Hummus – making hummus with dry chick peas

I love hummus. Actually, the whole family loves the stuff and it thrills me that the kids enjoy it so much. They love getting hummus in their lunch for school along with some pita bread, or bread sticks. I was very happy to learn how to make hummus with dry chick peas.

Hummus is quite healthy since chick peas are low in calories and are a good source of protein and fibre. Olive oil is also one of the best oils you can use containing essential fatty acids and antioxidants. Making hummus at home is simple, far cheaper and allows you to control the ingredients.

I make hummus at least once a month for years. Each time I make it I use canned chick peas. I even posted the recipe for hummus here. I have often heard that using dry chick peas produces a far superior hummus; one that is creamier and tastier than that with the canned peas.  Using canned peas is just so much easier and does not require you to decide to make hummus the night before, so I have never gotten around to trying it.

Finally, I have tried hummus with the dry peas and everyone who told me it is the best way to make hummus is correct. I loved it and will likely make it this way more often.

The cumin and olive oil can be stirred into the hummus, but I prefer the flavour if it is drizzled on top. It also looks much more attractive plated this way.

If you are wanting to try so new kinds of hummus, check out these few varieties of hummus:

Hummus - making hummus with dry chick peas

4.70 out of 5
53 reviews
Print
Making hummus with dry chick peas instead of canned. A traditional recipe with olive oil, ground cumin and tahini. This recipe is creamy and delicious, 
Prep Time: 12 hours
Cook Time: 1 hour
Total Time: 13 hours
Servings: 6 cups

Ingredients

  • 2 cups dry chick peas
  • 2 tsp salt
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • water
  • juice of half of a lemon
  • 3 tbsp tahini
  • 2-3 garlic cloves
  • 1/2 cup water (or more if needed)
  • 1/3 cup olive oil
  • 1 tbsp ground cumin
  • pita bread , crackers, etc.

Instructions

  • Place the dry chick peas in a large bowl or pot and fill with water so that the water is at least an inch or two above the peas. Let them soak overnight in the fridge.
  • Drain the chick peas. Place them in a pot and fill with new water, the salt and baking soda.
  • Bring the chick peas to a boil. Once the water is boiling, lower the heat so that it is a low boil. Cook the chick peas for an hour. They should soften so they can easily be smushed with your fingers.
  • Drain the chick peas and let them cool until they come to room temperature.
  • Using a food processor, pulse the chick peas, lemon, garlic cloves and tahini. While the food processor is running, slowly pour in the water. Check the texture and thickness of the hummus. If needed, add more water to desired consistency.
  • When serving, scoop into a bowl and drizzle olive oil and sprinkle cumin on top of the hummus.
  • Serve with pita bread, crackers, or veggies.

Categories

Did you try this recipe?

Leave a comment and let me know how it turned out. Or, take a picture to share on Instagram and tag me @theblackpeppercorn.

Leave a comment

Recipe Rating




117 comments

  • 5 stars
    I love hummus after living for a while in Israel before continuing on my travels
    I used to buy it, then I made it with canned chick peas and then I saw your recipe
    hands down it was better using the dried chickpeas
    I will be using this recipe forever 🙂
    Toda raba
    Shalom

    • Reply
  • My boyfriend and I love this recipe, I always make a double batch. Great for adding to sandwiches instead of mayo!

    • Reply
  • 4 stars
    Tha ks to Nivand,
    I made a rather thick hummus paste and was wondering if it would last anywhere more than 2 weeks. Knowing the Internet can get anal about food more than 1 week, But considering if garlic paste can survive a month in the fridge, peanut butter can too, why not hummus right?

    although I’m confident that it should be fine, added that mine was on the thick side. I just wanted some reference to others who have had it more than 2 weeks. I treat it like butter though. It goes on bread for breakfast. yum….

    Navind, can you tell me how much oil and lemons did you use? for what quantity of chickpea? did you add water? How was the consistency?

    thanks

    • Reply
  • 4 stars
    Thank you for a great recipe, just tried it.
    It took a lot more water/oil/garlic/lemon juice for me, but i suppose it could be my initial chickpeas measuring issue.
    Also, for the tahini aroma substitute I discovered a small amount of mustard seed oil could work(but don’t add too much, it’s pretty strong flavor!).

    • Reply
  • Fantastic. I’ve been using this recipe for over a year now. Everyone, from my 10-month-old grandson to me and my elderly siblings (!) have enjoyed it. Thanks so much.

    • Reply
  • The baking soda is used primarily so the skins come loose and you can easily remove them. The skins are tough and not easily digested, even blitzed. So tend to give people chronic bloat or gas as a result.

    On that unsavoury note baking soda is not essential and many dont like the taste as it tends to linger, but it’s a good idea to peel the chick peas anyway. If you rapidly cool them after boiling in icy water the skins are not that difficult to remove without baking soda, they become slippery and slide off in your finget tips. Leave the unpeeled ones in the icy water as you work putting the peeled ones in another bowl ready for use. It takes awhile but gives you time to think and meditate on lifes simple treasures like Hummus.

    I found adding a half a tespoon or so of ground cumin to the mix itself gives a nice taste while sprinkling paprika powder and olive oil on the finished product, colour and taste.

    There are so many slight differences in how to make this around the world, its wonderful to experiment with all the endless flavours on this basic.

    A very nice alternative I tried from Israel after boiling and peeling is to lightly smoke the chickpeas in wood chips. This gives a wonderful depth of flavour and is easily achieved in a home kitchen or outside on your barbecue…….Sometimes I mix cayene pepper and paprika as a final sprinkle this lifts it a notch for the spicy lovers, myself included.

    The first time I had hummus was in Greece, for breakfast with a lovely fresh warm bread and I’ve been hooked ever since. Tahini sauce alone is also used across the Middle East with meat dishes epsecialy grilled lamb and is also absolutely delicious.

    Why was here? Oh yes how long to boil the soaked chickpeas, I forget little details like this. Its remarkable how many different opinions you get on this alone. Mine have just started boiling, as they’re the organic ones and smaller I will go for 40-50 minutes testing as I go. I also want to hand peel so don’t want them too mushy. Thanks for the basics refresher.

    Another question is how long does humus keep? I just made a big batch that was absolutely fine for four weeks! Others will say no longer than a week. So who knows Im still alive and it was as fresh tasting as ever. Just keep the main batch seperate and sealed in a cold fridge and dish out into bowls your daily dose with a clean spoon. This will prevent contamination. But dont take my word for it cause I honestly don’t realy know, maybe I used enough lemons and oil to preserve it for ever LOL……

    • Reply
  • 4 stars
    Instead of cooking for an hour we can also pressure cook chick pea for 5 whistles. If you are soaking it overnight you don’t have to add baking soda.

    • Reply
  • 5 stars
    Made this yesterday, although it takes a long way, because i had no highspeed blender(only regular blender)but it was worth the result, i love it… Finally i made it… Super happy..thanks chef!

    • Reply
  • 5 stars
    1) Hummus thickens after sitting for a while; so you should make it a little bit thinner than you want the final consistency to be. Think “Cream of Wheat”. You should then have a final product more like very soft peanut butter.
    2) Do not use plain water to thin it. Instead, reserve the cooking water. If you change the water after soaking overnight you will have removed most oligosaccharides, which cause gas (flatulence). True for all beans and pulses. Several changes while soaking works even better.
    3) Putting the hot, drained beans into ice water causes the skins to loosen. For the very best hummus, the ideal is to remove the skins. Very tedious work; so we only do this for very special meals. You can get the family involved.
    4) While baking soda speeds up the cooking process, adding salt makes beans tougher. You should never add it until the beans are mostly cooked.

    • Reply
  • 5 stars
    Thanks for this. I had a bag of dried chickpeas on hand and had never made hummus with other than canned, and figured I might as well give it a go. I now have a huge bowl of hummus chilling in the fridge and it is the best I’ve made so far in terms of consistency and fresh flavor. This may be my go-to version from now on. Thanks!

    • Reply
    • 5 stars
      Thanks so much for the recipe. Do you think this could be frozen?

      • Reply
  • 5 stars
    Delicious and ridiculously easy. I am throwing away all of my old hummus recipes.

    • Reply
  • 5 stars
    I made this today and it was incredible. My canned chickpea supply was low, and my dried ones were getting old and super dried up, so hummus seemed like the best way to use them quickly. There weren’t many left, so I ended up halving this recipe. I didn’t have tahini, so I just omitted it, and added about 4 more cloves of garlic. I love garlic, and am currently coming down with a common cold, so I’m eating as much raw fresh garlic as I can. This does that perfectly. I made some pitas and have been eating it all night! Thanks for the recipe and take care!

    • Reply
  • 1 star
    So I just (attempted) to make this. Having made hummus countless times with canned chickpeas, I immediately thought the numbers were off, since 2 cups of dried Chickpeas makes a substantial amount.

    So I am wondering if you meant to say use 2 cups of chick peas vice 2 dried cups.

    As someone above stated, when I attempted to make this, it was ridiculously pasty in my Blendtec, and I had to split it up to salvage it, and add 2 more lemons, ~4 tablespoons of Tahini, more salt, and more garlic.

    Just FYI to everyone, be careful on the quantities listed as I think he is mistaken on the amount of dried chickpeas to use.

    • Reply
  • Oh my (sighs) I feel as though my innocence has been taken away.

    This is delicious

    THANKYOU.

    Makes our families hommus addiction all the more affordable

    • Reply
  • I can not have lemon juice, is it absolutely necessary?

    • Reply
  • Please write your recipes in units of weight. We don’t buy chickpeas by the cup, why did write your recipe that way? fucking idiot.

    • Reply
  • 5 stars
    Thanks for the recipe. I make a tahini-less version. Basically the same – without the expense of tahini. I also use the dry-bean method as I limit salt in my diet and the canned beans are pretty loaded with sodium. Much of that may be in the liquid – not sure. When I used canned beans I was adding the bean liquid anyway – thus the salt. I also use roasted garlic. I eat a lot of garlic! A quick trick for roasting garlic is to use a muffin tin. Cut the tops off the head – exposing the inner cloves, drizzle with EVO, cover the entire tin with foil, bake at 350 for one hour. Voila! The tin does not have to be full. Do as many heads as one desires. I am salivating as I write 🙂

    • Reply
  • 5 stars
    I’ve just made this hummus. My first time making homemade hummus. And it is gorgeous!!! Thanks for the recipe I’ll also be making this every month from now on 🙂 I love hummus with a drizzle of hot peri peri sauce on top…how long will it last in the fridge? Apologies if you’ve mentioned this already. 🙂

    • Reply
    • For me, beans are fine for a whole week in the fridge. However, there will be official refrigerator times of about 3 days. The cool down period for the beans is the most dangerous, the faster you can cool them off, make the hummus, and then refrigerate, the safer things will be. If you boil the beans, cool them quick, and have good sanitation practices for all the ingredients, I don’t see why it wouldn’t be safe for 10 days in an airtight container. I say this because adding the small amount of acid(lemon juice) and the garlic, both add to the defence against foreign invaders. I think cumin is good for that as well.

      I actually use citric acid, since it’s always handy and I can get the acidity exactly where I want it. And I love garlic, so I’m not shy with it either. Any additional spices you may add, might also contribute additional defences, notably, cilantro/coriander(leaves or seeds), pepper, oregano, as examples you might add to hummus.

      I have never used recipes, but my hummus always turns out great, tasting along the way if needed. The amount of tahini is way way way too low for me on this recipe; the tahini is what turns hummus into a complete protein. So good luck, and with me, hummus doesn’t ever make it that long. Making eight cups worth today(that’s just the bean part), and thought I would do a search..

      • Reply
  • Hummus means “chickpea” in arabic. It is a levantine arab dish that is often served in greek restaurants, tho. Just fyi.

    • Reply
  • First, thanks for the recipe!

    3 ideas I’m going to add to this (my chickpeas are currently boiling in the pot:

    1. I just read an idea where you keep the water the chickpeas were boiled in, and to use that in place of the plain water.
    2. Rinse the cooked chickpeas in cold water and make sure the skins are all off.
    3. Roast the garlic before adding it.

    • Reply
    • Those are some great tips!

      • Reply
    • 4 stars
      I’ve noticed that pinching off the skins of the chickpeas will make a smoother hummus. I’ve seen tahini in the supermarket, but it’s a rare item and is probably worth a trek to a middle eastern store.

      • Reply

Subscribe to the newsletter and never miss a recipe!