Sunday… 11/13/11… 14:00…
- Your mission: Make as much hummus as humanly possible in one sitting.
- Your partner: Fellow expat blogger and hummus lover, Sarah Friedlander.
- Your code name: Team Hummus
 |
| All stocked and ready to walk to a neighbor’s to finally cook up some hummus!!! |
Last week, my students and I talked about what we were going to do this weekend. Some were moving, visiting with family, or driving out to the coast. I, on the other hand, informed them that I would be making hummus. The blank stares abounded, so I did my best to explain this Mediterranean delicacy, this luscious combination of flavor and texture, this perfect topping for crackers, carrots, pita bread, tortilla chips, you name it.
 |
| This would be a full bag of dried garbanzo beans, soaked for a solid six hours, and then left to simmer for another hour and a half. |
Yes, it’s true. After months of pining for it, talking about pining for it, being taunted by it when it’s at that specialty food store one day but not the very next, gorging on it during those rare meals it adorns in my life these days, yours truly has finally gotten down to the business of home-made hummus.
 |
| And after Sarah’s food processor had at it. |
Thanks to finally crossing paths with culinary soulmate, Sarah Friedlander, we made a date (and a verifiable TON of hummus). She had the food processor (key), I had the dried beans, so I soaked and simmered, she oven-roasted some gorgeous red bell peppers (this is how we do), we threw in some garden-grown and seriously spicy red peppers from my and Ryan’s recent trip to the Colchagua Valley, and improvised the rest when it came to ratios of olive oil, water, salt, garlic, and, of course, tahini (or I should now say, “Tahina”).
 |
| Why not add some of Sarah’s oven-roasted red bell peppers?! |
Considering her food processor was industrial strength (routed through a 500-or-some-odd-watt power converter), our collective elbow grease consisted largely of chopping and measuring and… finally… tasting. We made three varieties: Classic, Roasted Red Pepper, and I suppose what I will christen Spicy Chilean Peppy Pepper. All three are stacked high in my fridge at present and getting ready to be divvied out to friends and students and today’s lunch (I know better than to spend all this loot in one place).
 |
| Favorite snack actualized. |
So, thank you to Sarah for hosting this long-awaited chickpea endeavor (dare I say we were very hummus-fied with the results?!). Thank you to Chile for challenging me to think outside the ready-made hummus containers I can find at every grocery store and corner store and organic market back home in California. Thank you to Ryan for not thinking me crazy to walk the neighborhood with a pot of garbanzo beans in my bag.
 |
| All stacked up (and this is only half of the results!). |
And, of course, thank you, dear reader, for indulging this craving-turned-weekend-pastime that all amounted to a few hours in hummus heaven. I wish I could share the wealth with all of you!
2 comments