Mixadventures with many flavours of hummus

It’s been over half a year since my last mixadventures post, so I figured it was time for an update about some of the “new” recipes I’ve tried.

Rice pudding

One evening, back in August (middle of winter), I succumbed to a craving for something hot and nourishing and sweet. I grew up on traditional rice pudding, which I adore, and was keen to try the Thermomix version.

My mouth is watering just looking at the above image, and I feel kinda tempted to make some! (I’m trying to remember what I drizzled on that…) Once again, it was super easy and quick — and yummy! Just insert arborio rice, skim milk, sugar etc. and press go!

Broccoli salad with herbed salt

My assigned Christmas dish was a salad, and I decided to find one I hadn’t made before. So I perused the trusty recipe community and picked out a healthy broccoli salad. It’s similar to the one in the Basic Cookbook, but has a different dressing. (I was a little disappointed in the original one.)

The recipe also includes “herb salt”. Since I had plenty of time, I decided to make this too. I hunted for appropriate recipes (having no real idea what herb salt is usually like) and found one that sounded likely. The recipe simply blitzed salt with garlic and herbs — in this case rosemary and sage.

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The herb salt mix was dried for a few days in a dish (above) and then I put it in a glass jar for storage.

The salad itself was yummy — essentially blitzed broccoli, capsicum, apple, pine nuts with a dressing containing dijon mustard, balsamic vinegar and honey. Alas, being Christmas day, I forgot to take a photo.

Hummus hummus hummus

I’ve been making a variety of dips in the Thermomix recently. I was sticking to guacamole and my capsicum and sundried tomato dip (both yum), but suddenly conceived the desire to make rainbow hummus.

Honestly, you’d think I would start with just one batch of normal hummus, right? Nope. I had to make rainbow hummus — inspired by a video I’d seen on social media. So pretty! I had a D&D game coming up, so…

I did compromise and make tri-colour hummus instead of six colours, but still… So. Much. Hommus. The three flavours I made were: spinach and artichoke, beetroot and sundried tomato. They tasted pretty good, but not sure whether it was all worth the effort. (Aaand, I forgot again to take a photo.)

The first lot of beetroot hummus was a little disappointing — not enough beetroot! So a few weeks later I decided to make a batch of beetroot hummus according to the Thermomix Basic Cookbook. I used twice as much raw beetroot to make it really beetrooty. It tasted great — much better than the initial attempt.

I much prefer beetroot hummus to plain hummus. In addition to eating as a dip, or a spread for sandwiches, it goes really well with poached eggs

I’ve also tackled some other variations on hummus in recent months, courtesy of the WW weight loss program. One was pumpkin, yogurt and chickpea, the other was carrot, chickpea and orange. Both were more or less hummus, but without tahini. Chickpeas feature highly in WW recipes, being points free.

Steamed chicken

I mentioned last post that I started making poached chicken. Super yummy and easy, but not quite as easy as simply steaming chicken in the Varoma. I’ve been doing this weekly while on WW, since chicken breast is another points-free food in the program. And this is definitely a points-free cooking method.

I’ve been steaming two chicken breasts at a time, cut into rough chunks. It takes just 20 minutes. I then use the chicken cut up into vegetable soup (extra protein) or risotto or whatever other vegetable-based dish I’ve created.

Apricot chicken risotto

The recipe for Apricot chicken risotto appeared in a Thermomix email last year, and I immediately downloaded it and went shopping for ingredients. It uses apricot nectar with the vegetable stock concentrate instead of water, along with fresh vegetables and herbs and chicken thighs.

Mmm, I think I need to make this one again soon. It looks pretty WW friendly with a few minor adaptations.

I should also mention that earlier this year I made a basic vegetable risotto using some of the chicken stock saved from poaching chicken. Highly successful!

Butter chicken

Although there’s a Thermomix recipe for butter chicken, I adapted a WW version instead. This one includes chunks of cooked pumpkin and peas. I elected to leave out the evaporated milk and served with a scoop of natural yogurt instead.

Instead of cooking rice, I simply mixed in a small amount of couscous (once served) and added fresh spinach and broadbeans, which I’d recently stashed in the freezer.

This was the first curry I’ve made in the Thermomix! I was thrilled to use some of the homemade garam masala my sister gave me for Christmas.

Thus ends another epistle. I’m rather inspired to make some of these recipes again. Then look for some new ones to try, of course.

It’s actually been a big day on the blog, as I’ve also given the whole site a facelift today. Thanks for reading.