It’s a long debated question, sometimes a joke, and it’s also become a serious competition. Who does hummus best in the Middle East? Hummus is a dip and a spread, but Middle Easterners eat it as a hearty breakfast, warm off the stove, with a pita, lemon, parsley and lots of olive oil. A dollop of cooked fava beans, ful, is also welcome among hungry working men. Since the Hezbollah started sending missiles to Israel, people from Lebanon have started engaging with Israelis across the border, asking for a hand in peace. Their common language: hummus.

One X account Mount Levnon, represents a Christian Maronite group of Lebanese. The identity of the account is anonymous but they are advocating for “a free Maronite state, committed to a Mediterranean alliance with Israel , Cyprus, and Greece.” And one of the ways they engage with Israel is by sharing hummus tips and secrets. (We have the best recipe of hummus in Israel, provided by Maxim founders – Jews and Arabs who co-own a restaurant in Haifa).

But Mount Levnon might not agree. “I’m raising my kids to be super friendly with Israelis, treat them like family, chat about anything under the sun. But the moment hummus or falafel comes up, that’s where we draw a BIG, BOLD RED LINE,” they write on their account, joking that real hummus is from Lebanon and that “fake” hummus is from Israel and it’s marketed under the Sabra brand.

One on team Israel, Klaas, writes. “If only there could be peace and open borders so we can come sit around the table together and fight this out once and for all.:

But When Mount Levon saw that Israelis were also making a version of hummus made from chocolate, the line was crossed.

Mount Levnon, who is pro-Israel and is starting to learn Hebrew says jokingly, “I’m officially breaking the ceasefire, stop putting chocolate in your hummus. Come on Israel, we need to talk.”

Carlos Abadi on team Israel replies, “We surrender, admit to heresy, and accept the punishment.”

Slow Food chef Moshe Basson from Jerusalem who is from Chefs for Peace,  told Green Prophet that hummus was eaten by Queen Ester in the Bible. It’s roots go way back. As for who made it first, maybe Adam and Eve? Who makes it best? The heat is on. Also don’t be surprised that if you visit Israel or Lebanon that locals fight over which joint makes the best hummus. Some more on the debate about hummus in Jaffa.

The post Would you try chocolate hummus? appeared first on Green Prophet.

In recent years, hummus has become a pop culture food phenomenon, drawing praises from dieticians for the health benefits and chefs for the flavor.

However, the core ingredient, the chickpea, has had its production threatened. The chickpea has played a significant role in the vegetarian diet for thousands of years. It is high in protein and rich in important carbohydrates and minerals. And vegans love it. 

Grown in the Pacific Northwest and Northern Plains of the United States, the chickpea has an integral role in the agriculture systems of these regions. Recently this role has been threatened by a soil-born water mold, Pythium ultimum. 

George Vandemark and his team have worked to improve chickpea varieties and develop new ways to control disease in legumes. Their research was recently shared in Crop Science, a publication of the Crop Science Society of America.

“For over 30 years, common pathogens in chickpeas and other legumes have been controlled by fungicides,” says Vandemark. “We discovered this approach was not working effectively when one of my coworkers visited a field where seedlings had not emerged.”

The planted seeds died shortly after they started to germinate. As the seed grew to the top of the soil, the disease attacked the plant and killed it.

To identify the cause, researchers isolated the chickpea seeds in the soil. They discovered that the pathogen P. ultimum developed resistance to fungicide. This resistance allowed the mold to infect the plant.

“Our approach looked at two different types of chickpeas – kabuli and desi,” says Vandemark. “The kabuli chickpea is almost exclusively grown in the United States because of the large export market.”

Time to start planting small Desi chickpeas

Kabuli chickpeas are larger, have a clear or light beige seed coat, and are typically canned and used to make hummus. Desi, believed to have originated in Turkey, is smaller, has a colored seed coat, and is used for making stews.

If you ask around famous hummus chefs in Israel, for instance, they will tell you to use only the smaller Desi variety. Get the ultimate hummus recipe here. Or scroll down to the bottom of the post for it. 

The researchers examined different lines of the chickpea to identify natural sources of resistance to P. ultimum.

The most popular varieties of chickpea grown in the United States were susceptible to the disease. The team did discover other chickpea varieties that showed resistance to the soil-born mold.

“We identified many desi chickpeas that were resistant to the pathogen,” said Vandemark. “Luckily, several kabuli also displayed intermediate levels of resistance.”

These resistant chickpea varieties excited the researchers because they produce chickpeas that look similar to what consumers are used to.

“These traits are not ones we want to lose,” said Vandemark. “Consumers expect the kabuli type chickpea to come from the United States. The lines we identified with resistance to the disease have the shape and seed color that are desirable.”

With this discovery, the research team is using the resistant plants to breed new kabuli varieties. The resistance chickpeas are crossed with current commercial varieties. This will develop a type that is more resistant to the disease.

“Moving forward, this will lead to new chickpea varieties with improved resistance to P. ultimum,” explains Vandemark. “This research will also lead to new methods for controlling diseases that rely less on fungicides and more on genetic resistance.”

From this research, scientists can gain a better understanding of disease and disease resistance. This will push researchers to use plant breeding as a means to combat diseases, rather than synthetic chemicals.

“P. ultimum has a broad range of hosts,” says Vandemark. “While we looked at chickpeas, it can affect small grains like wheat and other legumes like soybeans. The chickpea has a small genome size, making it easier to examine.”

Future researchers can build upon this research to examine potential disease resistance to P. ultimum in other crops. Naturally controlling the disease using genetics and breeding can lead to a more sustainable production system.  

George Vandemark is a researcher for the United States Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service. This work was supported by the United States Department of Agriculture and the USA Dry Pea and Lentil Council.

___

Maxim’s Hummus Recipe

Ingredients
• 6.5 pounds of small-sized dried chickpeas (Desi chickpeas)
• 1 tablespoon baking soda
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 2 tablespoons of salt
• 2 tablespoons of lemon salt
• Half measure of tehina (Amount of tehina equals half the volume of    cooked chickpeas)
• Water
• Olive oil to garnish

Take 6.5 pounds of dried chickpeas and soak them overnight in cold water, along with baking soda and baking powder. The next morning clean the chickpeas in running water. Drain the water and remove any small stones.

Adding cold water to cover the chickpeas and then a double amount, vigorously boil the chickpeas in a large pot. After reaching boiling point, turn down heat, and simmer for 3 hours with a lid, until the chickpeas are soft.

When done, strain the chickpeas, and set aside until cold. When cold, put into a food processor, adding raw tehina – about half the volume of the cooked chickpeas. Add in salt, lemon salt, and enough tablespoons of cold water to achieve a thick, but smooth consistency. Spread the hummus on a plate, and garnish with olive oil.

“That’s it. Now you will have lovely hummus”, says Tony.

And a lot of it. Divide the recipe in half if you want a lot less.

The post Digging into chickpea family for less pesticides in the United States appeared first on Green Prophet.

The conventional hummus product with the highest level of glyphosate – more than 2,000 ppb in Whole Foods Market Original Hummus – was nearly 15 times the benchmark set by a US enviro group.

Independent laboratory tests commissioned by the Environmental Working Group in the United States found glyphosate, the notorious weedkiller linked to cancer, in more than 80 percent of non-organic hummus and chickpeas samples, and detected at far lower levels in several organic versions. Find out what brands are worrisome below. The take home: buy organic most of the time.

Glyphosate is the most widely used herbicide in the world. It was sold for decades by Monsanto, now Bayer AG, under the brand name Roundup. Bayer AG is a German multinational pharmaceutical and life sciences company and one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world.

This product Roundup was marketed for years by Scotts MiracleGro company in the United States until last year. Until Scotts understood they could no longer be implicated in peddling this poison. But Scotts is how consumers accessed RoundUp for years. Some blame Roundup celiac and stomach diseases as well.

The International Agency for Research on Cancer has classified glyphosate a probable human carcinogen, and the state of California lists it as chemical known to cause cancer.

One third of hummus brands tested exceeded recommended amount of Roundup

One-third of the 27 conventional hummus samples exceeded EWG’s health-based benchmark of 160 parts per billion, or ppb, for daily consumption, based on a 60-gram serving of hummus (about four tablespoons).

The Environmental Protection Agency’s woefully inadequate legal limit for glyphosate in chickpeas, known as a tolerance level, is 5,000 ppb, or more than 30 times EWG’s benchmark.

The conventional hummus product with the highest level of glyphosate – more than 2,000 ppb in Whole Foods Market Original Hummus – was nearly 15 times the EWG benchmark.

Overall, 10 hummus samples exceeded EWG’s benchmark for glyphosate:

Sabra Classic Hummus

Sabra Roasted Pine Nut Hummus

Whole Foods Market Original Hummus

Whole Foods Market organic-label Original Hummus

Cava Traditional Hummus

Harris Teeter Fresh Foods Market Traditional Artisan Hummus

Glyphosate levels in organic samples were much lower

EWG also tested 12 samples of organic hummus and six samples of organic chickpeas. All but two contained detectable concentrations of glyphosate. Although glyphosate levels in organic samples were much lower than those of their conventional counterparts, one dry chickpea sample had the highest glyphosate concentration of all samples tested in the study.

“Beans, peas and lentils are a nutritious, affordable source of protein and an important part of the American diet,” said Olga V. Naidenko, Ph.D., EWG’s vice president for science investigations. “These excellent foods would be much better without glyphosate. Toxic weedkiller should never be allowed to contaminate these products, or any other foods, that millions of American families eat every day.”

The beans and bean-based products such as hummus tested in the study were purchased online or at major food retailers in the Washington, D.C., New York City, and San Francisco metropolitan areas, including Aldi, Costco, Giant, Harris Teeter, Safeway, ShopRite, Target, Trader Joes, Walmart and Whole Foods grocery stores.

Glyphosate was first brought to market in 1974, but its use exploded after 1996, when Monsanto introduced genetically modified “Roundup Ready” crops that were resistant to the herbicide. For consumers, most worrisome is use of the chemical on beans and grains as a drying agent just before harvest. This spraying can lead to high levels of glyphosate in beans, hummus, oat cereals and other foods.

By law, organic farmers are not allowed to spray Roundup or other toxic pesticides to grow and harvest crops. The detections of glyphosate on the organic samples may be due to pesticide drift from conventional crop fields or contamination at processing and packaging facilities.

Only organic

“Organic foods, including organic hummus and chickpeas, remain a better choice for consumers,” said EWG Toxicologist Alexis M. Temkin, Ph.D. “EWG testing of both conventional and organic bean products for glyphosate helps increase the transparency in the marketplace and protect the integrity of the Department of Agriculture’s organic certification.”

Hummus and chickpeas, as well as other beans, offer multiple nutritional benefits, and are an important part of a healthy diet. EWG’s findings show the need for a ban on pre-harvest uses of glyphosate, a much stricter EPA standard, and increased testing by the USDA and the Food and Drug Administration for this cancer-causing chemical in the American diet.

EWG’s research on beans and hummus builds on EWG’s tests of oats and oat-based products for glyphosate, which found the weedkiller in nearly every sample of cereal and breakfast bars tested.

The post These popular hummus brands worst for cancer-causing Roundup appeared first on Green Prophet.

Thankfully you can still find pasta that doesn’t piss off gay people. And if you are a bit of contrarian and want to piss off straight Arabs in Israel then just say the words Al Arz. It’s a brand of tahini paste. Nazareth is mainly a Muslim and Christian town, and yes it’s the one from the Bible and today it’s home to the country’s only Arab-owned tahini paste company. Al Arz has come under fire and is facing a boycott for supporting a LGBTQ organization creating a hotline for LGBTQ Arab youth.

Let’s just say tahini (also known as tehina, tehini, techina) is a big deal in Israel. It may even be bigger your sexuality. It’s the glue that holds hummus together and it’s like salt and pepper to every Levantini table. But when this brand decided to help support an Arab LGBTQ group, its straight patrons called for a boycott of Al Arz.

Responding to the boycott calls, Al Arz promised to give even more support to the LGBTQ community.

On a local Whatsapp community group in Jaffa, which is a mixed group of Arabic, Hebrew and English speakers, one member Moti White encouraged his friends to buy more, not boycott the tehina, citing it as “the first Arab-owned business in Israel to actively and openly support the LGBTQ population by giving funds towards creating an Arabic-language phone hotline for struggling LGBTQ youths.” he says.

“LGBTQ people in Israel are now posting pictures of themselves with this brand in order to spread awareness,” says White 31, editor and singer, claiming the movement is being led by Muhammad Zoabi, a local gay Arab activist and vegetarian, vocal in leading the way against the boycott.

Zoabi’s statements in both Hebrew and Arabic:

Here is a previous video featuring Zoabi, who defines himself as gay and vegetarian:

“We in the Al Arz Tahini family love people without differentiation between religion, sex, gender or color. Food connects people. And so do we. We will continue to be an open house and empower disadvantaged sectors whatever they may be,” the statement from the company stressed.

While many Arab Israelis are socially very conservative, especially the Muslim population, LGBTQ Arab Israelis have slowly been taking a more front-facing role. This past May Ayman Safiya, a renowned Arab Israeli dancer drowned in the sea and his funeral brought out thousands of mourners, despite his queer identity.

The Middle East is not always kind to gay people, men especially. You can go to jail for being gay in Iran – or worse be hung like this 31-year-old Iranian man last year. Sharia law does not permit gay sex. In Israel, on the other hand, you might have a better social life if you are part of the gay community.

I was just walking my kid home from his friend’s playdate and two gay guys in front of me were commenting in Hebrew on the quality of the local men in Jaffa. It’s tough now that tourism is cancelled because of Covid-19. The Pride Parade was cancelled. That sucks. Tel Aviv-Jaffa is one of the lesbian and gay capitals of the world, but when those borders expand to Nazareth, a predominantly Muslim and Christian community, the rulebook isn’t so clear. Or better put, you might be walking a slippery slope.

And yes people we are talking about food. We cared about Barilla and its anti-gay statements; likewise the heteros can’t mess with our tahina. We like it in so many ways and it belongs to all of the Middle East (as does hummus – see hummus wars), in all its tasty varieties.

The post Proud Tahini company gets boycotted for being gay appeared first on Green Prophet.

Hummus, the centuries-old Middle Eastern bean paste, is ready for its close-up. According to a report released by food industry trend-trackers Baum and Whiteman, hummus will emerge as America’s “it” food in 2015.  “Once a niche product here, eaten primarily by Arab and Israeli immigrants,” says the report, hummus is matching the meteoric trajectory of Greek yogurt as the nation’s next food fetish.

Hummus’ popularity in the states is rising for a few simple reasons. The light snack aligns with healthy eating. The report confirms this, “Hummus is high in protein and fiber and low in fat, so it touches lots of dietary bases.”

Next, it tastes great.  Every hummus lover knows that the food’s versatility trumps its bland appearance. Serve it old school with a splash of olive oil and a side of tabbouleh.  Shift its flavor with lemon or extra garlic, some chili, roasted peppers, or nuts. Traditionalists may scoff, but its characteristic mildness is a magnet for culinary creativity – consider the hummus ice cream dreamed up in Tel Aviv!

Then there’s the muscular marketing campaign begun over a year ago by the Brangelina of Big Food – beverage giant Pepsi and the world’s top-selling hummus brand Sabra.

Pepsi owns Israel-based Sabra, and they’ve teamed up on long-term production plans (working with America’s nearly extinct tobacco farmers to make a switch to chick peas). Pepsi packs promotional power and launched an advertising campaign to lure snackers away from salsa. Their plan is working – Sabra hummus is the now National Football League’s “official dip”.

In 2006, 12% of American households bought hummus (most Middle Eastern consumers make hummus at home – it’s a simple process. See a version from Green Prophet’s resident foodie – link here – and another from a Haifa hummus shop – link here). In the US, the paste is pitched as fast food – sold in grocery stores in throwaway plastic containers – famously skewered in a hilarious music video by Arab-American Remy Munasifi (link here).

According to the report, hummus sales reached $800 million in 2012, a massive increase from $16 million in 2006. Today, 20% of US households now buy hummus, and the number is rising in part due to distinct deviations from the chickpea base – Baum and Whiteman cite versions blended with “beet, pumpkin, Thai chili, spinach, artichoke, guacamole, edamame, cilantro chimichurri, and lemongrass.”  (There’s even kale hummus, although the trend report declared kale to be on its way out of foodie favor.)

So as Remy’s video presaged, 2015 will be “all about that paste”.

Image of hummus from Shutterstock

The post 2015 will be the year of hummus appeared first on Green Prophet.

As hummus, a staple of Middle Eastern cuisine, gains popularity among Americans seeking healthful snacks, tobacco farmers open their fields to chick peas and Pepsico undertakes to develop new hummus food science with an Israeli company, Strauss. Both businesses see massive potential in developing American chick pea strains for a number of good reasons, some perhaps less good. Let’s start with the good: homemade hummus or that bought from a kiosk which makes it fresh, is high in protein, low in salt and fat, and can be free of artificial additives.  Made with inexpensive chickpeas, it can easily be whipped up at home.

But in America, the Mecca of fast food, the quickest way to a consumer’s heart is through store-bought pre-made, conveniently packaged eating opportunities. 

Market-research firm Information Resources Inc. says US food retailers rang up $530 million in sales of “refrigerated flavored spreads” (a food category dominated by hummus), a 25% jump over 2010.

That chickpea-jonesing trend (it’s also a crunchy snack!) has caught the attention of major food companies like Sabra Dipping Co. (a joint venture of PepsiCo, Inc. and Israel’s Strauss Group Ltd), and Kraft Foods Group, Inc., which owns Athenos, another big hummus brand.

Sabra hooks Americans on hummus through free sampling events staged in major cities, distributing over ten thousand 2-ounce tasting packages in a single day. The company kicked off its first national television ad campaign earlier this year.

Sabra 2012 sales reached an estimated $315 million.

Like quinoa shortages, tiny chickpeas have become a hot commodity and forward thinking manufacturers are preparing for a potential shortage. 

To meet demand, Sabra’s manufacturing plant near Richmond, Virginia will undergo an $86 million expansion. And to reduce its dependence on the primary chickpea-growers in the Pacific Northwest, Sabra wants to cultivate a commercial crop in Virginia.

“We need to establish the supply chain to meet our growing demand,” says Sabra’s chief technology officer, Tulin Tuzel. “We want to reduce the risk of bad weather or concentration in one region. If possible, we also want to expand the growing seasons.”

Sabra also seeks to identify new chickpea varieties.

Sourcing chickpeas locally will lower shipping costs, and come with a healthy perk of reduced transportation emissions.

So Sabra is lobbying farmers in the heart of American tobacco country to grow chickpeas, an easy sell as declining cigarette sales has dramatically changed the economics of farming tobacco.

Compared with corn or wheat, chickpeas are a tiny crop, but lucrative.

Last year’s US harvest reached a record 332 million pounds, up 51% from 2011, with a record value of $115.5 million, according to the USDA.

In addition to heightened hummus production, chickpea demand from Spain, Turkey and Pakistan also has led farmers to increase plantings.

But it’s not a simple substitution of seeds: experts say the state’s high summer heat and humidity could prove a significant obstacle to chickpea viability. (Is this an invite for genetic modification?)

With Sabra financial support, Virginia State University is working on identifying a variety more suited to the climate. Agronomist Harbans Bhardwaj thinks Virginia farmers may be able to grow the crop on a commercial scale within three years. The university has recruited farmers to plant on-farm trials.

According to the Wall Street Journal, James Brown, a 72-year-old tobacco, corn and soybean farmer in Clover, Va., said he knew nothing about chickpeas when an agent from Virginia State called him several months ago and asked if he would plant the bean.

He said he jumped at the opportunity because he is looking for ways to make his roughly 300-acre farm more profitable.

Brown planted four acres with chickpeas in mid-April. That week, his wife served him the first chickpeas he’d ever eaten. “They tasted pretty good,” the farmer said.

Image via soggydan

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