Butterbean Hummus with Charred Okra and Marinated Peppers

Deep Run Roots

This recipe is more like five in one. Each part is pretty easy by itself, and some of them can be done ahead of time, but that's still a lot.

First, you have to make the Stewed Fresh Butterbeans that we made on this channel last week, since that is the base of your Butterbean Hummus. (https://cookwithheather.com/Deep-Run-Roots-Stewed-Fresh-Butterbeans/) I used them still warm, and I think that helps make the smoothest hummus.

You also have to make some Garlic Confit, and if you're like us, you'll be disappointed that this recipe uses the whole batch. This part takes the longest, but it's almost all hands-off once you peel your garlic. You probably don't want it fresh from the oven for this, but a little warm is fine. Get this started before the butterbeans, and it will probably work out fine.

The Marinated Peppers are just charred bell peppers, peeled and cut up before they're tossed with some oil, vinegar, and seasonings. Peeling peppers is one of my least favorite kitchen tasks, but Vivian does say you can use jarred peppers if you like for this. If I had them, I'd use them. They need to marinate for at least 10 minutes.

And then there's the Charred Okra, which you'll want to make just before you eat. We didn't get any film of that part, but...you're actually trying to char it, so there's not a lot you can mess up, right? We did ours on the grill (which we also used for the peppers), but you can also do that on the stovetop, preferably in a hot cast iron pan. I bet you could broil them, too, but you'd have to watch them pretty closely. But beware, you DO want small, young, tender okra for this. Bigger ones will be woody and/or stringy, and not very nice to eat this way. (Cut them in rounds and fry them, they'll be much better that way.)

When it's all done, then you can marvel that this might just be the best hummus you've ever had. I swear, people who don't normally like hummus even liked it! And people who do liked it as well.

Captions

[00:00]: [Music]
[00:04]: hello and welcome to cooking the books
[00:06]: with Heather today it is the middle of
[00:09]: summer it is the middle of like harvest
[00:12]: season
[00:13]: so much fresh produce
[00:15]: and I was looking for something to make
[00:17]: and realized that we've been putting
[00:20]: away all of these vegetables
[00:22]: and we haven't really cooked any
[00:23]: recently on the channel so
[00:27]: I looked through my cookbooks and I
[00:29]: found something that I had almost
[00:31]: everything to go ahead and make
[00:33]: so today we are going to be making
[00:35]: butter bean hummus with charred okra and
[00:38]: marinated peppers
[00:40]: there are four components to this recipe
[00:43]: none of them are really all that
[00:45]: difficult but you know different things
[00:47]: that you kind of put together
[00:49]: but they're well four components plus
[00:52]: one other recipe so this uses stewed
[00:56]: fresh butter beans which I will have
[00:58]: posted before this but I have not made
[00:59]: yet because I'll make that next but the
[01:02]: first component that we are making
[01:05]: oh and if I didn't say say so I don't
[01:07]: think I did this is from Deep Run Roots
[01:10]: Vivian Howard's cookbook that's been out
[01:12]: for quite a while one of the very first
[01:14]: cookbooks I started working with on this
[01:16]: channel and
[01:18]: um
[01:19]: I I was looking through the okra section
[01:22]: and I've made almost all of the recipes
[01:24]: in the okra section except for like
[01:26]: pickled okra and
[01:29]: I don't I don't want to make that really
[01:32]: and it's pickled okra with
[01:35]: corn
[01:36]: and it just I don't have a vessel for
[01:39]: that I'm just not ready for that so
[01:42]: this one has ocher in it
[01:44]: um and butter beans and we've recently
[01:47]: put up uh butter beans we
[01:50]: blanch them and froze them
[01:52]: today I'm going to be using some that I
[01:56]: um
[01:57]: made last year so we still had a couple
[01:59]: left from last year but so I'm using
[02:03]: some of those today but we have fresh
[02:06]: ones and we made a little short so
[02:08]: hopefully I'll be able to link that up
[02:09]: here otherwise it'll be linked somewhere
[02:11]: or you can go look at the shorts on my
[02:13]: channel
[02:14]: um of how we did that in case you're
[02:17]: interested in doing that yourself
[02:20]: but the first component we need to make
[02:22]: for this recipe is garlic confi
[02:25]: so this is just garlic cooked in olive
[02:30]: oil
[02:31]: um in the oven for she says about 45
[02:34]: minutes so I've got quite a lot of
[02:37]: garlic in this small Ramekin I think the
[02:39]: point is for this to basically cover the
[02:42]: garlic cloves I don't know if it will
[02:45]: but you know doing the best I can I did
[02:49]: not
[02:50]: um
[02:53]: take the like Woody ends tops off of
[02:57]: these but they are peeled
[02:59]: and before I do that I'm gonna try to
[03:02]: stick this time
[03:06]: into
[03:07]: underneath so it's not just sort of
[03:12]: poking out and getting burnt
[03:14]: um you want it to flavor the oil and the
[03:16]: garlic here
[03:18]: so I'm going to kind of
[03:20]: stick all that inside as much as I can
[03:24]: and then I'm just going to pour the oil
[03:26]: this should be extra virgin olive oil
[03:30]: um
[03:31]: it's nothing super special it's just
[03:33]: what I use
[03:35]: generally for cooking and stuff I
[03:39]: don't usually care too much about it
[03:41]: being super duper special but
[03:45]: um
[03:48]: use what you like
[03:50]: so that is
[03:51]: just about perfect for covering it and
[03:55]: not overflowing my Ramekin so that's
[03:58]: great and now we're going to cover it
[04:02]: with some aluminum foil
[04:05]: I've got it on this
[04:07]: um
[04:09]: baking sheet so that it is easier to put
[04:12]: in and take out of the oven
[04:15]: so we're just going to put this in the
[04:17]: oven
[04:17]: and let it sit there for
[04:19]: 45 minutes at 350 degrees
[04:24]: she says at the end the garlic will be a
[04:26]: toasted blonde color and quite soft
[04:30]: so we'll show you what that looks like
[04:32]: in about 45 minutes
[04:36]: okay it's been about 20 minutes
[04:39]: my garlic is super soft it did
[04:43]: boil over a little bit I should have
[04:45]: probably gone for a slightly larger
[04:48]: Ramekin but
[04:49]: anyway
[04:51]: this is fine uh she says you can store
[04:54]: this in the refrigerator for up to two
[04:56]: weeks and when you use it use equal
[04:58]: parts oil and garlic cloves so I will
[05:01]: pull out
[05:03]: I'll probably pull out the time before I
[05:06]: put it in the refrigerator because it'll
[05:07]: be a lot easier to pull out while
[05:09]: everything is warm versus cold but
[05:14]: that's our garlic coffee we'll be back
[05:16]: to show you the rest in just a minute
[05:19]: so I think we're all ready to make our
[05:21]: butter bean hummus
[05:23]: um because we needed
[05:26]: the garlic home fee for that the
[05:29]: these are supposed to be cooled they're
[05:34]: they're not super hot they are
[05:37]: um
[05:38]: they're not
[05:38]: super cool either but that's okay
[05:43]: um
[05:44]: so first I'm going to put in my
[05:48]: stewed fresh butter beans I'll link
[05:51]: those up there
[05:53]: uh
[05:56]: and I have drained them I assume I do
[05:59]: not need all of this
[06:01]: cooking liquid so
[06:04]: but just in case I need some I decided
[06:08]: to keep it so we've got our butter beans
[06:11]: in here we're adding pretty much all of
[06:14]: the garlic confit that we made that's
[06:18]: some garlicky stuff here
[06:22]: although it's very mellow when it's
[06:25]: roasted like that
[06:27]: now we are adding
[06:31]: garlic oil all over our hands but now
[06:34]: we're going to add
[06:36]: um oh yeah we're going to use this to
[06:39]: measure our lemon juice
[06:41]: fresh lemon juice fresh squeezed lemon
[06:43]: juice
[06:46]: I don't have quite enough here I think I
[06:48]: do but if I don't I have more
[06:52]: we're going to call that good good for
[06:54]: me
[06:56]: good enough for me
[07:00]: we have
[07:01]: um
[07:03]: some more olive oil she says olive oil
[07:05]: for finishing which means use the good
[07:07]: stuff I don't have any particularly good
[07:10]: stuff right now so
[07:12]: we're using the same stuff
[07:15]: that's a lot of agua
[07:18]: um
[07:19]: we're going to use some tahini which is
[07:21]: a sesame seed
[07:24]: paste
[07:26]: mine was I got mine in a squeezable
[07:28]: bottle which I really like
[07:31]: so it's a little bit thinner than
[07:33]: something tahini sometimes is
[07:35]: and now I'm going to use this measuring
[07:39]: device
[07:41]: to measure
[07:44]: some honey
[07:55]: that's good
[08:06]: all right
[08:08]: um
[08:09]: oh I forgot
[08:12]: a couple ingredients
[08:14]: um first we need salt and now it is
[08:18]: she says
[08:20]: there's a range for salt here we're
[08:23]: gonna start at the low end and because
[08:25]: we can always add more
[08:28]: I'm using kosher salt
[08:32]: I need some cayenne
[08:34]: I swear I had
[08:37]: a different container of this but
[08:39]: apparently it's gone
[08:41]: so
[08:42]: make sure I'm putting the right amount
[08:44]: in
[08:45]: hopefully not too much for my family
[08:47]: we'll see
[08:50]: and
[08:52]: now here's
[08:54]: a question
[08:57]: uh
[09:01]: uh this calls for some water
[09:03]: should I use the water
[09:05]: from the cooking liquid or should I just
[09:08]: use water water
[09:11]: I think I'm gonna go with plain water so
[09:13]: let me get a measuring device
[09:16]: good enough
[09:17]: I'm just going to put this water in
[09:20]: now we're going to word this up
[09:25]: she says about three minutes or until it
[09:29]: is really really smooth and the Skins
[09:30]: are broken down and then if you don't
[09:32]: like it if you have some skins and you
[09:34]: don't like it you can pass it through a
[09:36]: fine mesh sieve
[09:37]: we're probably not going to bother with
[09:38]: that but three minutes of loud noise
[09:44]: [Music]
[09:46]: hasn't been that long
[09:47]: but I'm going to sort of
[09:52]: wipe down the edges make sure we're
[09:54]: getting everything Incorporated and I'm
[09:57]: going to give it a taste
[10:02]: to see if I want to add a little more
[10:03]: salt at this point
[10:10]: it's good
[10:13]: I think I'm gonna say no on more salt I
[10:16]: think it's good
[10:18]: so a little more time
[10:23]: I'm just going to give it one more
[10:24]: little
[10:32]: wipe down
[10:35]: and
[10:39]: a little more time and then we'll be
[10:41]: done
[10:43]: all right I'm gonna call that good
[10:46]: enough
[10:48]: probably been about three minutes now
[10:51]: that's our Butterbean hummus we still
[10:53]: have two more components to make for
[10:56]: this dish
[10:58]: but this is served at room temperature
[10:60]: so I'm gonna find a bowl or something to
[11:02]: put this in
[11:05]: just to store it because we're going to
[11:07]: serve it on a nice platter with some
[11:09]: stuff
[11:11]: but we'll see you when we're ready
[11:13]: to make the next component
[11:15]: okay
[11:17]: next thing we're going to be making is
[11:19]: the charred okra my husband's going to
[11:22]: cook that on the grill probably in a
[11:24]: grill basket but the goal for these is
[11:26]: for them to be like two-thirds charred
[11:30]: you can do it on the grill on a grill
[11:32]: pan or
[11:35]: um
[11:36]: on a cast iron skillet in here but
[11:39]: before we do that we need to add some
[11:42]: things to it oh not this
[11:45]: that's for a different thing we're going
[11:48]: to add
[11:49]: um
[11:51]: some salt
[11:55]: now these okra are whole
[11:58]: they looked really good but they're
[12:00]: supposed to be small to medium and mine
[12:03]: are
[12:04]: some pretty large so they might be a
[12:07]: little stringy for this application once
[12:09]: they're done
[12:10]: but we're adding a little bit of cayenne
[12:14]: I'm not measuring very
[12:18]: uh accurately right there for that but
[12:21]: I'm going to measure this so we're going
[12:23]: to add some extra virgin olive oil
[12:26]: and then we're just going to toss it up
[12:32]: thank you
[12:38]: so
[12:40]: uh yeah you can't really
[12:43]: see but
[12:45]: I'm gonna toss this
[12:48]: and then when he's ready he will
[12:53]: Char these on the grill hopefully we'll
[12:56]: get a little bit of video of that
[12:58]: process but
[13:00]: really we're just trying to give them a
[13:03]: lot of color
[13:04]: um
[13:07]: yeah that is
[13:10]: it for these I'm going to let them sit
[13:13]: until
[13:15]: they're ready to be charred they
[13:17]: probably will
[13:20]: pull out a little bit of the liquid
[13:22]: because you know pre-salting things does
[13:24]: that oh I did like trim off the the the
[13:28]: the
[13:29]: tips if they were yucky and the ends the
[13:32]: stem ends if they were kind of brown but
[13:35]: other than that they don't entirely
[13:36]: whole so
[13:39]: hopefully we'll show you the grill step
[13:40]: and pretty soon we will show you the
[13:43]: marinated peppers for our butter bean
[13:46]: hummus with chart okra and marinated
[13:48]: peppers and that will be the last thing
[13:49]: we need to make okay
[13:52]: making the last component for our
[13:54]: Butterbean hummus we're making the
[13:56]: marinated Peppers we have I'm making
[13:59]: approximately half a recipe of these
[14:01]: because I don't need all of them but I'm
[14:03]: going to use all of the marinade because
[14:05]: whatever it's going to be the same I'm
[14:08]: going to add some I'm gonna do the olive
[14:10]: oil first because that was the last
[14:11]: thing that I
[14:13]: used for this
[14:15]: some olive oil this is supposed to be
[14:16]: the good olive oil I'm using the same
[14:18]: stuff for everything but that's fine I'm
[14:21]: gonna use some
[14:24]: balsamic vinegar she says to use aged
[14:26]: again the good stuff
[14:28]: it's balsamic vinegar that I have
[14:32]: um
[14:32]: and
[14:34]: some
[14:36]: finely chopped fresh parsley that's
[14:39]: about right
[14:41]: there we go and some salt
[14:45]: I hope I have enough in here
[14:55]: good enough
[14:56]: I'm gonna have to refill that okay and
[14:59]: then we're just going to mix this up I'm
[15:02]: using some red and green peppers because
[15:04]: that's what I have I would have
[15:06]: preferred mostly red maybe some yellow
[15:09]: or orange for color but you know if you
[15:11]: use what you have
[15:13]: so all I have to do is let this sit for
[15:15]: about 20 minutes
[15:19]: 30 minutes
[15:21]: we'll let it sit for as long as we have
[15:23]: until everything's ready to eat
[15:26]: so in just a minute we will plate it all
[15:28]: up show you what it looks like
[15:31]: um
[15:31]: we're basically going to use these as
[15:33]: sort of like gravy on top of the
[15:36]: hummus
[15:38]: Nestle it in on top and put the okra all
[15:41]: around to use for dipping
[15:43]: I also made some flatbreads too so
[15:45]: hopefully those will turn out really
[15:46]: well
[15:47]: um
[15:48]: yeah that's it
[15:50]: we'll let you know what we think in just
[15:52]: a minute
[15:52]: [Music]
[16:01]: on this episode of cooking the books
[16:03]: with Heather you watched me make butter
[16:05]: bean hummus with charred okra and
[16:07]: marinated peppers from Vivian Howard's
[16:10]: Deep Run Roots which is
[16:12]: a great book for uh fresh produce
[16:17]: recipes
[16:18]: so it's the middle of summer and I've
[16:21]: definitely found myself turning to this
[16:22]: book again and getting some of the
[16:24]: recipes that we haven't made yet
[16:27]: um
[16:28]: and I had looked through the okra
[16:31]: section
[16:32]: and I'd made
[16:34]: pretty much everything except for I
[16:36]: think pickled okra in that section
[16:38]: but I had not made this recipe which
[16:42]: includes the charred okra
[16:44]: because it's in the beans and peas
[16:46]: section which I hadn't worked out of all
[16:48]: that much so
[16:50]: um
[16:51]: first off
[16:52]: I love the butter bean hummus I'm not
[16:55]: sure I could have
[16:56]: said for sure that it was made with
[16:58]: butter beans but it was smooth it was
[17:01]: delicious it was very garlicky uh I
[17:06]: didn't end up needing to strain out any
[17:09]: bits of the skin from the butter beans
[17:12]: in mine it really got very very smooth
[17:15]: in the food processor and I that was not
[17:18]: a problem at all for us
[17:21]: um we were very sad that it used the
[17:23]: entire recipe of the garlic confit and I
[17:26]: think we'll be probably making that
[17:28]: again
[17:29]: um soon I don't know if there are other
[17:32]: recipes in this book that use it or
[17:36]: whatever but it's something we can
[17:37]: certainly find some use for be great
[17:39]: just you know dip some bread in it
[17:42]: honestly
[17:44]: um
[17:45]: we had a little bit of a
[17:48]: um
[17:48]: filming issue that day uh one of our
[17:51]: cameras battery was gone and we were
[17:54]: just busy and didn't so we didn't get to
[17:57]: film
[17:59]: charring the peppers
[18:01]: um so that's not really part of the
[18:03]: recipe but it's the bell peppers are
[18:06]: roasted peeled and cut up
[18:10]: um supposedly into strips I cut mine
[18:12]: into more easy to eat pieces
[18:16]: um
[18:17]: but we've done that before on this
[18:19]: channel so I will link that up there but
[18:21]: you can also substitute Jarred roasted
[18:24]: bell peppers if you prefer I don't think
[18:27]: it would cause much of an issue
[18:31]: in this recipe I think it'd be perfectly
[18:33]: fine
[18:34]: um and it's peeling Peppers is so
[18:38]: annoying
[18:41]: all the bits stick to your fingers and
[18:43]: anyway so that part we didn't get to
[18:46]: film and we also didn't get to show you
[18:48]: any of the charring of the okra which my
[18:52]: husband did for me on our uh charcoal
[18:55]: grill
[18:57]: um
[18:57]: but
[18:59]: you can also do in a pan or
[19:04]: which what does she say in like a cast
[19:07]: iron skillet or
[19:10]: uh on a grill pan I would probably
[19:13]: suggest like a cast iron skillet if
[19:15]: you're doing it inside honestly because
[19:17]: you'll get a better char
[19:19]: with that
[19:21]: but uh
[19:24]: so you just cook it on medium high heat
[19:29]: Char them
[19:31]: most of the way if you're looking for
[19:33]: the Char so you don't really have to
[19:34]: worry about that but
[19:36]: I do suggest only doing that with
[19:41]: small to medium sized okra we did have
[19:45]: some that were pretty large and those
[19:48]: ones were not very nice to eat
[19:51]: this way they they get kind of stringy
[19:54]: and Woody and they were
[19:57]: not great but the small ones were really
[19:60]: tasty and they are not at all slimy
[20:02]: inside even the people
[20:05]: particularly my husband who has an issue
[20:08]: with the sliminess of okra and usually
[20:11]: only eats it fried had no problem with
[20:13]: this and it was great with the hummus of
[20:16]: course you could also
[20:18]: serve the hummus with anything you sir
[20:20]: normally sort of hummus with we also got
[20:22]: some actually I made some flatbread
[20:26]: just a quick yogurt uh flatbread
[20:29]: um
[20:30]: and you could dip it with bread you
[20:32]: could dip it with vegetables crackers
[20:34]: whatever whatever you normally use a
[20:36]: hummus for you could use that instead of
[20:38]: the okra but having the okra just seems
[20:40]: a little bit healthier to me than bread
[20:44]: anyway
[20:45]: so all that to say we really liked this
[20:48]: recipe
[20:50]: um butter beans are super easy to to put
[20:54]: away yourself which I've shown you how
[20:57]: we do that but you can also buy them in
[20:60]: the grocery store and cook them in the
[21:02]: same way
[21:03]: in the freezer section you can buy them
[21:06]: it's fine
[21:09]: I don't want to put them up yourself
[21:12]: or if it's the winter and you don't have
[21:14]: any feel free
[21:16]: anyway I'll be making this again
[21:19]: even if my children don't like hummus at
[21:21]: all we loved it so and everybody else
[21:24]: who tried it also loved it
[21:27]: who let people who like hummus even
[21:29]: somebody who didn't like hummus loved it
[21:31]: so anyway if you've enjoyed watching me
[21:34]: make this give me a thumbs up hit the
[21:36]: Subscribe button share this with your
[21:38]: friends and come back and watch me make
[21:41]: something else next week