Sunday, February 10, 2013

Roasted Carrot and Chickpea Hummus

Roasted carrot and chickpea hummus
 I happened to see an interview with a popular Estonian writer and a respected thought leader Mihkel Mutt. Shooting many thought pearls from his sharp cannon he was talking about why we should read and re-read the classics.
If we only read whatever new comes along there is a risk that people will adopt bad as acceptable, acceptable as mediocre, mediocre as good and good as genius. The classics help us to re-calibrate the important criteria in life.

I was thinking about this all day and while the tought was inspiring to always aspire perfection it rang a bell in a culinary sense as well. The classic recipes are classic, because they are good and are treasured by millions of mouths because the classics make them happy. The classic cooking methods are classic again because they have worked for long and will continue to attract new generations.

Adopting eating habits that lead to diabetes in early ages as acceptable, aisles of packaged ready-made food as satisfactory, fast food as good nutrition and a plate of take away "pasta bolognese" as genius is crying out for an occasional visit to a real quality restaurant or Mom´s kitchen or foodie friends to re-calibrate the main criteria.

Roasted Carrot and Chickpea Hummus
Ingredients:
200g carrots, cut into 1-2cm pieces
2-3 tbsp cooking oil
salt
cumin powder

1 can chickpeas
2 tbsp tahini paste
1 clove garlic, crushed
2 tbsp olive oil
juice of half a lemon
3 tbsp cold water
1/2 tsp salt
pepper
1/2 tsp cumin powder
1/2 tsp coriander powder

Add more colour to pale hummus with roasted carrots

Heat the oven to 200 C, place the carrots into a baking tray, sprinkle with oil, a pinch of salt and a pinch of cumin powder and roast the carrots until soft, ca. 30-40 minutes. Cool them down.

In a food processor mix the roasted carrots. Add chickpeas, tahini paste, garlic, olive oil, lemon juice, water, salt, pepper, cumin and coriander powders. Mix until smooth and well combined.

Drizzle olive oil and sprinkle some more cumin powder and serve with crisps, tortilla chips or thin roasted bread slices.

A more northern taste of classic hummus, with roasted carrots