David & Stephen Flynn
David & Stephen Flynn started The Happy Pear in Ireland in 2004 to make healthy food and living accessible to everybody. Their latest cookbook, Recipes for Happiness, is currently a No.1 bestseller.
David and Stephen’s Trio of Hummus
David & Stephen Flynn
Effort:
Complexity:
Cost:
In season now
Serves: Makes about 1 kg
Prep time: 10 mins
Cook time: 30 mins
Ingredients:
Basic hummus:
5 cloves of garlic (approx. 20g)
3 x 400g tins of chickpeas
150ml lemon juice (juice of 3 lemons)
6 tablespoons light tahini
2 1⁄2 teaspoons sea salt
a pinch of freshly ground black pepper
1⁄2 teaspoon of ground cumin
9 tablespoons water
To transform your hummus:
3 medium carrots (250g)
6 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium raw beetroot (175g)
Veg Portions / Serving: 1
Recipe donated to Veg Power from The Happy Pear. Photography by © Sean Cahill | seancahill.org. Recipe by © David and Stephen Flynn.
This is a really cool thing to do with hummus – make a basic hummus and then vary it! You have one third basic hummus, turn a third of it into a roasted carrot hummus, and another third into a pink sweet beetroot and olive oil hummus. Dave’s youngest daughter, Izzy, is a serious fan of hummus – she calls it ‘butter’! Her favourite is beetroot hummus. If you make these, let us know your favourite on twitter.
Method:
Preheat your oven to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Cut your carrots into bite-size pieces and put them at one end of a baking tray. Sprinkle with salt and drizzle with a little of the oil.
Remove the dirt from the beetroot, top and tail, then scrub the skin, but don’t peel. Roughly chop your beetroot into bite-size pieces, then put them at the other end of the same baking tray and similarly sprinkle with salt and drizzle with a little oil. Keep the beetroot and carrot separate, though – you don’t want the colours to merge. Put the baking tray into the preheated oven for 20–30 minutes, or until the veg are well roasted and slightly charred around the edges.
Peel the garlic, drain and rinse the chickpeas, then put into a food processor together with the rest of the basic hummus ingredients. Blend for about 3 minutes, until pretty smooth. This is your main batch of really tasty standard-issue hummus. Taste and season with more salt and pepper if you think it needs it. Divide into 3 equal batches and leave one of the batches aside – this will be your basic hummus.
Once the carrots and beetroot are roasted, take them out of the oven. Put the second batch of hummus into the food processor with the roasted carrots and 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and blend until smooth. Remove and clean out the food processor.
Finally, put the third batch of hummus into the food processor together with the roasted beetroot and 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and blend until smooth.
Engaging Kids
Kids who engage regularly with veg through veg-themed activities, such as arts and crafts, sensory experiences, growing and cooking are shown to be more likely to eat the veg they engage with. Encouraging kids to engage and play with veg is the handy first step to them developing a good relationship with veg and life-long healthy eating.
Kids in the kitchen
There are lots of opportunities for kids to be in charge of turning on the blender and deciding when the mixture is ready with this one. They can also peel the garlic, grind the pepper and salt, juice the lemons and measure out the water and tahini. Children love seeing the three different colours of hummus emerging at the end.
Find more ideas, safety tips, videos and even a free chart in our Kids in the Kitchen section here.
Activities
Why not get a selection of different dried or cooked chickpeas and beans and try and capture the different colours, textures and shapes with colouring pencils? Or make a rainmaker with an empty, clean lidded crisp tube or milk bottle – pour in some dried chickpeas or lentils, decorate them and seal the lid tightly before shake, shake, shaking!
Kids more interested in science? You can find at-home science fun with veg with our videos from Stefan Gates’ here.
Sensory
Why not explore chickpeas through touch and sight? Maybe compare some tinned cooked and dried, or just explore whichever you have and see if you can and your child can describe them. What do they look like? What colours, shapes and patterns can you see? What do they remind you of? What do they feel like? Are they rough, smooth, slimy, hard?
Find more sensory ideas, tips and videos here. If you get stuck and need a little help with describing words, we have a selection for you here, too!
Serving
When serving up the hummus, why not let your child help you plate it, deciding what dippers to put on a tray and arranging them the way they want.
Find the best ways of involving your own child and their skills and interests on our Roles for Kids page.
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