Baby-Led Weaning: Easy Peasy Hummus

The great thing about baby-led weaning is that you and your baby can eat the same thing, so you don’t have to worry about making separate food for your child. As long as you’ve gone easy on the salt and there aren’t any whole nuts or honey (for under ones) then you can enjoy meals as a family! One of the other great things about this is that it makes me more aware of what we’re all eating, and so we’ve all been eating more healthily.

One of our favourite lunch ideas is hummus. Or houmous. (Which way do you spell it?) This middle eastern dip is so tasty and so healthy, and as I’ve recently discovered, so easy to make! I make it using our Babymoov Nutribaby*, a multi-functional food processor which can steam, blend, defrost, warm and sterilise. We have our hummus with warm pitta bread and carrot sticks. Everybody loves it and it takes mere minutes to make!

Because we eat hummus so often, I have started buying dried chickpeas. The problem with dried chickpeas is that they need a lot of soaking and cooking before they’re ready to use, so for this recipe I use a 200g tin of chickpeas which I drain and rinse. They go into the Nutribaby along with 2 tbsp tahini (sesame seed paste), juice of half a lemon, 2 crushed garlic cloves, a big slug of olive oil (2-4 tbsp), a splash of water and a pinch of salt. You could also add cumin or paprika if you like!

The ingredients are pulsed for a few minutes until they have blended into a creamy consistency. At this point I sometimes add a little more olive oil to loosen it up. Then I taste to see whether it needs more salt. I go easy on the salt because the boys will be eating this too, and instead I tend to add a little salt separately to mine after serving. And that is it done! We have our hummus with warm pitta bread and carrot sticks. I steam J’s carrots sticks for a couple of minutes in the Nutribaby to soften them slightly, as he only has 4 teeth!

Easy Peasy Hummus

printable recipe

Ingredients, for 2-4 people:

200g tinned chickpeas, drained and rinsed

2tbsp tahini

juice of 1/2 lemon

2 garlic cloves, crushed

2-4tbsp olive oil

1tbsp water

pinch of salt

Method:

1. Add chickpeas, tahini, lemon juice, garlic, 2tbsp olive oil, water and salt to blender or food processor.

2. Blend to a creamy consistency.

3. Add more oil if needed and blend again. Taste and add more garlic, salt, or lemon juice if needed.

4. Serve with warm pitta bread and carrot sticks (steamed slightly for babies).

What other quick lunch ideas do you recommend?

Follow me on Bloglovin, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest and Google+

*