Recently, I was looking for something to make and had been feeling a little meat heavy and so wanted something vegetarian. I stumbled upon this from Smitten Kitchen (if you do not yet know this blog, do yourself a favor and go investigate) and decided that this was going to be IT. It had flavors that I love and simple ingredients. This was going to be tasty.
Except it wasn’t. At all. I can’t tell if I overcooked the chickpeas, didn’t add enough salt, or added too much cumin (in hindsight, I’m fairly certain this was part of it). (???) Whatever the source, this was a solid recipe fail the likes of which I hadn’t participated in since I added too much mint to some version of beans and greens. (You should be cringing as you read that – it was AWFUL.) BUT, I had a pot full of the stuff. Nothing was fundamentally wrong with the ingredients (chickpeas, spinach, onion, a little tomato), and I hate throwing away food. So, I stuck it in the fridge and hoped inspiration would strike.
Strike it did! I turned this into a remarkably healthy (and tasty!) green hummus. Even overdoing the garlic a smidge (heh …..I have been vampire safe for the last week…very vampire safe), this worked out. It was excellent as a dip with veggies & crackers, and as a sandwich spread. I even put it in a pie crust with some ricotta & sundried tomatoes as a rustic tart. So, the take home message is: when recipes go wrong, use it as an excuse to try something out. If it is already a big thumbs down, playing with it a bit isn’t going to hurt anything – you were already going to throw it out, and who knows? You might transform it into anti-vampire potion. ;)
Though I have not tried this specifically, if I were to recreate this dip without the initial step of the Sunday dinner flop of 2010 (and toning down the garlic), this is what I would do:
½ lb dried chickpeas, soaked until tender (or 2, 15 oz cans rinsed & drained) 1 lb spinach, washed ½ t cumin 6 cloves garlic Juice from 1 lemon 2 T olive oil 1 ½ T cooking sherry or red wine vinegar (optional) ¾ c fresh parsley (small handful) Salt, pepper and red pepper flakes to tasteHeat 1 T of the oil in a large skillet. Cook the washed spinach (no need to dry, just shake the worst of the water off) in the oil until tender.
In a food processor combine chickpeas, spinach, garlic, parsley, red pepper flakes and 1T of lemon juice. Puree until smooth (or a consistency you like).
Taste. Add the other 1T olive oil, salt, sherry or vinegar (or just more lemon juice) to taste and combine. Sprinkle with paprika (smoked if you’ve got it) and serve.
I had to work in batches because I have a little food processor, but it worked. Just divvy up the ingredients (or toss them all in a bowl first, before adding to the food processor to have consistency in batches). You will end up with buckets of the stuff, but it holds up really well in the refrigerator, and I froze some so I will keep you posted if that is a go/no-go.
