On account of some medical issues I became aware of I’ve had to change the way I eat and think about food. This has been a fascinating experience, and an enlightening one. For one thing, it’s given me a whole new perspective on our health care system, and especially our food system.
At the same time I’ve also had a chance to spend more time playing around in the kitchen, which I enjoy. With help from some interesting books and web sites, I’ve started compiling a body of information and food expertise; my aim is to develop a system for eating and thinking about food according to some very strict criteria, to be discussed another time.
One development in this venture in to veganism is yet more discoveries in the wide variety of foods I’ve never considered, or in some cases heard of. I find I’m putting together an assemblage of products and recipes according to some rather strict criteria. More on that another time.
Today’s culinary experiment was to find an easier way to make an old favorite, hummus. In the past, I used canned garbanzo beans (aka chickpeas), tahini, spices, etc. and chopped/mixed them in a blender until they were a smooth, yummy paste. The problem was that chickpeas don’t chop well in a blender and processing them takes awhile.
My proposed solution was to visit our local Indian grocery store, the Kemal Spice House and pick up some Besan, which is chickpea flour. I figured that getting that part already pulverized would save time and energy.
I started with about a cup of tahini in a large plastic cottage cheese container, added about a 1/4 cup of lemon juice, a tablespoon of garlic paste (Your tastes may differ. I tend to view garlic as a food group.), a tablespoon of olive oil, and imprecisely measured amounts of cumin, coriander, chili pepper, and a dash of salt and mixed it all together into a kind of crumbly mass. I then slowly added two cups of Besan, followed by two cups of water, stirring it all in as I added the water. I think it actually took more than two cups of water to get the consistency I like.
At first, the result was kind of bland. But after sitting for a couple of hours the flavor improved dramatically. That said, the seasoning in this batch isn’t quite right, but that will improve with time. The texture is also a bit smoother than my usual hummus. I noticed that there are different grades of Besan available; fine (what I bought), medium, and coarse. Perhaps a larger granule size would improve the texture.
Cross posted from buffingmymortalcoil.wordpress.com
