Bethany's Vegan Kitchen

This smoky, slightly sweet, versatile houmous has a gentle warmth to it, and is great with all sorts of things. Eat it as a dip, spread it onto sandwiches and wraps, or eat it with salads

Yield; Roughly 485g houmous Cook time; 50 minutes (including cooking the chickpeas)

You’ll need;

1. Three red peppers, deseeded and quartered
2. One tablespoon of oil
3. Two teaspoons of smoked paprika
4. 125g (this is the dried weight) chickpeas
5. A quarter of a teaspoon of bicarbonate of soda
6. One tablespoon of tahini
7. Two tablespoons of lemon juice
8. One teaspoon of hot sauce, I used sriracha
9. One clove of garlic, minced
10. 50ml cold water
11. Salt to taste

Method;

• Start by soaking the chickpeas in plenty of boiled water, along with the bicarbonate of soda, for at least eight hours. Once they’re ready to cook, pour away the soaking water and give them a good rinse
• Put the chickpeas into a small saucepan and cover them with water. Pop a lid on the pan and bring it to a boil, then reduce the heat to low. Leave them to cook for 30-40 minutes, or until they’re tender. Drain away the water, rinse them in cold water, drain again, then leave them to cool
• Pop the peppers into a mixing bowl, drizzle over the oil and sprinkle over half of the paprika. Give them a good mix to combine, I found this was easiest to do using my hands rather than a spoon. Once everything is well combined, lay the peppers skin side up on a lined baking tray
• Roast the peppers for 20 minutes at 200°C/180°C fan assisted, until the skins begin to blacken
• Once they’re done, leave them to cool to room temperature before peeling off and discarding the skins. Put the peppers, chickpeas, tahini, lemon juice, hot sauce, garlic, water and salt to taste into a blender (or jug if you’re using a stick blender), then blend until smooth

The houmous will last at least four days in the fridge, if you want to keep it for longer store it in the freezer. I find filling an ice cube tray with houmous is most convenient, then you can just defrost a few cubes as needed

This recipe is especially useful if you’ve got a few red peppers that need using. If they’re a little wrinkled they might not be great for frying, but they’d be great for roasting. That way they won’t go to waste and you can still get the best out of them