Roast root hummus

This is a great snack or starter, served with crudités or warm flatbreads, or spooned into toasted pitas with salad and shredded cold meat. Use whatever leftover roast roots are at hand, and if you have some roast onions or garlic, chuck those in too.

Credit: Simon Wheeler

• serves

  2

• prep

  10 minutes

• difficulty

  Easy

Ingredients

• 1 x 400 g tin chickpeas, drained and rinsed
• 100–300 g roast roots, such as carrots, parsnips, celeriac and perhaps some roast onion
• Juice of 1 small lemon
• 2 tbsp tahini or thick natural wholemilk yoghurt
• 2 tbsp olive or rapeseed oil, plus extra to finish
• 1–2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• ½ tsp cumin seeds, bashed, or a good pinch of ground cumin, plus extra to finish (optional)
• good pinch of dried chilli flakes, plus extra to finish (optional)
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

You will need to roast your vegetables prior to beginning this recipe.

Instructions

In a food processor, whiz the chickpeas, roots, lemon juice, tahini or yoghurt, oil, garlic, cumin and chilli flakes together until fairly smooth. If it’s too thick, thin with some hot water until you get the consistency you like. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

To serve, spoon the hummus into a bowl or onto a plate, sprinkle with a good pinch of crushed cumin seeds and chilli flakes, if you like, and trickle on some olive or extra-virgin olive oil. 

Sealed in a container, this hummus keeps well in the fridge for up to a week.

Note

• You can use leftover home-cooked chickpeas here if you like: 250 g cooked peas is roughly equivalent to what you get in a 400 g tin.

• If you don’t have any chickpeas, cannellini or butter beans work well too

Recipe from River Cottage: Love your leftovers (Bloomsbury, $45), by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, with photography by Simon Wheeler.

View our Readable feasts review and more recipes from the book here.

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.