I love houmous! Quick and easy to make, and healthy, it makes a great summer lunch served with vegetable sticks and toasted pitta bread.
With the school holidays coming up I thought that this was a great recipe to share with you. If you’re anything like me, you will find it hard to come up with a good mix of home lunches to serve. I don’t know why but I find lunch the most frustrating meal to serve in the holidays. I suppose it’s because breakfast and dinner don’t change, we eat those meals holiday or term time, but term time lunch and holiday lunch are really different in our house.
During term time Dan and our youngest both have school dinners. Our eldest prefers to have a packed lunch which she makes herself and, on the two days when I eat at work I take in a salad, or occasionally some leftovers from last night’s dinner. On the days I’m at home I either have food I’ve been cooking for the blog or I just grab a tin of mackerel in tomato sauce, which I love… but is way too smelly to eat at work.
However, in the holidays, it gets to 12 o’clock and everyone starts asking me what we’re having for lunch. There’s a limit to the number of times I can declare that I don’t know but we’ve got some beans in or there are some eggs in the fridge, and I’ve decided that I can’t face a summer of scrabbling around in the back of the cupboard or the bottom of the fridge, desperate for inspiration.
For this reason I’ve started two boards on my Pinterest account. One called School Holiday Lunch Ideas, the other called Perfect Picnics. Why not take a look? They’re full of great recipe ideas. This recipe will go into both.
I find that houmous has a slightly addictive quality to it – just one more dip – so it’s a good job that it is really easy to make. All you need is a food processor and some store cupboard staples. If you’re finding it hard to get hold of tahini then you can buy it from Amazon here*. Failing that you can leave it out – you will still have a delicious dip, it will just have less depth of flavour to it.
If you don’t want to top your houmous with anything then feel free to skip that part, but I like to make mine look pretty. Feel free to use whatever you fancy. This time I decided to use a combination of pomegranate seeds, nigella seeds and chopped parsley. I forgot the drizzle of olive oil for the photo but drizzled liberally when we ate it as I love the contrast of flavours and textures.
So I hope that this recipe and all the ideas on the Pinterest boards help you deliver something a little more exciting than beans or eggs this summer.
* I will receive a small percentage of the sale if you purchase this tahini through the Amazon link above. The price of the product is the same as if you went through the Amazon website directly.
Houmous
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons tahini
- 1 clove garlic (crushed)
- 3 tablespoons lemon juice
- 1 x 400g tin chickpeas (drained)
- 2 tablespoons olive oil ((plus extra for dribbling))
- ¾ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon cumin
To top
- Your choice of a combination of pomegranate seeds, chopped parsley, nigella seeds, a small handful of pine nuts, a dusting of paprika, a few reserved chickpeas etc.
Instructions
- Place all the ingredients into the food processor and process for one minute. Scrape down the sides then process for another few minutes, scraping down the processor sides as necessary, until the houmous is smooth. If it is looking a little thick, turn the food processor on again and drizzle in a little water, a tablespoon at a time, until it reaches your desired consistency – I usually use 20 to 30ml.
- Spoon into a bowl, gently smooth out the top, drizzle over a little olive oil then finish with your choice of toppings.
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