Roasted Pumpkin and Chickpea Salad with Homemade Hummus and Crispy Flatbread
Serves: 2
Time: 50 minutes
Tonight’s dinner is a little bit more involved so will take a little longer than normal but it is a perfect example of why I love eating plant based meals. It not only looks delicious but it tastes epic to boot. I kicked off the lazy shoes and reminded myself just how easy it is to make your own hummus. Of course you can buy it but I went extra hard on the lemon juice so it has a real zesty kick that just makes the whole meal.
Leftovers
Leftovers tomorrow are delish, you just need to cook up extra flatbreads.
What you'll need
1 butternut pumpkin
1 large eggplant
2 tins of chickpeas
1 bunch of kale
2 large wholemeal flatbreads
1 lemon
1 tablespoon sesame seeds
1 tablespoon sunflower seeds
2 tablespoons pepitas
1/2 bunch flat leaf parsley
1/3 bunch of coriander
From the Pantry
olive oil
1 tablespoon tahini
salt and pepper
Feeding Four?
You will have extra eggplant in the shopping list and you will want to cook all the flatbread. I'm also going to add an extra tin of chickpeas and a lemon so you can make a double batch of hummus.
Prep and Cook
Preheat Oven to 210c
Cook Flatbread
Lightly brush the top of your flatbread with olive oil and pop in the oven to cook for 8 minutes. You want them to be hard enough that you can snap them.
Cook Veg
Peel the pumpkin and remove seeds, then cut up into large squares and toss in oil with salt and pepper.
Drain one tin of chickpeas and add to the pumpkin and toss again, then spread out on an oven tray lined with baking paper.
Roast in the oven for 30 minutes.
Slice the eggplant in half lengthways, then each half lengthways into quarters, and then into half across the length.
Toss with oil and salt and pepper and spread out across a tray lined with baking paper. Roast for 20 minutes.
Rip the kale off the stalks and then roughly rip into smaller pieces. Use the bowl that you tossed the eggplant in to toss the kale (you shouldn’t need to add oil, what’s left on the bowl will be enough to lightly coat the kale) season with salt.
Once the eggplant has cooked for 20 minutes remove it from the oven and carefully rearrange the eggplant so that it is only taking up half your tray. Then scatter the kale over the empty half of the tray and pop back into the oven for 7 minutes.
Make Hummus
Drain the second tin of chickpeas and pop into a food processor with the tahini, juice of 1 lemon, 1 tablespoon of olive oil, 2 tablespoons of cold water and a good pinch of salt and pepper.
Blitz till smooth.
Make Herb Oil
In a fry pan toast the sesame, sunflower and pepita seeds till lightly golden.
Roughly chop half the parsley and all the coriander up and pop into stick blender vessel with approx 1/4 cup of olive oil and blitz till smooth.
Add the toasted seeds to the oil and season.
Plate it Pretty
Smear two large spoonfuls of hummus across your serving plates in a large circle.
Combine your veg all together on one tray and gently scoop up and pile into the centre of your hummus, this should give you a mixed look.
Roughly chop the remaining parsley and scatter over top.
Drizzle with the herb oil and serve with broken flatbread on the side.
Lunch tomorrow
You will need to cook up extra flatbreads to have for tomorrow’s lunch and put in a separate container so that they don’t get soggy.
If you think it looks a bit light as a salad then you could leave the flatbreads raw and wrap all the ingredients up and bulk out with some red cabbage and mung beans.