Roasted Garlic Hummus

Silky smooth homemade Roasted Garlic Hummus is always a crowd pleaser! Serve it as a dip with pita wedges before dinner as an appetizer or with vegetables at parties for a fun snack. Or spread it onto a sandwich for a delicious lunch. It's super easy to make your own hummus at home! This recipe is vegan and gluten-free.

Roasted Garlic Hummus

Oh, hummus, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I love you on toast, in sandwiches, and as a snack. I love you as a dip, as a spread, and even as a drink.

Have you noticed that hummus in restaurants tastes better than the stuff that comes in tubs from the store? We like to pick up a big container of it from a local falafel place because it's super creamy and tastes WAY better than the grocery store stuff.

I'll let you in on a secret. The key to silky smooth hummus is baking soda. Yep – simple baking soda. I learned this lesson from Kitchen Creativity by Karen Page. Karen also says that overcooking the chickpeas is key. No canned stuff - dry chickpeas are important here.

While it's super easy to drive to the falafel place to pick up hummus, I like to make it at home, too, so I can play with flavors. Garlic is my fave!

How to Roast Garlic

Rather than use raw garlic, I roasted it to mellow out the flavor, and taking a cue from Karen’s previous book The Vegetarian Flavor Bible, I’ve added fresh chives.

• First, you peel off most of the paper on the garlic bulb. You want to leave a little to keep it intact.
• Then, you slice off the tops of the cloves in one big cut.
• Next, you drizzle the exposed cloves with a little oil and season with a sprinkling of salt and pepper.
• Finally, you wrap the bulb in foil and roast it in a 400° oven for about 40 minutes. If you have an air fryer, you can cut your time in half—just cook it for 20 minutes on 400°.

How to Make Roasted Garlic Hummus

Cooking dried chickpeas takes a little bit of time, but believe me, it’s worth it.

• First you place the chickpeas and the baking soda in a large pot and add enough water to cover the chickpeas by 2 inches.
• You bring it to a boil over medium-high heat, then partial cover the pot and reduce the heat to a simmer. You allow the chickpeas to cook for about 60 minutes, or until they have begun to fall apart.
• Next you skim the skins from the top of the water then drain the chickpeas. (If you can't get all of the skins out the water, it's okay.)
• Now you place the chickpeas in a food processor, and process until they become a paste.
• Squeeze the roasted garlic out of the papery skin into the food processor, and then add the tahini, lemon juice, water, and salt. Process everything until the mixture smooth and creamy. Stir in the chopped chives.
• Finally you transfer the hummus to a bowl and top with the olive oil, sumac or paprika, and extra chives, if using.

This recipe calls for dry chickpeas that have been soaked for 6 to 8 hours ahead of time. Soaking ahead of time helps lower the cooking time and may help with digestibility. You can skip the soaking step, but it may take longer for the chickpeas to cook.

Finding Inspiration in Kitchen Creativity

I have a confession to make: I sometimes run out of ideas for new recipes. It can be tough to create new recipes for this blog week after week. Sometimes I find inspiration in foods from my childhood, and other times I try to recreate foods I’ve eaten in restaurants or cafes. I also like to veganize recipes from omnivore magazines. But sometimes there’s just nothing going on to inspire me.

Karen Page’s book Kitchen Creativity: Unlocking Culinary Genius—with Wisdom, Inspiration, and Ideas from the World's Most Creative Chefs has come to my rescue. This isn’t a cookbook, but it is a book about cooking with intuition and imagination, as well as flavor and technique.

This hefty tomb took Karen Page four years to write, which is pretty evident by the book's massive size. This is a gorgeous hardcover, and it's packed with beautiful photos by Karen’s husband Andrew Dornenburg. Interviews with well-known chefs are sprinkled throughout. This book is loaded with information that anyone who loves to cook will find invaluable. It’s a great gift for foodies for the holidays!

Kitchen Creativity

Kitchen Creativity is divided into two sections: “The Creative Process in the Kitchen” and “A World of Infinite Culinary Possibilities.”

“The Creative Process” section of the book has three parts, which echo the three stages of cooking. The first stage is “Mastery”, which includes learning foundational skills and a study of the past. (I learned that the candy apple was first created in my home state of New Jersey!) Flavor compatibility, tips on how to train your palate, and how to choose high-quality ingredients are all included in this section.

The second stage of “The Creative Process” is “Alchemy,” and this is where classic foods are transformed into something wonderful and new. Ice cream, meringue, and bruléed come together for a baked Alaska; and caramel/molasses, peanuts, and popcorn combine to make Cracker Jack. Flavor dynamics are also explored in this section, and the different tastes – salty, sour, sweet, bitter, and umami – are explained.

The final stage is “Creativity.” This is where it all comes together. Creating dishes without recipes and using your intuition to cook are covered here, as well as who, what, when, where, why, and how.

The second section of the book is “A World of Infinite Culinary Possibilities,” and it contains an a-to-z list of inspiration, from American and African-American Cuisines to Yellow Foods and Yoga. (Okay, it’s actual an a-to-y list!)

As a vegan who loves her hummus, the excerpt on my favorite dip caught my eye:

“Hummus” from Kitchen Creativity

What is hummus? While the classic calls for chickpeas + garlic + lemon juice + olive oil + tahini, chefs are elevating it to new heights through sharing their time-honored secrets (e.g., “overcooking” the chickpeas with a hint of baking soda to achieve the smoothest possible texture, and using a judicious amount of one of the highest quality tahinis available) in addition to giving it their own spins.

Some chefs are flavoring classic hummus, taking the experience in new directions, e.g., garbanzo beans + parsley oil. Other chefs are substituting other legumes (e.g., black beans, green or red lentils, white beans) for garbanzo beans, and other flavorings for tahini, e.g., black beans + orange oil.

Excerpted from Kitchen Creativity: Unlocking Culinary Genius—with Wisdom, Inspiration, and Ideas from the World’s Most Creative Chefs by Karen Page (Little, Brown, October 31, 2017).

Roasted Garlic Hummus with Chives

Dianne

Serve this silky smooth hummus with pita wedges or cut vegetables at parties for a fun appetizer, or spread it onto a sandwich or wrap for a delicious lunch.

This recipe makes about 2 cups of hummus. A serving is 2 tablespoons

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Prep Time 10 minutes mins

Cook Time 1 hour hr

Course Appetizer, Snack

Cuisine Mediterranean

Servings 32 servings

Calories 51 kcal

Ingredients

  

To Roast the Garlic

• 1 bulb garlic
• ½ teaspoon olive oil
• pinch sea salt
• pinch black pepper

To Make the Hummus

• 1 cup dried chickpeas soaked for 6 to 8 hours, drained and rinsed
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• ⅓ cup tahini
• ¼ cup lemon juice
• 2 tablespoons cold water
• ½ teaspoon sea salt
• 2 tablespoons chopped chives plus more for garnish, optional
• 1 tablespoon olive oil for serving, optional
• 1 teaspoon sumac or paprika for serving, optional

Instructions

 

To Roast the Garlic

• Preheat your oven to 400°.
• Peel most of the paper off of the garlic, but make sure you keep the bulb intact. Use a sharp knife to cut the top part of the garlic bulb off. You’ll want to trim about ¼” off.
• Drizzle the tops of exposed cloves with the olive oil, and sprinkle with the salt and the black pepper. Cover the bulb with foil and bake for about 40 minutes, until the cloves are soft. The garlic is done with deeply golden brown and completely soft.
• Allow the bulb to cool about 10-15 minutes.

To Make the Hummus

• Place the chickpeas and the baking soda in a large pot and add enough water to cover the chickpeas by 2 inches. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, then partial cover the pot and reduce the heat to a simmer. Allow to cook for about 60 minutes, or until the chickpeas have begun to fall apart. Skim the skins from the top of the water then drain the chickpeas. (If you can't get all of the skins out the water, it's okay.)
• Place the chickpeas in a food processor, and process until it becomes a paste. Squeeze the roasted garlic out of the papery skin into the food processor, and then add the tahini, lemon juice, water, and salt. Process until smooth and creamy. Stir in the chopped chives.
• Transfer the hummus to a bowl and top with the olive oil, sumac or paprika, and extra chives, if using.
• Refrigerate until ready to eat. Serve with pita wedges or cut vegetables.

Notes

Store your hummus in an air-tight container in the fridge for 3-5 days.

Originally published December 6, 2017. Updated December 19, 2021.

More Hummus Style Recipes You Might Like Include:

• No-Bean Hummus
• Chocolate Hummus Shake
• Dessert Hummus

More Dip Recipes You Might Enjoy Include:

• Garlicky White Bean Dip
• Spinach Artichoke Dip
• Vegan Queso
• Everything But the Bagel Dip