Masaman Hummus (Oil-Free!)

Hello world, and all of the beautiful people in it. Here’s a fun fact for you: I F-ing LOVE curry. Thai, Indian, mild, insanely spicy, authentic, Americanized, you name it. I love the depth of the flavors, the soupy goodness, all of the surprising ingredients snuck in there. Just thinking about it makes me drool a little bit.

Another deep love: hummus. Creamy, salty, and delicious with anything you dip in it or put it on. Perfection.

But, restaurants are hard when you’re living that plant-based life, and even I have limits to how many times I’m down for eating hot curry in the summer months. And as for hummus, the store-bought varieties tend to be loaded with oil, which is both heavily refined and just not a wise addition to anyone’s diet (remember that on a WFPB diet, you are going to be averaging around 10-18% of your energy from fat, so adding in oils is certainly not necessary nor beneficial).

So, with all that in mind, I stewed on the dilemma, until one morning I woke up with a stroke of inspiration. I’d been organizing my freezers the day before, and realized I had a lot more cooked chickpeas than I thought I had, as well as a cache of carrots that would make any cartoon rabbit pass out in ecstasy. Between those and a half-empty jar of coconut milk, and I knew what to do: Use the main flavor components I typically add to homemade curry, but in measurements that would better compliment a dip. The result: truly bad-ass “curry” hummus with no added fat and 200% more flavor than anything I’ve bought at a grocery chain.

So what all makes up this beautiful chimera of flavors? Well no hummus exists without beans, and in this case, we go traditional: the mighty chickpea. Chickpeas have been part of human life since around 8500 BC (though it could be longer, that’s just as far back as we have been able to document), and for very good reason. They are loaded with nutrients: just counting those that meet 10% of the daily value recommendations per 100g, we’re talking Thiamine, B6, Magnesium, Zinc, Iron, Phosphorus, and Folate. Moving over to macros, chickpeas have the kind of protein that make them a favorite among the vegan bodybuilder set, while delivering a massive payload of fiber, particularly insoluble. This is the mmm-mmm good stuff, y’all. The kind of fiber that keeps you full longer, binds to fat in the colon, feed your hungry, helpful bacterial buddies, and help prevent colon cancer.

And aside from the colon benefits (if you’ve read any of my ongoing diatribe preaching the joys of fiber, you know how important gut health is to me), studies have shown that regular legume consumption can help maintain blood sugar and lower blood pressure and cholesterol. You don’t have to have my family’s extreme history of early, deadly heart disease to know that those are the kinds of benefits you want from cornerstones of your diet, which does help explain why beans and legumes are an every-meal kind of recommendation by Dr. Michael Greger and his like-minded colleagues.

Another key component of that curry flavor profile is coconut milk. Now, admittedly, when I went to write this portion of the post, I was surprised by the amount of conflicting research regarding the health benefits vs drawbacks to coconut milk. Obviously, it can be very high in calories, depending on the brand and fat content, so discretion is advisable, but there is also some conflicting advice regarding the impact of coconut milk on arterial health. On the other hand, the medium chain fatty acids found in coconut milk have been reported to aid in exercise performance and weight loss through the increased oxidation of fat and hormone balance.

So what does one do?

The only thing I will say on the matter is this: per serving, this recipe utilizes at most, a tablespoon of low-fat coconut milk. If that quantity, based on your interpretation of the research, leaves you feeling concerned, maybe this recipe is one you should skip. Or you can try omitting the coconut milk in favor of soy, almond, or cashew, though I can’t attest to the change in taste this would cause.

As much as I would love to sing the praises of every last ingredient in this concoction (and there are plenty of very, very positive things to say about some of them, particularly garlic and ginger), I can’t in good conscience keep you from this recipe any longer. So, without any further ado, here we go. Time for the…