Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Dirt Heart Witch

Home
About
Archive Index
- Agora: The Dance of Pagan Recovery

Home
Pagan
Homemade Hummus and a Warm Welcome Home

Homemade Hummus and a Warm Welcome Home

Last updated on: August 26, 2014 at 1:56 pm by Jenya T. Beachy

Homemade Hummus and a Warm Welcome Home 2014-08-26T13:56:58-07:00 Jenya T. Beachy

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

I just returned from my 3 week trip to the UK and Ireland on Saturday night and, while it was wonderful to go adventuring, I’m really happy to be home.

There are a lot of food related differences between here and there. What we call french fries are there called “chips” and what we call chips, they call “crisps”. Not too hard to get used to. Other things that surprised me were: “bacon” is more a very thin ham steak, while ham steak is “gammon”; the breakfast sausage is a much finer grind than I’m used to; and a “full breakfast” includes beans and grilled tomatoes. Also, pancakes are dessert (which, frankly, I sort of agree with, especially when they’re drowned in butter and syrup) (which, frankly, is what makes them totally delicious, IMO).

Don’t get me wrong; I had some really amazing meals there, from home-cooked pork (thanks, Jim’s family!) to street noodles (thanks, Wok2Go!) But as soon as we got back to Cali, we ordered our favorite pizza and ate really a lot too much.

One thing I missed while I was gone was cooking. I’m not really a ‘foodie’, per se; for me, the preparing of food is often more about the process. I like to learn why things do what they do, and why the directions say that the butter should be at room temp before adding it to the sugar. The more we understand the underlying principles, the freer we can be with our creativity and I like to take a recipe and make it interesting and special by a little bit of tweaking here and there.

So as soon as I had the time and the space, I mixed up one of my easy favorite dishes: hummus. I love homemade hummus because a) it’s a great healthy snack, b) it is profoundly uncomplicated, and c) most importantly, it’s really, really tasty.

Here’s how I do it:

What ya need:

2 cups of Garbanzo Beans*

I used a 15.5 oz can this time, because I had no dried ones and also because I wanted to eat it NOW instead of waiting for beans to soak and cook!

1/2 cup of Lemon Juice

AKA the juice of 2 or 3 lemons

1 or 2 tablespoons of Minced Garlic

Personally, I like to buy pre-minced garlic. Some folks don’t mind the garlic-fingers effect, but I’m not a huge fan. Of course, it’s even better if you have someone who will peel and mince the garlic for you right when ya need it.

1 teaspoon of Cumin

3 tablespoons of Tahini

2 or 3 tablespoons of Olive Oil

Salt

I also used in this batch a couple handfuls of Sun-dried Tomatoes because they were there.

And some Pico Pica Taco Sauce, maybe 2 or 3 tablespoons

First I tried the “August in Austin” hot sauce we bought on our last trip to TX, but one drop of that stuff had me literally walking around the house with my tongue hanging out for 15 minutes.

What ya do:

Just put all that stuff in the blender (Vitamix lovers unite!) and let it spin until it’s the right consistency.

Give it a taste and see what else it needs. If it’s not right, but you’re not sure why, try a pinch or two more of salt. Spin it up and try it. Still not right? Add another splash of lemon. Still not perfect? Add more garlic, or more hot sauce!

Other possibilities to make it more interesting include:

Olives – Pureed with the beans if you want them to disappear, otherwise cut them up and mix in when you’re done with the blending.

Salsa – Onion-y and tomato-y deliciousness

Cilantro

Artichoke Hearts

Lime

Plain Yogurt

Saw a recipe today for Hummus with Peanut Butter…somebody try that and let me know how it is!

California Hummus with a California Apple, California Queso Cotija (and some pretzels)

Now, smear it on bread instead of mayonnaise, dip your chips, vegetables, pita bread, crackers, whatever else, in it and enjoy!

So, today I got to play in the kitchen, eat one of my favorite snacks, settle in more to my home-place. A good day.

*If you use dried Garbanzo Beans, you’ll need to either soak them overnight, or boil them for 5 minutes or so, then let them sit for a couple of hours. Either way, the next step is to drain them, add new water, bring to a boil, cover and simmer for between 1 and 3 hours, depending on how old your beans are! Salt them after they’re cooked.

Previous Post

August 6, 2014

the Traveling Homestead #1

Next Post

August 28, 2014 Everything Out There is In Here Too

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Air Animal Products Arts and Crafts Author Big Gods Books Buddhism Celebs Chickens Comestibles Deep Well ~ Great Heart Society Dirt-Heart Farmette Drink Earth Elemental Practices Fauna Festivals Fiction? Fire Flora Food Goats Holidays-Holy Days Homework! Invocations Jenya T. Beachy Justice Kitchen Witchery Meat Birds Meditations Moon Magick News Off-Topic Ole Time Good Spell Feri Pagan Tent Revival Poetry Practices Prayers Predators Queer Rant Recovery RIP Rituals Saints and Prophets of Shapeshifter Seasonal Shapeshifter Tradition Small Gods Songs and Chants Spellcraft Stories The Secret Country of Yourself The Village The Witches' Toolkit Travel Turkeys Uncategorized Updates Urban Pagan Homestead Videos Water

Select a Month February 2020 January 2020 November 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 October 2018 August 2018 May 2018 April 2018 February 2018 October 2017 September 2017 July 2017 January 2017 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Which branch of Christianity uses the term "Mass" for its main worship?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Baptist Methodist Catholic Pentecostal