Roasted Sweet Potato Hummus plated with crispy chickpeas, rosemary, and roasted sweet potatoes on the side
52 Weeks of Hummus //Healthy //Herbs //Potager //Recipes

Roasted Sweet Potato Hummus with Thyme + Rosemary

February 4
3 min read
9 Comments

Savory + Sweet – and such a treat!

This roasted sweet potato hummus is addicting! Full of savory notes from roasting with thyme and rosemary, your mouth will be humming with bursts of sweet maple syrup and cinnamon with the bright notes of cardamom. Serve with warm flat breads and apple slices for a most decadent dish.

The Modern Potager Kitchen Garden

The joy of the modern potager is getting to expand your culinary skills and make restaurant-quality meals at home. Picking fresh ingredients from the garden and turning them into something that awakens your tastebuds and thrills is really what life is all about.

It should come as no surprise that I have a high appreciation of historical foods as an heirloom gardener. One of the oldest and most historically relevant dishes in human history is hummus.

And I could eat hummus morning, noon, and night. On its own with fresh flatbreads, alongside eggs, or loaded with roasted veggies. It’s this love of hummus that led Matthew to adamantly state, “You cannot survive on hummus and cucumbers alone.” As we shared a plate of one of my favorite variations, roasted red pepper hummus, with fresh radishes, cucumbers, and herbs from the showcase garden, the challenge of his statement kept dancing in my mind.

While it made me laugh in the moment, the notion that I could not survive off such a healthy dietary staple sent me down a path of cultural exploration and adventures in the kitchen for weeks on end. I wanted to understand the lore surrounding hummus and its impact upon the world. And truth be told, I wanted to discover if one could survive on hummus without getting bored.

In short, I’ve accepted the challenge to explore all that hummus has to offer in both traditional and new ways with the help of some fantastic local chefs, food bloggers, and a little creativity. Together, we’ll make a year’s worth of delicious hummus variations—52 recipes that feature the best of seasonal produce and pantry essentials.

We’ll test various cooking techniques, discussing the pros and cons of each method to achieve multiple results. While some chefs swear by using dried chickpeas and removing the skins, today’s high-powered blenders make quick work of tinned beans with their skins intact.

Red skinned sweet potatoes on a baking sheet sprinkled with fresh thyme, rosemary, sea salt and fresh pepper
Red skinned sweet potatoes on a baking sheet sprinkled with fresh thyme, rosemary, sea salt and fresh pepper cut open to cool after roasted

THE HISTORY OF HUMMUS

The earliest known origins of hummus date back to the 13th century, with several cultures claiming the creation of the savory dip. Yotam Ottolenghi, chef and cookbook author, writes about the hummus wars in his book “Jerusalem: A Cookbook.” But Israel isn’t the only country where people argue over the best hummus recipe. Palestinians, Egyptian Arabs, Greeks, and other Middle Eastern and Mediterranean countries also declare hummus as their dish, each region adding its own nuances.

The essence of the classic hummus recipe are chickpeas, tahini, lemon juice, and salt. As cooking methods have changed over the centuries, the textural preferences and techniques used to create the creamiest dip have altered the base recipes.

SWEET POTATOES: A TRIP AROUND THE GLOBE

Sweet potatoes are a high-carbohydrate, low-fat, and fiber-rich food. Many nutritionists value their high beta carotene (a precursor of vitamin A), vitamin C, and potassium content. The tubers are also a decent source of vitamin B5, vitamin B6, vitamin E, and manganese.

Originating in Central and South America, the global history of how sweet potatoes crossed continents has baffled historians. But archaeologists have found prehistoric remnants of sweet potato in Polynesia from about A.D. 1000 to A.D. 1100. Pat Kirch, an archeologist at the University of Berkeley, California, thinks Polynesians sailed across the Pacific to South America and picked up the ever-so-popular sweet potatoes.

However, Polynesians didn’t take the potatoes and head home. There are clues that they may have introduced chickens to South America while they were at it before sailing back to the Polynesian Islands. And you know the Heirloom Potager team loves to learn more about our heirloom chickens too.

Roasted Sweet Potato hummus with crispy chickpeas, maple syrup, olive oil, cinnamon, and fresh thyme and rosemary
Roasted Sweet Potato hummus with crispy cinnamon chickpeas

Roasted Sweet Potato Hummus with Thyme + Rosemary

Makes approximately 1 1/2 cups of fresh hummus | 4 servings

Created from years of making hummus + inspiration from Ambitious Kitchen

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups hydrated garbanzo beans/chickpeas (this is approximately 1 can), drained (reserve water brine)
2 tablespoons tahini (sesame paste)
1 pound sweet potato, roasted + cooled (save the crispy skins for topping!)
1 Lemon, cut for juice
1 garlic clove
1 teaspoon fresh thyme, divided in half
1 teaspoon fresh rosemary, divided in half
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon, divided in half
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
Sea salt + fresh cracked pepper
1-2 tablespoon maple syrup
1 tablespoon olive oil, for roasting
Glug of really good extra virgin olive oil

1/2 cup of chickpeas
1 tablespoon olive oil, for roasting
1/2 teaspoon fresh thyme, divided in half
1/1 teaspoon fresh rosemary, divided in half
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon, divided in half
Sea salt + fresh cracked pepper

Really good extra virgin olive oil
Flaky sea salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon cardamom
Sprinkle of fresh thyme + rosemary
1/4 cup of roasted chickpeas

1) Heat oven to 400F. Rinse and dry sweet potato(es) and toss with 1 tablespoon olive oil, 1/2 teaspoon thyme, 1/2 rosemary, and salt and pepper. Roast for 30-45 minutes until tender. Cut in half and let cool (cutting helps release the steam). Squeeze the soft sweet potato into a dish and reserve the crispy skins.

2) While the roasted sweet potato is cooling, gently toss 1/2 cup hydrated garbanzo beans with olive oil, 1/2 teaspoon each fresh thyme and rosemary, and a sprinkle of sea salt and pepper. Roast in oven for 10-15 minutes or until crispy. Remove from oven and dust with cinnamon and cardamom. Set aside to cool.

2) Drain the hydrated garbanzo beans reserving the liquid to help thin the hummus, as needed. Place in a high-powered blender with tahini, juice from half the lemon, small garlic clove, roasted sweet potato, maple syrup, remaining fresh rosemary and thyme, cinnamon and cardamom, and freshly cracked pepper and a pinch of sea salt. Blend at high speed until smooth, scraping down the sides if needed. If the mixture is not blending well, add 1-2 teaspoons of reserved bean liquid to help thin. Add one circle of olive oil (about 2 teaspoons) and blend again.

2) Place hummus in a shallow bowl and dress with crispy chickpeas, julienned crispy sweet potato skin, a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and maple syrup, a sprinkling of flaky sea salt and cinnamon and cardamom, and a mix of fresh thyme and rosemary.

Serve the hummus with sliced apples and warm flat breads. Don’t be surprised if you want to eat this by the spoonful ;)

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