Warm Fava Hummus with Caramelised Pistachio Butter

 

Cookery writer, teacher and author of Pulse, Jenny Chandler gave a demonstration of this mouth-watering Mediterranean counterpart to dal at our 2018 Grand Dal Finale.

Photo courtesy Jenny Chandler

Photo courtesy Jenny Chandler

Makes 2 large bowls – ideal for sandwiches, salads, dipping and whatever else you usually do with hummus. The butter only really works with warm hummus, you could always zap it in the microwave just before serving.

Ingredients

  • 250 g split fava beans
  • 1 clove of garlic, crushed
  • Juice of 1/2 – 1 lemon
  • 100 ml -ish extra virgin olive oil
  • Salt to taste
  • 50 g unsalted butter
  • 50 g roughly chopped pistachio nuts
  • Good pinch of Urfa chilli flakes (or any other sweet, slightly smoked chilli)

Method

For the hummus

  1. Take a small pan, cover the fava beans by a couple of centimetres of cold water and then place over a medium heat. Skim off the froth as the beans come up to the boil and then simmer until they begin to soften and collapse into the cooking liquid. Do add a little extra water if needed but only enough to keep the favas from drying out. The idea is to purée the beans and liquid to make the hummus but if they are very wet you could strain through a sieve.
  2. Whizz up the beans with a blender, out board engine (aka handheld blender) or food processor and mix in the garlic, lemon juice, olive oil and salt to taste. You could, of course, serve this minus butter BUT please do give it a go, you may become hooked.

For the butter

  1. Melt the butter in a small saucepan (ideally a steel rather than dark, non-stick pan so that you can watch the colour of the butter changing later).
  2. Turn up the heat until the butter begins to froth and then use your nose; once you begin to get that gorgeous biscuity smell you need to be on your guard. Swirl the pan a little so that you can see what’s going on and once the little flecks of milk solids are turning a foxy red/brown it’s time to quickly tip the butter into a heatproof container to stop it from burning. Too pale and the butter will taste cloying and fatty, too dark and it will taste burnt (just like a sugar caramel).
  3. Stir in the pistachios and  Urfa chilli flakes. Swirl the butter over the warm hummus and serve right away with toasted bread.
 
 

This recipe was originally published by Jenny Chandler on her blog I've Mostly Been Eating and demonstrated at our 2018 Grand Dal Finale.

 
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