Black Bean Hummus and Homemade Pita

One of the gals at work mentioned Black Bean Hummus. My ears perked and interest piqued! Whaaaaat is it? I've never heard of it!! Tell me more!!

She said it was simple.....same recipe as regular [chickpea] hummus only you use black beans.

Well heck....I've gotta try me some of that!

Let me tell ya....YUM! Super YUM!!! Super EASY!!! and I'm thinking...let's serve this for the SUPER BOWL!!! Too bad a team with purple jerseys won't be playing. I'm not saying any team in particular. I'm just sayin....you know....cuz it's like.....I dunno.....a color thing?

Cuz my Black Bean Hummus came out kinda purple.....ya know?

2- 15 oz cans of black beans, drained. Reserve liquid
2 or 3 garlic cloves
1/4 cup tahini
juice from 1 lemon
Olive Oil and Paprika to garnish

In a food processor, chop up the garlic cloves. Add the beans, tahini and lemon juice. Just as it's coming together, starting adding some of the reserved bean liquid....until you have the desired constancy. Enough to make it smooth, but not runny.

Put it in your serving bowl. If you have an immersion blender, you might wanna give it a few pulses in the hummus....just to give it that extra smoothness. Drizzle with Olive Oil and sprinkle with paprika.

Serve with pita slices.

Wanna try your hand at making pita? It's the easiest thing ever!!!

You can find the Master Recipe for White Flour Dough here at the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day blog.

So...you make that dough (4 ingredients...flour, yeast, water and salt....come on, I know you can do it!!)

Preheat your oven and stone to a piping hot 500'

After that first initial rise (there will be no second rise), grab about 1 lb of dough. Shape it into a ball (don't knead...just pull the dough under until you have a smooth ball.....this takes less than a minute). Place it on a well floured surface

Divide the dough into 4 and shape those into balls

Use enough flour to keep them from sticking but not so much that the dough dries out...don't stress over it...don't over think it......you'll be fine

Now....take one of those little balls....flatten it a bit....roll it out, turning, rolling.....kinda like you would for a pizza, until it's about 1/8 thick.

Slide it onto you stone and bake for about 5 - 7 minutes. After the first 4 or 5 minutes, I took the pita off the stone and continued to bake it directly on the rack (placement of racks is not important) so that it would brown a little.

Remove from the oven.....Oh look!!! It puffed up!! That means he's got pockets...wooo hoooo

Now let him cool. In order to maintain the pliable softness that pita's are known for.....cover this guy up with a little cotton towel and tuck him in until he cools off

He'll flatten out as he cools. Serve warm or at room temp.

(This was my whole wheat version)

Want more hummus variations? Check out the Southwestern Hummus that I make with cilantro and jalapenos

(this hummus tastes best with tortilla chips)

Soo....there ya have it. Black Bean Hummus and Homemade Pita and links to more. You have no excuse now. If you haven't tried hummus or if you tried the store bought stuff and thought you didn't like it....give it a second chance. It's good stuff.