April 17 – Salty Dog & Hummus with Pita Chips
I was craving hummus and pita chips, but didn’t have either in the house. Now, I’ve decided during this month of incarceration that anytime I have a craving, I am allowed to satisfy it if practical and possible. I had canned chickpeas, but no pita bread for those chips. So I made homemade pita bread using a recipe from the NY Times Cooking site (cooking.nytimes.com) and it was awesome and easy - highly recommend.
Salty Dog
A Greyhound with a salted rim! If you made some cucumber-infused vodka, use it here.
Makes 1 cocktail
2 oz vodka
3 oz fresh grapefruit juice
Coarse salt
Pour salt onto a plate. Moisten the rim of a high ball glass with a slice of grapefruit. Roll rim in salt.
Fill glass with ice. Add vodka and juice and stir. Serve with a grapefruit slice to garnish.
Hummus with Pita Chips
You will be surprised at how much better both of these common snack items taste if you make them yourself. And, it’s really quick and easy Hummus.
Makes about 1 1⁄2 cups
1 15 oz can chickpeas, drained reserving
1 T of liquid (aquafaba)
1 T aquafaba
6 T tahini
Juice of 1 lemon
1⁄2 t cumin
1 large garlic clove, grated
1⁄2 t kosher salt
1⁄4 t black pepper
Extra olive oil for garnish
Za’atar for garnish
Place the tahini, aquafaba, and lemon juice in a food processor and blend. Scrape down the sides and blend again until it’s smooth. Add the chickpeas, cumin, garlic, salt, and pepper.
Pulse, scrape down sides, and pulse some more. It may be too thick at this point, so add water, 1 tablespoon at a time. Pulse some more. Taste for salt. Transfer hummus to a serving bowl.
Garnish with olive oil and za’atar.
Pita Chips
Makes 120 chips
10 pita bread pockets
2⁄3 c olive oil
1 t herbes de Provence, or Italian seasoning
1 t kosher salt
1 t garlic powder
1⁄2 t black pepper
1⁄4 t smoked paprika
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Combine the olive oil, herbs and spices. Cut each pita pocket around the perimeter in half, so you're left with 20 circles. Using a pastry brush, coat each circle on both sides with oil mixture. Cut each circle into 6 wedges, like pieces of pie. Place wedges on a parchment lined sheet pan and bake for 7 minutes. Check them, you may need to bake them longer but be careful as it’s easy to burn them.