Smokey, Spicy, Roasted Cauliflower Hummus
I love a good hummus. Frankly, I likely eat far too much hummus… but, is there really any such thing as too much when it comes to hummus. No. I say no.
If you disagree however, and feel that if one really is going to eat loads and loads of hummus that perhaps it should be a bit on the healthier side, then this hummus recipe is for you!
I happened to have a head of purple cauliflower that I’d just purchased, but the color doesn’t really make much of a difference to the outcome of this recipe. If you’re using white cauliflower then the end result will certainly a bit lighter and brighter. If you have an orange head of cauliflower then it will likely enhance the orange color a bit from the smoked paprika and cumin. My point is, use what you have or what you can get regardless of the color.
Given that this recipe uses veggies instead of beans it also uses less oil than a traditional hummus. So, it will have fewer fat and calories that a traditional hummus. Great, right? I’ve also decided to use sunflower seed butter over the more common tahini. If you don’t have sunflower seed butter on hand you can certainly use tahini as it’s certainly a more common ingredient for hummus but, you’ll need to adjust the recipe ingredients to accommodate for the seasonings already present in the tahini. You may also need to adjust how much oil you use.
If you’re going to use tahini, I’d say to start by adding the tahini and some olive oil first, and then the dry ingredients a bit at a time until you have the flavor you prefer. You may want to omit the lemon juice all together if using tahini but you can judge for yourself if you go down that road.
Ingredients:
1/2 head of largish cauliflower
3 Tbs Sunflower Butter
1 Tbs salt
3 cloves garlic
2 Tbs olive oil
1 tsp lemon juice
1 Tbs smoked paprika
1/2 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
3 Tbs veggie oil for roasting the cauliflower
Garnish:
1 stalk green onion
sesame seeds
Directions:
Clean and cut apart the cauliflower into florets then coat in veggie oil and place on a baking sheet. Bake at 425 degrees until brown. The time will vary for this given the size of you oven and baking sheet and the amount of cauliflower, of course. I’d say you can expect at least 12 minutes and maybe up to 20.
Look at how dark the roasted cauliflower got!!
Once the cauliflower has finished roasting, place it into a large food processor and add in the dry ingredients along with the lemon juice and garlic. Pulse the food processor a few times to break up the large chunks. Next, add in the olive oil and pulse again. Lastly, add in the sunflower butter and process until smooth.
All thats left to do now is to place the hummus into a lovely little bowl, garnish and serve! And, because this hummus is made from veggies, there is no way you could feel any guilt whatsoever about eating it with pretzel chips or pitas triangles or breadsticks ;-)
