Hummus with black roasted peppers - Food history and recipe

Hummus with black roasted peppers

"Hummus" comes from the Arabic word meaning "chickpeas". It is a Levantine Arab dip or spread that is made from chickpeas that have been cooked and mashed, then blended with tahini (a paste made from sesame seeds), olive oil, lemon juice, garlic and salt.
Chickpeas are a vegetable that have been cultivated throughout the Middle East and India for thousands of years. Some sources say that they were growing in the gardens of Babylon.

Hummus is a popular dish throughout the Middle East and in Middle Eastern cuisine around the globe. It is central to Turkish, Lebanese, Syrian, Egyptian cuisines. Thought the origin of it is blurry we know from archaeological digs, that people have been eating chickpeas in the Middle East longer than there has been pottery, or approximately 10,000 years. The tahini part of hummus, made from sesame seeds, has also been in the Middle East since ancient times. Sesame seeds were used to make sesame oil in food in Mesopotamia since 2500 BCE, so tahini is likely to be about that old.The fact is that hummus has been around for so long, and in so many different variations, the exact origin has been lost in antiquity.

As an appetizer and dip, hummus is scooped with flatbread, such as pita. It is also served as part of a meze or as an accompaniment to falafel, grilled chicken, fish or eggplant.
When hummus is eaten with bread it serves as a complete protein, similar to other combinations of grains and legumes. Hummus is high in iron and vitаmin C, and has beneficial amounts of both vitamin B6 and folate. It is also a good source of protein, fiber and potassium.

And it’s delicious and really easy to make!

4 Persons
Very easy
15-20 minutes

For the Hummus:

500g of cooked chickpeas
3 tablespoons of Tahini paste
Half of a red onion
1 garlic clove
The juice of 1 lemon
A handful of parsley
1 tablespoon of ground cumin
3-4 tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil
Salt to taste

For the roasted peppers:

3 Large red or yellow peppers
4 tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil
1 glove of garlic

Making the hummus:

In a blender, mix together all the ingredients above until you reach a paste of your desired smoothness. For extra texture save on the side a few entire chickpeas to add at the end.
Best served on toasted pita bread.

Roasting the peppers:

Cooked the entire peppers in a cast-iron pan or on direct flame until all the sides of the peppers are blackened.
Place them directly in a bowl and cover it to let them steam for around 10 minutes.
One they have cooled down a bit, scrape of the blackened skin and cut them into large strips.
At the same time gently heat up on the lowest setting possible the olive oil in a pan. Drop in the garlic clove roughly cut and let it infuse the oil for about 5 minutes.
Once the oil has cooled down you can cover you peppers with it and jar them for later use, for about one week, or eat them next to the hummus or on top and enjoy!

See you soon, more recipes are coming!

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