The last hummus

My pal hummus and I have been on an epic journey, one that’s been going for decades and has taken us through countless pots of simmering water, into innumerable cans of chickpeas, swimming through blenders and food processors (watch those blades!), dipping into a pantry’s worth of baking soda, gallons of tahini and lemon juice, enough garlic to feed Gilroy for a week. We’ve talked to an army of chefs and have read enough recipes to fill our favorite bookstore five times over.

We’ve peeled thousands of chickpeas, and if that sounds akin to peeling grapes, you’re not far off. That means that, of course, we’ve rejoiced in finding pre-peeled ones.

What have we been searching for? A way to make my pal as creamy and light as possible, to distinguish them from so many of their sadder counterparts, both store-bought and homemade. And now that we’re in peak dip season — aka seasonal entertaining — I would be remiss if I didn’t remind you of the breakthrough we made when I was researching “Cool Beans.”

In today's newsletter

• I break for animals: Hendrix

• Recipe: Perfectly Simple and Light Hummus

• Some favorite recipes using hummus

I’ll admit that at this point, I’m pretty much a hummus snob. When my then-colleagues and I taste-tested store-bought hummus brands, I was the killjoy in the room, carping on about how homemade could be so much better. The problem with so many of the supermarket brands is that they use preservatives, sometimes citric acid instead of or in addition to lemon juice, and that they are so thick and often grainy to be reminiscent of wallpaper paste. Warming them up — and even thinning them out with a little water — can help, but when good hummus can be made in the course of a few minutes with ingredients I always have on hand, why would I buy?

Note that I said I made “good hummus.” Not great. Because until I discovered the technique that changed everything for me, my homemade hummus was much better than most store-bought, but still a far cry from what you can get from the best chefs, at hummuserias and the like. (I’m looking at you, Little Sesame. Thank you for selling at the supermarket what I do in fact buy and devour whenever I’m feeling lazy.)

That hummus is light and fluffy, so so creamy, and it’s usually made pretty laboriously. It turns out that those chickpea skins can be what makes hummus a little grainy, so various techniques have been employed to loosen them and even remove them, if not completely, at least mostly. Baking soda helps. Baking soda also speeds up the cooking and helps you get the chickpeas super tender, which can also be part of the path to super-creamy and light hummus. One shortcut has you cook canned chickpeas with some baking soda to soften them further. Blending them while they’re still hot helps. Conversely, adding ice to the blender also helps. So does adding more liquid — preferably the cooking water — than you think you should, and so does keeping olive oil out of the main blend and saving it for drizzling.

I’ve done all those things and probably more, in various combinations. But all along, one question was nagging at me. Could it be about the blending technique itself? I knew from my work with my friend Tess Masters in her “Blender Girl” heyday that the order and timing of blending smoothies could make a difference in the texture. (The big takeaway: Add ice last to help the blender fully incorporate it into the smoothie rather than leaving an icy texture.) And wouldn’t/couldn’t a Vita-Mix or other high-powered blender obliterate those peels if you focused on the blending technique?

It sure could. After some trial and error — but not that much, actually — I realized that if you let the Vita-Mix grind a mixture of canned (yes, canned!) chickpeas, tahini, lemon juice, salt and just barely enough aquafaba to get the blades moving, that obliteration happens. Then, you keep the blender running and stream in almost a cup more of aquafaba (which you saved from those two cans of chickpeas), and it blooms and fluffs up almost like an emulsifying mayonnaise. The result: Well, just look at the video I posted on Instagram and see for yourself.

Better yet, make these ASAP. Creamy, light, and luscious, and in only about 10 minutes. No cooking. No heating. No peeling.

Is this the last hummus recipe I’ll ever need? I never say never, but I’ll tell you this much: Six years after developing it, I still haven’t found the need to make any other. My pal hummus and I have stopped searching and settled into domestic bliss. Come join us!

I break for animals:
Hendrix

Recipe: Perfectly Simple and Light Hummus

You can obsess over making the best hummus, or at least I can: cooking the chickpeas from scratch (with baking soda to loosen their skins), peeling them (a laborious task, trust me), even purposefully overcooking them, and exalting in the perfection. But this is how I usually do it, without peeling or even cooking the beans from scratch but still getting something amazingly luscious and light — a far cry from the leaden, grainy sludge too many of us have come to expect. The key is in the order of your blending and in the liberal use of aquafaba, the liquid from a can of chickpeas — of course.

Makes about 3½ cups // Time: Weekday // Storage: Refrigerate for up to 5 days.

Ingredients

• 3½ cups cooked or canned low-sodium or no-salt added chickpeas (from one 29-ounce can or two 15-ounce cans), drained but not rinsed (reserve the liquid)

• ½ cup tahini

• 2 garlic cloves, chopped

• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

• 1 teaspoon fine salt, plus more to taste

• Extra-virgin olive oil, for serving

• Smoked paprika, za’atar, or sumac, for serving (optional)

Directions

Measure out 1 cup of the chickpea cooking liquid (aquafaba) into a liquid measuring cup and add a few ice cubes to it.

In a blender (preferably a high-powered one such as a Vitamix) or food processor, combine the chickpeas, tahini, garlic, lemon juice, salt, and ¼ cup of the aquafaba. Puree until very smooth, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed and continuing to process for several minutes. (If needed, use the blender’s temper, if you have one, to push the mixture into the blades to keep it moving, and add another ¼ cup of aquafaba if it’s a little stubborn, or more if it’s a lot stubborn.)

With the motor running, slowly stream the rest of the aquafaba (with the ice cubes) into the chickpea mixture, stopping the machine every now and then to scrape down the sides of the bowl. The mixture should be light and about the texture of thick pancake batter. If it’s thicker than that, resume processing and slowly stream in a little more aquafaba until you reach the right texture. Taste and add more salt if needed.

To serve, spread the hummus on a shallow bowl or platter, swirling it if you’d like. Drizzle with a little olive oil and sprinkle with the smoked paprika, za’atar, or sumac, if using. Serve with pitas or raw vegetables or use as the base for roasted vegetables.

Recipe from “Cool Beans” (Ten Speed Press, 2020), copyright Joe Yonan.

Some favorite recipes using hummus

These are gift links to the recipes at the Post. Note that they require you to register but not subscribe. Gift links are free to access for 2 weeks, so if you want to come back to any of these recipes but don’t subscribe or want to subscribe, I suggest you find a way to save them!

Baked Hummus

Hummus Pasta With Tomatoes and Olives

Hummus and Pickled Vegetable Wraps