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A delicious twist on the classic hummus recipe with the added sweetness of roasted red peppers and a little kick of chilli. 

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One thing I always have in my kitchen cupboards is olive oil. I use it pretty much daily in some form or other; roasting veg, making bread, salad dressings or whipping up some hummus like the one I’ve shared here – it’s extremely versatile.

I’m really excited to be working with The Perfect Food, a project aimed at raising awareness of the health benefits of using quality European olive oil in your cooking, to encourage you to use it more in your kitchens. As well as enhancing the flavour of your food, extra virgin olive oil is also full of things that are beneficial to your health.

According to The Perfect Food we should be consuming 20g of extra virgin olive oil each day (which is about 4 teaspoons) as part of a balanced diet. It is a source of vitamin E and is rich in polyphenols, which help protect from cellular oxidation (which I googled and is basically cell damage) and its unique composition of fats also help the body to maintain normal cholesterol levels.

To help whet your appetite for all the delicious things you can make with olive oil, a group of London restaurants have joined the Perfect Food project. This January they’ll each be recommending a dish which is enhanced by using a good quality olive oil and they’ll also have staff on hand to talk about the product and answer any questions you have. If you’re in London sometime this January and fancy seeing what they’ve got to share the participating restaurants are…

• C’Alice – 199 Munster Rd, Fulham, London SW6 6BX
• Manitoba – 82 New Oxford St, Fitzrovia, London WC1A 1HB
• Macellaio RC South Kensington – 84 Old Brompton Road, SW7 3LQ
• Macellaio RC Exmouth Market – 38 – 40 Exmouth Market, EC1R 4QE
• Macellaio RC Union Street – Arch 24, 229 Union Street, SE1 0LR
• Rosso Pomodoro – Covent Garden – 50 – 52 Monmouth Street, WC2 H9EP
• Rosso Pomodoro – Camden – 10 Jamestown Road, NW1 7BY
• Rosso Pomodoro – Chelsea – 214 Fulham Road, SW10 9NB
• Rosso Pomodoro – Oxford Street – 300 Oxford St, John Lewis Shopping Centre, W1A 1E
• Rosso Pomodoro – Hoxton – 1 Rufus Street, London, N1 6PE
• Rosso Pomodoro – Swiss Cottage – O2 Centre 255 Finchley Road, NW3 6LU
• Locanda Canton – 98 Arlington Rd, London NW1 7HT
• Trattoria Monte Bianco – 86 Cleveland St, London W1T 6NQ London W1T 6NQ
• Al mattarello – 3 Middlesex Street, City, London E1 7AA,
• Osteria dell’Angolo – 47 Marsham St, Westminster, London SW1P 3DR

Not to be outdone by all these London restaurants, I’ve also created my own recipe… Roasted Red Pepper and Chilli Hummus.

Hummus is one of my favourite lunches, I can happily sit and eat a whole pot with lots of toasted pitta bread and veggie sticks. I particular like flavoured hummus and two of my favourite flavours are roasted pepper and sweet chilli. Rather than picking which of my two favourites to make I decided to combine the two together. The roasted red peppers have a lot of natural sweetness which means you get the sweet flavour with the chilli without need for any added sugar or sweeteners.

A couple of things to note about this recipe…

• I recommend peeling the chickpeas as I find this gives a smoother texture with a slightly better flavour. I’ve shared a video with the trick to doing this quickly and easily here, but if you really feel like it’s too much effort then you can skip it, it’ll still taste delicious.
• Many hummus recipes use tahini, however personally I find it a little too bitter so I prefer to lightly toast some sesame seeds instead and then grind them up in a pestle and mortar or spice grinder. This also means that if you don’t make recipes like this too often, you don’t end up buying a big jar of tahini and then having to think up recipes to use it up before it goes off. However, if you do happen to have some tahini in the cupboard to use up then you can switch this for the sesame seeds in this recipe.

Roasted Red Pepper & Chilli Hummus

Active Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 45 minutes

Serves 6 as a snack or 2-3 as a light meal served with toasted pitta bread and veggie sticks

Ingredients

• 2 red peppers
• 1 tsp olive oil (for coating the peppers prior to roasting)
• 1 small can of chickpeas (210g) – preferably peeled (see my original hummus recipe for a trick to do this easily)
• 1½ tbsp sesame seeds (or 1½ tbsp tahini – if you’re using tahini you can skip step 3)
• 1 clove of garlic – peeled
• 1 tbsp olive oil – preferably extra virgin (for the hummus)
• Juice of ½ a lemon
• ½ red chilli
• Salt

Method

1. Pre-heat your oven to 220ºC/200ºC fan.
2. Roughly chop your red peppers and toss them in 1 tsp olive oil. Roast for 30 minutes (turning halfway through the cooking time) in the oven.
3. While the peppers are cooking, toast the sesame seeds. Place a small frying pan on a medium heat and once hot add the sesame seeds (1½ tbsp) and cook until light brown, shaking them gently to help them to brown evenly (don’t overcook them as that will give them a bitter flavour). Once they’re browned immediately remove them from the pan (as the residual heat may burn them) and then grind them into a fine powder using a pestle and mortar or spice grinder.
4. Once the peppers are cooked, set them aside to cool while you prepare the remaining hummus ingredients. Start by draining  the chickpeas and if you’ve got a bit of spare time peeling them too (it gives you a smoother hummus).
5. Place them into a blender (or a large bowl if you’re using a stick blender) and add the other ingredients (roasted red peppers, ground sesame seeds, 1 tbsp olive oil, 1 clove of garlic, juice of ½ a lemon and ½ a red chilli – I add mine with with the seeds still inside).
6. Blitz the ingredients until smooth. You should find that it has a nice smooth texture but if it seems a little stiff add a little water to help loosen it. Season with salt (and then blend it again to make sure it’s evenly distributed) and serve.

I’ve served mine drizzled with a little more extra virgin olive oil, and scattered with chilli flakes and chopped coriander.

This is the estimated nutritional information per serving (assumes serves 6, excludes salt added to taste at the end). Please refer to my guide to Charlotte’s Lively Kitchen nutritional information if you want to learn more about how this is calculated.

Free From/Suitable For…

• Suitable for Vegans and Vegetarians
• Corn-Free
• Dairy-Free
• Gluten-Free
• Nut-Free
• Soy-Free

I’m sharing this recipe with the following blog challenges… #CookBlogShare with Hijacked by Twins and #FreeFrom Fridays with Le Coin De Mel and Free From Farmhouse.