A Hummus Bowl Dinner With Cabbage and Beets

It's vegan, it's got crispy capers on it, and it fits right into a busy spring day.

Hi there. It’s good to have you here.

Hurley is exploding in blossoms and green. I’ve been out in the garden every day until dark, pulling weeds and clearing beds, planting seeds and checking (too soon!) if they’ve started growing yet. The seedlings I started under lights indoors a few weeks ago just needed transferring to bigger pots. It feels easier to be hopeful with all the new growth around me.

The backyard glow just before dusk the other night.

I keep returning to this poem, my favorite reminder that “whatever winter did to us” spring is a chance to “return to the strange idea of continuous living despite
the mess of us.” And here we are! We’re all the sudden five weeks away from our wedding, and everything seems to be moving more quickly around me and though the daylight makes the days feel longer there’s so much to get done.

Which means it’s time to take some shortcuts with dinner. A recent favorite shortcut: buying pre-cooked and peeled beets. I adore beets, and they are on my anti-inflammatory vegetables list, so I always intend to cook them. But when I want to throw dinner together in half an hour, cooking beets is simply off the table… as evidenced by the bag of raw beets that’s been sitting in my fridge for two months now. (At least they stay fresh for a long time.) In the meantime, I’ve been buying and using those Love Beets and it means beets actually make it into my dinner rotation. I’ve been marinating them in vinegar salt for a quick cold side to a hearty piece of meat. I’ve been slicing them into salads. I’ve been topping warm hummus bowls with them.

I love a bowl of hummus topped with stuff for dinner. Here’s one I made that’s topped with spiced lamb, and here’s one topped with eggs and salad. This week I made it topped with charred cabbage, sherry vinegar marinated beets, and crunchy fried caper berries. It’s a dinner for two that’s ready in less than half an hour and it’s got a nice balance of opposites: creamy and crunchy, earthy-sweet and briny.

One 10 ounce container of hummus—I like esti hummus best, especially the lemon—is just the right amount for a hummus bowl dinner for two. I don’t like COLD hummus for dinner and it’s too thick straight out of the fridge anyway, so I warm and loosen it with a bit of hot water before serving. It’s a simple little trick that makes that grocery store hummus feel homemade. You can add bread on the side for dipping if you like—I usually eat my hummus bowls without.

Here’s the recipe: