It’s pumpkin season so I’ve been doing pumpkin twists on a lot of my usual favourites and right now, and today’s recipe is the perfect seasonal twist on my go-to hummus recipe. It’s not gimmicky or overpowering, the pumpkin just adds this subtle background sweetness that’s beautiful with the earthiness of the cumin and tahini…

INGREDIENTS

Base hummus recipe:

Cooked chickpeas (I find jarred chickpeas the perfect middle ground between the convenience of tinned products and the quality of cooked dried chickpeas, which takes a lot of time)

Lemon juice (use half if you prefer but I like a whole lemon for this quantity)

Ground cumin

Raw garlic (or you can add depth of flavour by roasting the garlic if your oven is already running – just use 4 cloves rather than 1)

Tahini (we will be using no olive oil within the actual blended dip, as is tradition, so need plenty of high-quality tahini)

Very cold water

Extra-virgin olive oil (optional topping)

Pumpkin additions:

Pumpkin purée (you can get this from a can but I’ll outline how to make this yourself in the Tips & Notes section)

Pumpkin seeds (lightly toasted to release flavour)

TIPS & NOTES

If you would like to make your own pumpkin purée:

1. Preheat the oven to 170C
2. Carefully cut the pumpkin in half – remove the seeds from the centre with a spoon (you can wash off the orange residue, pat them dry and roast in oil in a separate oven dish alongside the pumpkin itself for your topping, if you like)
3. Using a fork – pierce the inside flesh and outside skin at least a dozen times each to ensure everything cooks through evenly
4. Drizzle the inside flesh with a little olive oil, season with salt and pepper and place the two halves onto a pan to roasted for around 30 minutes
5. The pumpkin is ready to go when the flesh can easily be scooped out of the skin with a spoon (or an ice cream scoop, which is what I use!) but don’t remove all of the flesh now, let it cool for 10-15 minutes first
6. Scoop all of the pumpkin flesh into a blender and blitz until smooth – it may take a moment to get going, but there should be plenty of water content in the pumpkin itself to help the blender move

When it comes to making hummus, I do recommend removing the outer skin of the chickpea (though you might be able to still get smooth and creamy hummus without doing this if you have an extremely powerful blender). This is how you get that super-creamy hummus like restaurants and shops do!

I don’t typically recommend any particular brand for my recipes, but if you’re in the UK: I like the Bold Bean Co Queen Chickpeas. They’re large, flavourful, high-quality and quicker to de-skin than smaller chickpeas!

If you’d like to modify this recipe – to make plain hummus, simply omit the pumpkin and use 200g of chickpeas. If you’d like to swap out the pumpkin for something else like roasted carrot, sweet potato or fresh herbs then go for it; you may just need to adjust how much water and tahini you use to account for differences in natural hydration levels of your add-ins.

Let me know if you try this pumpkin hummus!

Check out how to make it here:

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