It’s the staple of vegan pot lucks, lunches, and snacks. Hummus didn’t start appearing on American menus until several decades ago, but its ingredients have been central to Middle Eastern cuisine for centuries.
Traditional hummus—made with chickpeas, sesame tahini, garlic, lemon juice, and sometimes olive oil—is packed with protein, fiber, and healthy fats. It’s usually served as a dip with wedges of warm pita bread, but is also good in wraps and sandwiches. Or you can spoon a dollop of hummus onto a baked potato or platter of steamed veggies.
Modern cooks have taken hummus to new heights in the past decade, experimenting to create a wide array of hummus-like dips and spreads. Here are recipes for Traditional Hummus and Curried Hummus, followed by links to five fun variations. Hummus is always vegan and so are all of these recipes!
Traditional Hummus
¼ cup packed fresh parsley
½ cup tahini
¼ cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 to 2 cloves garlic
1 ½ cups cooked garbanzo beans (or one 15-ounce can, drained)
Salt to taste
Process the parsley in a food processor until well chopped. Add remaining ingredients and process until smooth.
Curried Hummus with Cilantro
¼ cup packed fresh cilantro
¼ cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
¼ cup olive oil
1 teaspoon garlic salt
1 teaspoon curry paste (or to taste)
1 ½ cups cooked garbanzo beans (or one 15-ounce can, drained)
Process the cilantro in a food processor until well chopped. Add remaining ingredients and process until smooth.
Fun Vegan Variations on Traditional Hummus
- Skip the chickpeas and pack your hummus with healthy raw veggies with Gena’s (Raw) Broccoli Hummus from the Choose Raw website.
- Did you know that eating jalapeno peppers can boost endorphins? Give your spirits a lift with feel-good spicy Japapeno Hummus from the AllRecipes website.
- Chickpeas are the traditional hummus bean (in fact, the word hummus means chickpea in Arabic) but using navy or cannellini beans creates a dip with an especially smooth texture as in this Garlic-Dill White Bean Hummus from the Quantum Vegan.
- Slow-cooked onions add depth to the flavor in this Caramelized Onion Hummus from the Messy Vegetarian Cook.
- The addition of two cooked sweet potatoes reduces the fat content, adds a lovely orange color and a big boost of vitamin A in this Spicy Sweet Potato Hummus from Cookie and Kate.
Virginia Messina is a dietitian specializing in vegan nutrition. Her new book is Vegan for Life: Everything You Need to Know to be Healthy and Fit on a Plant-based Diet. Learn more about vegan nutrition by reading her blog TheVeganRD, or by following her on twitter.
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