Quick and easy hummus

Hummus is an easy spread to make, and great to have in the fridge to spread on sandwiches and wraps or to use as a dip for crudités, chips and savoury biscuits. This makes a large batch, so you could easily freeze half the hummus and enjoy it at a later date too.

Method

1. Drain the chickpeas, reserving some of the brine.
2. Place chickpeas, garlic and tahini in a food processor and blend. Add the lemon juice and olive oil with about 50 ml of the reserved brine. Blend again and season to taste with salt and pepper. Adjust flavour as preferred, adding more or less garlic, tahini, lemon juice, olive oil or brine. And blitz to a texture that you enjoy – some like their hummus super smooth and others not.
3. Serve as a dip with crudités, biscuits or chips or as a spread for sandwiches and wraps.

 Variations:

• Flavour the hummus as you prefer. Try mixing with Bulgarian yoghurt to form a smooth dip or blend marinated sundried tomatoes or cooked butternut into the hummus for an alternative flavour.
• To cook dried chickpeas, place 150 – 200 ml chickpeas (no soaking required) with 1 litre boiling water in an AMC Speedcooker. Seal with Speedcooker lid and heat over a medium temperature until the indicator reaches the red ring. Reduce the temperature slightly to maintain the pressure and cook for a further 20 – 25 minutes. Then remove Speedcooker from heat and allow indicator to drop completely before opening the lid. Drain well, reserving some of the cooking liquid before continuing with step 2 above.

*Tahini is a sesame seed paste, available in the health sections of supermarkets, at deli’s or health food stores. You can make your own by toasting sesame seeds and grinding in a spice grinder with a drop or two of olive oil. Or we have also successfuly replaced it with peanut butter in this recipe. It changes the flavour slightly, but it's still delicious!