Ok, there’s been a whole lot of sugar and junk food going on in my life the last week or so. It seems like every other day there’s another party or celebration or reason to over-eat and get a sugar high! I mean the Halloween candy alone has been enough to totally de-rail any healthy eating plan.
I needed a brief respite from delicious sugar sugar sugar (I’m sure it will be very brief), and I’m guessing that I’m not the only one. Remember the cookie bars I posted last time? I talked about re-visiting chili and hummus this week after a failed batch of both. Well, I did re-visit the hummus, and I discovered that the best way to get rid of the baby food texture of sweet potato hummus is to not add sweet potatoes…
I tried to stay seasonal. I really did, but sometimes I just have to accept the fact that I live in Southern California, it’s 70 degrees most days, and I can get bell peppers easily all year long.
Enter tasty Roasted Pepper Garlic Hummus. It’s spicy from the jalapeños, with a little hint of sweet from the bell pepper, and smoky from the cumin, oh and the roasted garlic is just amazing. Does anything smell better than garlic roasting in the oven? I think not.
The peppers and garlic were all roasted together, although I took the jalapeños and garlic out at 15 minutes, and the bell pepper out at about 20 minutes.
I didn’t add as much olive oil as most hummus recipes call for, because the peppers added a lot of moisture, and the consistency was perfect with just 2 tablespoons.
Fortunately, the blistered skin of the roasted peppers peels off really easily. Roasted garlic should just pop right out of the skins when pinched.
I served this with red bell pepper slices (mostly because that second one was about to go bad in the package, haha!) and tortilla chips. The options of what to serve it with are pretty much endless, though some of my favorites are pita chips, fresh veggies, roasted veggies, pretzels sticks, and flat bread.
Oh, and that chili with cornbread dumplings that I told you about…totally flopped again. The problem is that it tastes so good, but the dumplings just keep looking gross. It’s the case of the Ugly Dumpling…I’m definitely going to post the chili recipe at some point, with or without the dumplings! It’s really delicious.
What healthy foods do you turn to after holiday over indulgence?
- 1 15 oz can chickpeas
- 2 fresh jalapeños
- 1 red bell pepper
- 6 cloves garlic, skin on
- ¼ cup tahini
- 1 tsp salt
- ½ tsp cumin
- juice of 1 lime
- 3 tbl olive oil
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- Cover a small small roasting pan with parchment paper or aluminum foil.
- Transfer peppers and garlic to pan and drizzle with 1 tbl olive oil.
- Bake for 7 minutes, and then flip everything over and bake for another 7 minutes. Take out garlic and jalapeños and wrap them in aluminum foil for ten minutes. Leave bell pepper in the oven, turning to a side that hasn't gotten soft yet and bake for another 2-3 minutes. Flip again to bake on the 4th side for another 2-3 minutes. Remove bell pepper and wrap in foil for 10 minutes.
- Peel skin off of all the peppers, and scrape out seeds. Be careful to either wear gloves or wash your hands after handling the jalapeño seeds.
- Add to a high speed blender or food processor all ingredients except for remaining 2 tbl olive oil. Blend on medium speed until fully combined. Turn on lowest speed and drizzle in olive oil slowly until well combined.
- Serve with veggie sticks, tortilla chips, or pita bread.
*Nutrition Information is for about 1/3 cup of hummus*