organic market.  So far, I've only seen one brand of organic frozen beans and one brand of boxed, so naturally, they are not cheap.  I hope that as more companies provide BPA free packaging, the prices will come down.  I've also played with preserved lemons in lieu of regular lemon juice so if you have some, here's another way to use them. 

I found that both the frozen beans and the boxed have their uses.  I think that for a nicer presentation, a salad for example, the boxed wins out.  Although the frozen chickpeas did get a little mushier as they thawed, and more of their skins pulled away and required more time to remove, they got pureed in hummus so it didn't matter.  I found that a 17.6 ounce box yielded 9 ounces of chickpeas after draining, while the frozen, which has no liquid, is the full 16 ounces marked on the package.  With so many different brands of cans, the yield will vary, but I am estimating that the contents of the boxed is almost the same as that of a 15 ounce can. 

This is a very loose recipe that you should adapt to your taste.  Consider these amounts suggestions or starting points and taste the hummus after all the ingredients are in.  If it is too thick, it might need more olive oil or lemon juice.  Even a tablespoon or two of warm water.  If it is to bland, a little more tahini, lemon or salt might be in order. 

Many thanks to Maddy for the photo!


Hummus

(makes a bowlful with enough for many to snack or to provide a side dish or light lunch for at least 4)

1 17.6 ounce box or 15 - 19 ounce can of chickpeas, rinsed and drained ( If you can find frozen and would like to use them, use a little more than half of a 16 ounce bag - 9 ounces if you want to weigh them- and thaw before using)

1/2 cup tahini (I have been using fresh tahini from a local Mediterranean market and it is much more delicious than the packaged stuff )

1/3 to 1/2 of a preserved lemon (use more if it's a small one)

2 Tablespoons lemon juice and 2 Tablespoons warm water if you are using preserved lemon (otherwise use 1/4 cup lemon juice)

1/4 cup olive oil

2 cloves of garlic

1 teaspoon cumin

salt and pepper to taste


Place all ingredients in the bowl of a food processor and blend until smooth.  Taste, obviously avoiding the sharp blade at the bottom of the bowl of the food processor, and add lemon juice, olive oil, salt, etc. as I described in my narrative about the recipe.  I like to drizzle a little olive oil over top and then a sprinkle of ground sumac or paprika.  Enjoy with pita, crackers or vegetables such as carrots, celery or cucumber. 

Roasted Curried Cauliflower

I've been truly addicted to food52 lately, and testing many more recipes from that site than creating my own (though I rarely leave any recipe alone!), but here's one more "share." I thought I've roasted cauliflower to death, but this dish really caught my eye and proved to be a popular one with my tasters. I tested this for food52 several weeks ago during the contest for "your best cauliflower." This one, as well as one of mine, were selected as Editors' Picks, which means something but I'm not sure what. I guess it's like getting Honorable Mention.

If you like the flavor of curry, and have a decent powdered blend or a recipe to make one, I highly recommend you try this out soon! It is an easy, easy, recipe to prep - just cut up the cauliflower, open a can of chick peas, cut an onion and toss it all in a curry vinaigrette. Then just pour yourself a glass of wine and relax while your oven does the rest, roasting until the cauliflower mellows and starts to brown and the chickpeas get crispy and delicious. OK, maybe stir it up once or twice. It can be a vegetarian dinner for 3 or so with just some rice alongside, or can be a side dish for four with some protein, maybe shrimp or salmon roasted at the same time.

I cut the oil and vinegar back by half but kept the amounts for the spices the same. After tossing the veggies with the vinaigrette and arranging them on the baking sheet, I then added about one more tablespoon of olive oil to the bowl in which I made the vinaigrette to get out the rest of the spices stuck to the bowl, and then drizzled that over top of the cauliflower. I also set my oven at 425 instead of the 400 degrees specified.

Delicious!

Another Use for Vinaigrette

The other night dinner was to be a rotisserie chicken. Easy, relatively inexpensive and boring as can be. I had originally thought to serve it with a deconstructed hummus salad I'd seen on another food blog, but when I visualized a mound of beige chickpeas on the plate with beige chicken, I thought better of that dish. Instead, I used the already opened cans of chickpeas as the basis for an updated three bean salad. I immediately looked to an already started red onion for a touch of color and flavor. I added some green beans cut into inch long pieces, and some halved grape tomatoes. If I had some frozen, shelled edamame, I would have thawed a couple of handfuls and added them too. For the vinaigrette, I stuck with the flavors of hummus: lemon juice, olive oil, and garlic. Although I'm giving you some amounts in the recipe below, this vinaigrette is one that is best done by taste - add more lemon juice if it seems to heavy on the olive oil, or vice versa. I let it marinate about an hour so I did have to plan ahead, but once dinner time rolled around, there was nothing left to do but eat.

Right now, the better part of the lower levels of my house are covered in plastic sheeting and drop cloths. Drywall! It's likely to be a mess all week with the worst dust on Thursday and Friday. I'll have to be flexible about meals this week as I suspect many of them will be out.



Chickpea Salad


(serves 6 as a side dish)

2 cans salt free chickpeas, drained and rinsed

1/4 - 1/2 pound green beans, trimmed and cut into one inch pieces

handful or two grape tomatoes, halved or even quartered if large

1/4 cup roughly diced red onion, or more to taste

1 clove garlic, minced

juice of 1 medium lemon

3 tablespoons olive oil, more to taste if needed

kosher salt and pepper to taste

Place first five ingredients into a medium bowl. Gently mix. Sprinkle lemon juice over top and gently toss. Pour olive oil over top of ingredients, then sprinkle kosher salt and pepper. Gently toss once more. Let sit about an hour. Toss before serving. If you have some fresh herbs around, a couple of teaspoons of chopped parsley or thyme would be a great garnish.