Baba ganoush, hummus’ lesser-known cousin, is easily as tasty, if not more so. Even my partner, who doesn’t like eggplant, will slather this all over a chunk of bread and go back for more until the bowl is clean.

Baba ganoush is one of those wonderful recipes that works as a dip, a side dish, or even a low-key light lunch when served with a chunk of tasty bread. This one’s not strictly speaking a low-tech recipe, as I make it with a food processor… but you could do the hard yards with a fork if you wanted to, yielding a chunkier, but by no means sub-standard, baba ganoush.

Here’s how I pull together a crowd-pleasing bowl of baba ganoush, great served with a warm chunk of flatbread, or as an accompaniment to a range of Middle Eastern treats…

Flavour: Savoury and a little smoky

Yield: Enough baba ganoush for your contribution to a potluck party, or as a side dish at a meal for 4-6 people

Ingredients:

• 1 large eggplant pr 2 medium eggplants
• 3 tablespoons tahini
• 2 cloves garlic
• half teaspoon salt
• juice of half a lemon

Optional extras:

• olive oil, to serve
• paprika, to serve
• finely chopped parsley, to serve
• a handful of olives, to serve

Directions:

1. Roast the eggplant in the oven at 170C for 30-40 minutes (no oil, no salt – just the eggplant)
2. Once your eggplant is cooked, cool it, then peel it – the skin should peel off easily, and the flesh inside should be very soft
3. Pop the eggplant flesh (which might be in several pieces once you’ve made a mess peeling it 😛 ), garlic, salt, lemon juice and tahini in the food processor, and give it a few quick blasts on high speed, remembering to scrape the excess from the sides of the food processor between blasts to make sure it’s all well incorporated
4. Once your baba ganoush is coming together, blended nice and smooth, you can add a little water to loosen it up, if need be – just add a little splash at a time, pulse the blender again, and check the consistency – keep doing this until your baba ganoush is the consistency you want it to be (I like mine quite thick so I can get a really good dollop of it on a piece of flatbread, but not so thick that I have to scrape the bowl to get it on the bread 😉 )
5. Serve in a shallow bowl with a drizzle of olive oil, a sprinkle of parsley, and a handful of olives (your baba ganoush will keep fine in the fridge for 2-3 days, so you can make this in advance if you don’t plan to use it immediately)

Best served as an accompaniment to a Middle Eastern feast of falafels, fasolia, and Lebanese cauliflower 😀