A Recipe Blog

Over the silly season, I went a bit bonkers and bought a whole lot of cookbooks (I already have heaps but… christmas!… :-P). This self-made recipe was enjoyed by & passed on to my mum-in-law, and draws on two recipes for inspiration (see notes below recipe).

Ingredients (Makes 12 serves of dip, can be frozen and thawed for later use)

• 1/2 cup yellowbox honey to taste
• 1 cup hot water
• 3 tbsp salt (& extra to taste)
• 2 tbsp pepper
• 3/4 cup lemon juice
• 500g canned, drained ready-to-eat chick peas
• 1 cup dry roasted cashews
• 1/2 cup peanut oil
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin seeds
• 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 200g canned, drained ready-to-eat artichokes
• 3 tsp minced garlic to taste

Directions

1. In a food processor, ground the cashews. Then blend together with peanut oil & 1 tbsp salt until smooth. Add extra peanut oil if needed to reach desired consistency.
2. Mix 1/4 cup honey with 1/2 cup of hot water. Briefly blend into cashew mixture.
3. Add the chickpeas, lemon juice, artichokes, cumin, pepper and remaining salt and blend all ingredients together on high. With the motor running, pour in extra virgin olive oil until a thick smooth mixture is formed.
4. Add and mix in extra salt, honey and garlic to taste.
5. Serve with rice crackers or plain grain crackers (gluten free if required for dietary reasons).

Notes on the two recipes that inspired this one…

Firstly there’s the Sesame “Butter” recipe on p. 221 of The Autism Cookbook by Susan K. Delaine. I made something similar to this with cashew nuts for the above dip, and used Aussie yellowbox honey as a sweetener. A side note though; whilst there is some useful info on autism, food intolerances and cooking in this book, it is laden with errors and I wouldn’t recommend it necessarily (completely misleading & incorrect pictures with recipes, and several errors in recipes; e.g., use of ingredients in directions that don’t appear in ingredient list). It has a good stuffed chicken recipe though on p. 37 (which I’ve made a similar version of and was well received by family).

Second source of inspiration is the amazing Aussie book Gluten free and easy by Robyn Russell (which I can HIGHLY recommend). On p.56 there’s a recipe for hummus. Whilst I modified it a lot, the method for using a food processor to make the dip was helpful for my creation. This book is very handy for those with gluten intolerance; it even has a list of recommended gluten free products & brands (which is kept up to date online).

A couple of notes; I highly recommend the original flavour Fantastic rice crackers for use with ANY dip. They are quite tasty, even on their own! Here in Oz they’re really easy to find too. In Coles, Woolies, Harris Farm, etc. etc. etc.

Tags: blended, food-processed, gluten free, nuts, quick, vegetarian