I noticed my ATK sous vide book has a recipe for hummus. Has anyone tried this compared to traditional soaking/pressure cooking or slow cooking? Seems like it might be overkill. I generally want my beans overcooked, if anything, for hummus, so I’m not sure I see the point of the precision of SV.
I searched here, and post of the previous post compared dry SV to canned; not specifically dried SV vs other dry beans methods.
by fricks_and_stones
12 Comments
I make it with chickpeas straight from the can. Never tried navy beans, seems weird, and overly complicated for hummus.
one step is missing in this recipe is removing the skin, if you want silky smooth Hummus is try to remove as much as possible of the skin and the baking soda helps so much in this.
I’m going to cross the boundary here and suggest you pressure cook beans. Always consistent and fast! InstaPot FTW
overkill.
I make hummus a lot. I make bean hummus a fair amount. I do think it always helps to boil the beans — even if canned and the baking soda in the water is great to help really break them down and separate the “skin”.
The more “overcooked” the beans, the more you can get them to dissolve into creamy hummus with lots of tahini.
I just don’t understand what SV brings to the party here and at 194, you are getting pretty close to a boil/simmer and at the upper range of many immersion circulators.
I usually trust ATK and think they are great at separating overkill steps from recipes, but this is puzzling.
My take is that rather than doing Hummus, I’m gonna make Msabbaha. [Same principle but made in 10 minutes and with texture](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSFtOifG0zo).
Sous vide technique makes sense when you are making something that is improved by an anaerobic environment, very fine temperature control, very low temperatures, or some combination of these. Otherwise, it’s a solution looking for a problem.
Simmering beans in a big pot is just about the easiest thing you can do in a kitchen. The recipe text’s assertion that it is difficult to cook beans evenly is nothing short of farcical. You can put them in a big pot, bring them to a slow simmer, and slap a cover on them. Four hours later, you have cooked beans.
I made 195F chickpeas yesterday. They turned out very good.
What I did:
1) Brought 3 cups (would have maybe used 4 in the future) of chicken stock to a boil, then took it off boil.
2) Added 8oz of dried, rinsed chickpeas to the pot
3) put the pot in a steam precision oven at 100% humidity at 195F, and then left it for a couple hours.
I liked it because I had to go places and I’m way more comfortable putting the beans in a pot at a set temperature knowing that evaporation is going to be limited and I’m not at risk of overcooking the beans or boiling out all the water while I was outside the house.
I think this just might be one of those convenience things. Say if you’re juggling other prep and eliminating the need to monitor a pot would be a benefit. I don’t think it would make much of a difference in flavor or texture.
I feel like there’s a number of recipes in that book that came out of a planning meeting where they went through their recipe library and asked “can we sous vide it?” I can sous vide a soft cooked egg in 45 minutes or steam it in a pot for 6 minutes and get the exact same egg. If I’m making brunch for 20 people with a pancake bar, maybe sous vide would be helpful but normally it’s not worth waiting an hour to eat breakfast.
Pressure cooking is best for beans and it isn’t even close.
It seems the main purpose was to cook the beans without “blowouts.” It would make sense if you wanted perfect beans that don’t fall apart, but that doesn’t matter if you puree them. It could be said that sous vide rather than boiling would prevent the beans from getting diluted in a big pot of water. Sous vide could help to prevent the beans’ flavor and nutrients from leeching out, but I doubt there would be a noticeable difference in taste. I think the main purpose is a long cook time to get a creamier texture. They may want to break down the bean without over cooking it. Seems like they are overthinking beans.
I sous vide’d potatoes just to see what would happen. Never sous vide potatoes.
So much easier in pressure cooker. 15 min, done.