Hummus Love and Baba Ghannuj

Fresh chick peas

Everyone loves hummus, and better yet, fresh, homemade hummus. I won’t eat that prepared stuff. It’s pasty and nasty, and it’s so insanely easy to make it yourself anyway. 

Take a large can of organic chick peas, put in the blender, add lemon juice, olive oil, fresh parsley, and salt and pepper to taste, give it a whir, scoop up and eat with crackers, pita (my favorite), or crudités.

We’re growing chick peas in this year’s veggie garden. This is also insanely easy. Get yourself a bag of dried, organic chick peas. Plant them in tilled soil about an inch deep. Water. I like to put a little hay over my seeds to keep the moisture level high while germinating, but it’s not necessary.

Your chick peas will grow quickly. Like any other pea plant, the pods will develop as the plants mature. Your fresh chick peas will be bright green. Gather them up, let them dry, and store them in jars.

On another note, we have several Black Bell eggplants growing in our summer garden. I discovered baba ghannuj several years ago at a friend’s party; have loved it ever since. This will be the first summer, Goddess willing, that I make my own from our home grown eggplants.

Here’s my current favorite recipe for baba ghannuj. I DO add the cumin, which I love.

http://www.davidlebovitz.com/2008/07/baba-ganosh/