Roasted Red Pepper Hummus with Cumin

This past week was one of the coldest, that I can remember, over the past 7 years of my stay here in Northeast Ohio. Such low temperatures combined with a steady snowfall can wreak havoc on the roads and yesterday it took me about 45 minutes to just get from one exit to the next on the super-clogged up highway. I was pretty much faced with the choice to keep driving, at this pace, to work which was another 12 exits away or turning around and heading home. Well, I chose the latter. :) 

I called up my husband and told him not to drop my daughter to school, planning to keep her at home and give her some extra TLC and also something decent to eat, moreover she was feeling a little under the weather anyways. On the way back home I was picturing myself sipping on hot chocolate, dressed up in my warm fleece PJs all cozied up in my recliner and of course working at the same time ;). I got home in 10 minutes (yay!!)  and got a big hug from my lil munchkin which made me think that my decision to work from home was not bad after all. But pretty soon things went haywire when I tried to login remotely from home and was not being able to connect to my work environment. Let alone the hot chocolate, I dint even get time to change into my PJs until noon :( To compensate the time lost, I had to put in extra hours and just before logging off from work I remembered that I had a potluck at office the next day where I had to bring in some appetizers.

I wanted to make something easy as I had no energy for an elaborate recipe and that's when I found this baby in my draft folder. I had everything at home except the red bell pepper so I called up my husband, hoping he could pick that up on his way back from work, but unfortunately he was stuck at the office working late that day. So mommy and daughter had no other go rather than stepping out themselves in the bitter cold, dressed in multiple layers of clothing, literally looking like clumsy astronauts ;) but shopping with my lil one is always fun.  

Finally the dish was ready in a jiffy and the next day I took it to work. All my colleagues loved it and I hope you would too


 
Makes approx. 1.5 cups of dip

Ingredients 
1- 15oz can (approx. 425gms) -Gabanzo bean / Chick peas / White Channa (Cooked)
1 – Red Bell Pepper / Red Capsicum
¼ Cup - Tahini paste (*Refer Notes)
1 big - Lemon (approx. ¼ Cup - Fresh lemon juice)
4 tablespoons - Extra-virgin olive oil
1 clove - Garlic crushed
½ Tsp - Ground cumin
½ Tsp - Ground pepper
Salt to taste
3 – Scallions/Spring Onions, very thinly sliced

Directions 

Roasted Red Pepper 

• Preheat the oven broiler. 
• Cut the bell pepper into halves and remove the seeds. 
• Coat the bell pepper with canola oil or any other oil of your choice, which has a high smoking point. 
• Arrange the peppers skin side up on a baking sheet lined with aluminum foil and place the baking sheet on the highest rack in your oven. 
• Keep an eye on the peppers as they roast. When dark splotches begin to appear on the peppers, remove the baking sheet from the oven and carefully turn each pepper over. 
• When the top of the peppers begin to darken again, remove them from the oven and cover the peppers with aluminum foil, making sure that it is sealed air-tight all the way around. The steam from the trapped hot peppers will loosen the skins. After the peppers have cooled, peel the blackened skin off. 

Hummus 

• Drain the chickpeas and reserve the liquid. 
• In a food processor, add the chickpeas, 4 tablespoons of the reserved liquid, roasted bell pepper, tahini, lemon juice, 3 tablespoon oil, garlic and cumin and puree until smooth. 
• Transfer the mixture into a serving bowl and stir in scallions. 
• Season with salt and pepper. 
• Drizzle remaining 2 tablespoons oil over the top of the hummus.

Notes and Tips 

• Tahini (also tehina) is a paste made from ground, hulled sesame seeds, and primarily used in North African, Greek, Turkish and Middle Eastern cuisine. It is served as a dip on its own or as a major component of Hummus, Baba Ghanoush and Halva. 
• Tahini paste is available in Mediterranean stores or might be available in the international aisle in some grocery stores. 
• After opening theTahini jar please make sure you refrigerate it 
• You can substitute the scallions with chopped Cilantro or Parsley 
• Use a good quality olive oil as it really improves the taste 
• You can use store bought roasted red peppers 
• Use the same recipe for plain Hummus without including roasted peppers