Pumpkin Hummus. You'll be eating this by the spoonful, straight out of your food processor!

It's International Year of the Pulse and we have been having fun in the kitchen experimenting wth different legumes and pulses (and if you want to read more about the health benefits of legumes, check this out!). This is such a simple, healthy, delicious recipe that is too good to be just a snack!

We enjoy this with crackers and veggie sticks, but we also use it as a base for our dinners! It goes beautifully with ratatouille, stuffed red peppers (recipe coming soon!) or grilled fish. I have been known to eat it by the spoonful straight from the food processor.

This pumpkin hummus is a fabulous source of plant-based protein, fibre, manganese, beta carotene (the plant source of Vitamin A) and B vitamins, not to mention healthy phytonutrients!

Try this pumpkin hummus instead of pumpkin mash! And because we are using chickpeas that have been cooked and then cooled, this recipe is an excellent source of Resistant Starch. You can read more about the benefits here!

Ingredients

400g cooked (or canned) chickpeas
300g roasted pumpkin
Juice of one lemon
2 tablespoons tahini
1 clove garlic (or more if you love garlic as much as I do!)
1 tablespoon olive oil*
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon maple syrup or honey*
Salt and pepper to taste

Method

If you are making this completely from scratch, well firstly strut around like the domestic goddess you are! Strut right on over to your pantry, grab 1 1/2 cups of chick peas, place them in a bowl. Cover with water and leave to soak overnight. If you feel like some more strutting, then strut over to your bowl of soaking chickpeas and change the soaking water once or twice.

When your chickpeas have soaked for long enough, cook for an hour. Check your chickpeas are cooked through, drain and leave to cool.

While you are cooking your chickpeas, chop a smallish butternut pumpkin in half and slap one half on a baking tray and cook at 180 degrees for an 40 minutes to an hour or until it is completely cooked through.** Save the other half for some other culinary magic! (Or make a double batch of pumpkin hummus!)

When your pumpkin is cooked, scoop the flesh out of its skin and set aside to cool.

Place all ingredients in food processor and process until smooth, pausing a few times to scrape down the sides.

Once the hummus has reached your desired consistency, serve and enjoy!

* you can add more or less olive oil depending on the consistency you desire.

** This is optional, and some would say completely unnecessary, but trust me ok? Adding that teeny tiny amount does something magical, and once you've tried it this way I promise you will never go back to boring old non-honey-or-maple-syrup hummus.

*** There's no peeling or chopping into pieces here!