The Global Table, Week 1: Hummus, the Unifying and Diversifying Dish

Unifying Around Food 

Hummus often comes
surrounded with pita bread.
Image Credit: jeffreyw

History may overlook the role of food, but motherwit doesn't. Nor do those who work for change one relationship at a time.

While politicians argue about land and human rights in Israel and Palestine, a local restaurant proposes a practical solution. Hummus Bar, a restaurant in Netanya, Israel, discounts plates of hummus by fifty-percent to Jewish and Arab customers who sit together in peace to enjoy the dish.

Although cynics may dismiss the idealism, the manager testifies to
the offers efficacy.  Many interfaith discussions have arisen around tables with hummus. It's natural, nutty, spicy goodness elicits the best in both sides.  Humanity emerges instead of hostility.

A drizzle of olive oil and dash of oregano
add flavor and color.
Image Credit: Edsel Little

Diversifying and Adapting

Hummus doesn't derive its peacemaking power from a single recipe for a magical elixir.  Rather, its magic draws from diversity.  As a vegetarian, I had encountered hummus with lukewarm approval for years.  Then, a Syrian-American colleague and cook opened my eyes to the infinite variety of hummus.

My colleagues at a potluck all raved about the extraordinary hummus that she had contributed.  One taste told me this hummus exceeded all my expectations.  At once nutty and aromatic, tart and spicy, one taste kindled a craving for more.

I complimented her profusely and asked for the recipe.  Smiling, she explained that she added roasted pine nuts. However, she added, hummus varies as much by household as by country.  She hit upon this combination that pleased her entire family and stuck with it.  She encouraged me to explore several recipes and experiment until I found one that my whole family would like.

I will share my personal recipe shortly, the result of my own experimentation. However, in the spirit of exploring and experimenting, feel free to also check out allrecipes for variety and inspiration.  Many chefs have left their personal stamp on this staple.  You can, too.

Hummus with Roasted Pine Nuts

I have marked optional ingredients with an asterisk.  For a blander, basic hummus, cooks may omit ingredients with the asterisk.  Other ingredients list minimum amounts followed by or more. Cooks may stick with the minimum or season the hummus more according to their taste.  I favor more, in general.

Ingredients:

1/4 cup pine nuts *

Hummus with blue corn tortilla chips
is my personal favorite.

15 ox (1 can) garbanzo beans
Juice of whole lemon (1/2 cup or more)
1/2 - 1 cup water
1 1/4 cup olive oil
3 tbsp. to 1/3 cup tahini
2 to 4 cloves garlic
2 1/4 tsp. ground cumin
2 1/4 tsp. paprika *
1 - 2 tsp. oregano
1 - 2 tsp.thyme *
1 - 2 tsp. basil *
1 - 2 tsp. parsley
1/4 tsp. hot red pepper *
1/4 tsp. hot mustard *
1/4 tsp. or more toasted sesame oil *

1. Chop the garlic finely. Let it sit exposed to air for 5 - 10 minutes. Some research suggests that letting garlic oxidize increases its health benefits and flavor.

2. Heat a small fry pan over medium heat.  Toast pine nuts in pan and stir frequently. Remove pine nuts when they release their fragrance and begin browning (3 - 5 minutes).

3. Measure and add olive oil to blender first, and then tahini.  The remaining olive oil in the measuring cup will make the tahini slide out easily.  Measuring lemon juice next lets the lemon get a head start on breaking up the remaining oil.

4. Add all ingredients but pine nuts to the blender.  Blend until creamy and smooth. Stop and scrape splatter on the sides into the mixture.

5. Add pine nuts and blend until smooth.  You may drizzle olive oil over the hummus,  or garnish it with paprika and parsley.  Enjoy!

Let us know if you try a recipe, or if you would like to contribute a recipe or story. Invest in the wealth of motherwit and reap the benefits.

The Global Table - a New Series from Motherwit

Does cooking conjure up
images of  1950's homemakers?Image Credit: CCO

Melodies of Cultural Memory
Motherwit passes from one generation to another through shared experiences. Even as mothers teach children to clean or mend, they transmit knowledge and skills through experiences. 

These experiences permeate us like music. Melodies of sumptuous dishes and bonding linger in our minds. Memory arranges symphonies of nostalgia, so as we remember these skills, we elicit the intimacy in which we learn them. 

What wisdom passes from
a Chinese mother to daughter
as they cook together?
Image Credit: Alex Block

Many of us harmonize our concepts with white, middle-class American culture. The Betty Crocker-inspired image above, for example, depicts immaculately groomed Caucasian women in a modern kitchen.  They collaborate,  paying careful attention to detail as they follow prescribed directions. The daughter learns by looking on.

Tuning in Globally
These white, middle-class moms represent a powerful voice in motherwit - but only one in a dynamic, global chorus.  What happens when we also tune in to global voices?  Do we hear their distinctive melodies, or only a background harmony to our own experiences?

If we prick up our ears, what melodies could we pick out from the Chinese mother and daughter on the left? In contrast to the retro picture, they do not rely on a set, written recipe. Perhaps, they instead consult their past experience, their direct observation of the dish they are creating. What might their intuition tell them about what a dish needs? 

How does one cook
a whole meal outside?
Ask this women from Niger.
Image Credit:
 Galmi-Hospital_2006_Tommy-Sweets

Likewise, what melodies can we pick out from African voices?  This mother in Niger regularly orchestrates meals in an outdoor kitchen.  I cannot even manage cooking outside for barbecues or camping trips.  What could she teach us about versatility?

How do diverse experiences and insights enrich our own understanding?

The Global Table - 
Every Monday Starting in May
Mothers from many cultures has shared their wisdom and secrets with me most often through cooking.  Our common needs for nutrition, flavor, and creativity have built bridges across cultural divides.  We have bonded through our culinary discoveries and relished our taste-testing sessions.  

Starting in May,  Motherwit will feature The Global Kitchen every Monday. A new story and recipe from another culture will extend our table to you. Bring your good will, good taste, and relish for fun.  Posts will still include money-saving options for those interested, as well as other options.  

As always, we welcome your ideas and contributions.  Do you have a fantastic story and recipe to share?  Do you have a recipe to request?  Please add them in the comments to extend the table to everyone.

¢ Mothercents ¢ Why and How Mending is Better than Ending

A reminder to appreciate
the ties that bind
Image Credit: John Shepherd

"Ending is better than mending." This quote from Brave New World came back to me in a flood of memories.  This novel introduced me to the twisted world of dystopia.

This world conceives children in test tubes with varying amounts of alcohol to determine their social class.  The word father is a joke, and mother is an obscenity. A world devoid of motherwit reaches the short-sighted conclusion: Ending is better than mending.

The last several posts have focused on taking care of things to save money. Let's refocus now on why we take the trouble to save.  We live in a throwaway society.  Cheap goods tempt us to replace rather than repair. Why not throw in the towel?

When our mentality shifts to one of disposal for convenience instead of necessity, we toss out our past, present, and future.

1. We lose maintenance/repair skills passed through generations.   

2. We lose out on developing creative, problem-solving skills in the present - including re-purposing. 

3. We lose out on the planet  if we cultivate landfills and incinerators instead of sustainability.  

Ecology is a logically sound reason, but not even the best one. When we repair, recycle, re-purpose or donate, we not only invest in a healthy planet.  We open our eyes to the intrinsic value of everything.

As we place higher value on goods, our own value as human beings should also appreciate.  As we invest in our priceless innovation, we realize our capacity to grow and learn.

Sifting Wheat from Chaff

Granted, the trash cash has its place.  However, is the garbage our first or last resort?  Asking ourselves the following questions can help us distinguish trash from goods with some further purpose.

1. Has this product become unhealthy or dangerous?  Food and medicines past expiration dates put your health at risk.  In these cases, go on to question 2.

2. Can I dispose of this product more safely or sustainably?  Stale or spoiled food can compost into fertilizer for the lawn and garden.  Local police stations sponsor safe drug disposal days, and some pharmacies offer to dispose of expired medications.

3. Can anyone else benefit from this product?  Goodwill Industries and other thrift shops accept donations of clothes, shoes, DVDs, CDs, household goods, books and toys, to name a few.  Goodwill can even use clothes in poor condition to make rag rugs. General thrift store guidelines can put you in the ball park, but checking with specific organizations is recommended.

Freecycle groups post items to swap and save everyone money.  Check out the Freecycle link for background information and groups near you.

Developing a Mending Mentality

Before we can destroy anything, we must see it as either worthless or hazardous.  However, a mending mentality require us to see value in ordinary things in their appropriate places.  Mending challenges us to look beyond exteriors into essential characteristics.  Food waste can break down into compost.  The plastic net bag that held oranges can consolidate garden tools and even allow them to drip-dry.

In this throwaway world, a mending mentality requires consistent practice and pooling knowledge.  We welcome your feedback and ideas here.  Please, don't be shy, and leave your suggestions in the comments section.

¢ Mothercents ¢ - Laugh and Learn from Soaking, Simmering and Salvaging Beans

When Mistakes are the Mother of Invention

Not checking the chart
for soaking and cooking
 led to mushy beans.

Laughter is the valve on the pressure cooker of life.  Either you laugh and suffer, or you got your beans or brains on the ceiling.     - Wavy Gravy 

These wise words echo my feelings on an overcooked pot of black eyed peas. I know that checking the bean soaking/cooking chart leads to a more delectable dish, but still I skipped the step.

I fell into the seductive trap of "multi-tasking."  While I pored my attention into cookie baking, the peas dissolved into mush. Yes, sometimes multi-tasking is an inevitability.  When we upgrade it from necessity to virtue, we may set ourselves up for disappointment.

Properly boiled black eyed
peas keep their shape.
Image Credit: George Kelly

Motherwit, I am learning, is as much about salvaging messes as preventing them.  Fortunately,  mushy beans slip nicely into my salads where shapes, textures, and colors compensate for flawed peas. More importantly, mistakes can lead to discovery.

Another cook online boiled peas too long and posed the question on Veggie Boards: How can we use overcooked black query on what to do with overcooked peas?  A flurry of overcooked black-eyed pea suggestions ranged from pates to fritters. Would the cook have opened the door to those possibilities without the mistake?

Cooking beans yourself can not only save money.  It put us back in charge of what we eat.  Even errors can lead to possibilities, as we unpack in this week's Mothercents.

For Best Results - Or Making the Best of Your Results

1. Check the Chart
Most cooks try for the best possible results, and planning is the key.  Amanda Meyers has shared a complete bean soaking/cooking chart. Wikihow also offers step-by-step guide to cooking beans on the stove or in a pressure cooker. I would only add three tips to reduce gas and digestive discomfort.

• Soak the beans in baking soda. 

• Cook beans with a bay leaf.

The left pea is falling apart
while the right one stays firm.

• Let beans reach a boil for a few minutes, and then let them simmer.  

Properly cooked beans should hold their shape in the hand but mash easily between your fingers. The photo illustrates the difference, with the ideal bean on the right. If your end result resembles the left one, read on.

2. Making the Best of Bedraggled Beans 

Salads can hide a multitude of mistakes, but a wealth overcooked black eyed pea suggestions await on Veggie Boards.  Rather than repeat the ideas, I'll highlight some yummy options.

• Hummus: Mix them into a hummus with or even replacing garbanzo beans.  Mushiness is an asset in the blenders.
• Pate: Experiment with a simple black eyed pea and pecan pate or a more challenging black eyed pea pate.  Great on crackers for a party.
• Fritters:  Black eyed pea fritters or spicy African Accara capitalize on moisture to mix well with other ingredients.



A salad can mask misshapen peas, although
I'd rather not serve it to company. 

• Croquettes:  Add some quinoa and make this crispy on the outside, chewy on the inside treat from Vegan with a Vengeance.

Laughing and Learning

When we can make the best of whatever life brings, we grow. When we can laugh at our imperfect products, we reconnect with what makes us human.  Not one of us can play the hero or the clown all the time.  We need both to round us out as people.

Feeling trapped in mistakes chokes the chuckles right out of me.

Laughter comes easier to me when I see more possibilities, more choices.  So how about you?  How do you get your best results?  When life hands you lemons, how do you make lemonade?  Write us about it in the comments, and keep the conversation going.

￠Mothercents￠ Save What Truly Matters When Out of Power

What Truly Has Value

Motherwit moments can strike at a moment's notice.  An ordinary occurrence reveals an extraordinary lesson.  An unexpected event teaches us what we value most.  Last week, Motherwit struck when a

The Emperor in "The Nightingale" 
Image Credit: Creative Commons

stray car blocks away from my house crashed into a pole.

The driver brought down the power lines and brought on a short power outage. The two hours of darkness taught my niece new skills and instilled a deeper appreciation for what truly matters.

Cozily curled up on the couch, my mom, niece and I were enjoying hot pizza and Faerie Tale Theatre. The episode of Hans Christian Anderson's "The Nightingale" had captivated my niece, Sophia, who loves anything related to China.

The story tells of an extraordinary friendship between a great, Chinese emperor and a simple nightingale.  Even after the emperor rejects the nightingale, the little bird returns to him on his deathbed and saves his life.

When the emperor had lost his power, he discovered what mattered most.  He knew then what to preserve, and what to let go. Ironically, the outage also taught us what to save and what to use up.

What can we discover in the nightingale's song?
Image Credit: Kev Chapman

Life Lessons and Practical Magic

The emperor discovered that the nightingale's loyalty meant more than all his imperial splendor and power. Similarly, Sophia discovered that problem-solving, creativity, and love mean more than electricity and even an excellent DVD.

In all her ten years, Sophia had never experienced a power outage.  Snuggling in blankets, we told stories and watched my seven-month-old kitten gaze upon the gas log fire. Grandma and Sophia took a walk to see how far the power outage extended. The power came on seconds before they returned.

My mother and I gathered flashlights, lit the fireplace, and safeguarded food in the refrigerator and freezer. Sophia longed to finish the show, but she got into the pioneer spirit, carrying candles, winding up the human-powered flashlight, and watching the fireplace. She regarded each emergency measure as as a piece of practical magic and the outage as a new adventure.

Sophia later told her mother how we kept the refrigerator cold.  We moved frozen half-gallon containers of ice from freezer to refrigerator. The refrigerator then functions like an icebox until power returns.  This adventure leads to this week's tips on preserving food in an outage. Even when power outages limit your options, you can choose one of these ideas.

￠Mothercents￠ Preventing Waste in a Power Outage

Half gallon milk jugs
 stand and freeze well.

1. Freeze emergency ice packs.
Plastic half gallon milk or juice containers make excellent emergency cooling agents.  Wash them out and fill them with clean water, but leave two inches empty at the top to allow room for freezing.  In an emergency, use them to cool perishable food in the freezer, refrigerator, or cooler.

* Experiment with smaller bottles with tight caps as ice packs for injuries.  Ice can stop swelling and pain very effectively.

2. Use porches, balconies, garages, basements or cooler rooms.
If you have one of the above, you may have an extra refrigerator or even freezer in cold weather.  I once weathered a three-day power outage without food spoilage, simply because we moved perishables to an unheated porch in a chilly November. 

They store well on my top shelf.

3. Eat what you can't save.
My mom, Sophia, and I treated ourselves to big bowls of ice cream in front of the fireplace.  When you're unsure that you can outlast an outage, use up the most perishable items first.  

Knowing power outage safety empowers us at a time when we have no power.

Motherwit Moments 

Not all discoveries comes with fanfare and fireworks.  More often, we learn priceless wisdom in small epiphanies.  If we pay attention, we can find the extraordinary in rather ordinary circumstances - a power outage, making dinner, or a sunset.  

What extraordinary tidbits have you discovered in an ordinary moments?  Please share these moments in the Comments section.