Musabbaha-Whole Chickpea Hummus Syrian Style

Hummus or Hoummous is a creamy dip made of chickpea and tahini optionally with spices or flavours added. I have seen and made hummus too and loved it.But while googling for something to do with my extra parsley other than my quick and easy tomato salad when I came across this post and was surprised to know about this whole chickpea hummus or Musabbaha.This is a chickpea hummus where chickpeas are kept whole and spiced with cumin,pepper and chilli powder and a dressing made with tahini , parsley, garlic and lemon is poured over it and the whole thing is garnished very lavishly with parsley.You can use this as a starter ,sandwich topping,side dish or salad.I enjoyed it as salad itself.

Cook the chickpeas that has been soaked previously.You can also use canned chickpeas after draining out the liquid. Crush together lemon juice,garlic and little salt together and mix half of it to the chickpeas.Also add the spice powders -cumin,chilli & pepper  to the chickpeas and mix well also addding little olive oil.Do the taste test and adjust the salt or the spices. Keep aside or you can also arrange it in small serving plates like this...

Meanwhile mix the tahini with the rest of the lemon-garlic-salt mix to obtain a smooth creamy sauce.Fold in chopped parsley into this sauce.The sauce should be tangy and you can add as much lemon juice as you need to get your kind of tang.I added around 2 tbsp of parsley into the sauce and kept about  1 tbsp for garnish.You can adjust the amount if you do not like parsley.

Layer the sauce on top of the chickpeas.No need to mix in .The flavours will be absorbed even if you do not mix in.It looks almost like this,though you can add more sauce than what you see in the pics.

Drizzle little more olive oil  on top and garnish with the remaining parsley .Serve chilled or at room temperature.

This hummus is spicy and very herby thanks to the parsley.The tahini is very creamy and provides warmth as the sesame as apt to do.You can mix every thing together and also use it as a wrap/sandwich filling rather than going for layers.