Hummus Guidelines

 My hummus recipe is based on this one: https://www.inspiredtaste.net/15938/easy-and-smooth-hummus-recipe/

 

Observe that the amount of salt in the recipe instructions is 1/2 teaspoon in the directions but is listed as 'to-taste' in the ingredient amounts.  I believe that they intended to put 1/2 teaspoon in the ingredient amounts.

 

Be advised that  their instructions for whipping together the lemon juice and tahini in the beginning actually work for getting the creamiest most delicious result, and that doing it in a food processor is the best way; a blender or hand tools don't get the same result.  But I don't have a food processor nowadays and I use a blender.

 

When I make it, I usually do it based on one pound of chickpeas that I cook in the pressure cooker.  Here are the ingredient amounts scaled up to that amount (from chatgpt):

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Below is a scaled-up version of your hummus recipe that will use all the cooked beans you get from 1 lb (450 g) of dry chickpeas.

1 lb of dry chickpeas → ≈ 6 cups cooked beans (about 1.1 kg) The Reluctant Gourmet

Hummus for 1 lb Dry Chickpeas

(makes about 8 cups / 2 quarts of hummus)

Ingredient	Original	Scaled for 6 cups cooked chickpeas*
Cooked chickpeas	1 ½ cups (250 g)	6 cups (≈ 1.1 kg)
Fresh lemon juice	¼ cup (60 ml)	1 cup (240 ml)
Well-stirred tahini	¼ cup (60 ml)	1 cup (240 ml)
Garlic, minced	1 small clove	4 small cloves (or 2 large)
Extra-virgin olive oil	2 Tbsp (30 ml)	8 Tbsp (120 ml = ½ cup)
Ground cumin	½ tsp	2 tsp
Fine salt	½ tsp	2 tsp (start with 1 ½ tsp, add more if needed)
Cold water / aquafaba	2-3 Tbsp	8-12 Tbsp (120-180 ml), added gradually
Paprika, sumac or za’atar	dash	several pinches for garnish

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Further notes:

I put a lot of salt in the pressure cooking water, and if I soak the chickpeas overnight in advance in that water as well.  This compensates for the salt that is in the canned chickpeas already.  People say  it prevents full cooking of the chickpeas but that is not true.  In the pressure cooker I find that 2.5 hours on high with no pre-soak is guaranteed to get the job done.

 

 The paprika or za'atar on top at the end + some olive oil is a good move.   I use smoked paprika or chipotle. Sumac is another good option.

 

But I take things further:

 

I use more garlic than it calls for.  For the scaled up version I have used a whole head of garlic, and even more would work.

 

I put smoked paprika in the hummus itself.

 

This one is key: put the zest of a few of the lemons in the hummus. Lemon juice in fact has kind of a neutral acidic flavor, the zest gives the hummus actual lemonyness.

 

You can beef up more ingredients; using more salt than the recipe calls for really helps.  Increase the ratios of tahini and lemon juice.  With the garlic+salt+lemon juice they were probably conservative in the original recipe to coddle those with feeble palates. 

 

For my last batch, I experimented with adding acidity by soaking sumac in the lemon juice.  Not sure what the ultimate effect of this was but it didn't hurt anything.

 

From the base of this recipe you can't go wrong as long as you don't deviate excessively, all the ingredients taste good.