From Scratch: Easy Instant Pot Hummus with Dried Chickpeas

Instant Pot Hummus

Instant Pot Hummus is an easy and quick way to make a lot of hummus! It tastes delicious, and it’s also much cheaper than buying hummus from the store. If you don’t have an Instant Pot, you can still save money by making hummus with canned chickpeas. Saving money is great, but the real reason I enjoy cooking things like this from scratch is that I learn new skills. Learning how to cook dried beans and transform them into a delicious and healthy dip is a great life skill. Someday I would like to grow my own chickpeas, and make hummus from that!

Instant Pot Hummus Saves you Time

Using the Instant Pot is my favorite way to cook beans, because it cuts the cooking time drastically. Instead of soaking for twelve hours, then cooking for about two hours, you have a few options:

• Soak for twelve hours in a bowl of water, then cook for 20 minutes in the Instant Pot.
• Do a quick five minute “soak” in the Instant Pot, drain, add clean water, then cook for 20 minutes in the Instant Pot.
• Skip the soaking and just cook the chickpeas in the Instant Pot for 40 minutes (this is what I do in my video and recipe below.) You can go from dried chickpeas and ingredients to a bowl of hummus in one hour.

No matter which method you choose, you are going to save hours.

Instant Pot Hummus Saves you Money

I’m always looking for ways to use dried beans. Dried beans are a great pantry item. They’re one of the cheapest foods you can buy, and the store for a long time. They will stay fresh for 1-2 years in a sealed plastic container, or up to 10 years in a sealed #10 can, mylar storage bag, or other reduced-oxygen storage method. When beans “go bad,” they simply stay hard when you try to cook them.

Buying an Instant Pot and a Food Processor is an investment. But you will be able to cook many nutritious meals from scratch with this equipment, and it will save you a lot of time. Ignoring the initial investment, I calculated how much money I saved to make this batch of hummus. I used food prices in my area, so yours may be different.

• One 10oz Sabra brand hummus container has 1 1/4 cups of hummus and costs $3.97

Cost of this recipe using dried chickpeas:

• Two cups of dried chickpeas: $3.79
• 1/2 cup tahini paste: $1.25
• 4 tablespoons minced garlic: $0.09
• 3/4 cup lemon juice: $0.55
• Total cost: $5.68 for 5 cups of hummus

The cost per cup to make my own hummus is $1.14.
The cost per cup to buy hummus is $3.17.

I am saving over 50% by making my own hummus! Depending on the price of ingredients in your area, it might cost about the same to skip the dried chickpeas and use canned chickpeas instead. You will still save money by making hummus from scratch. But I still recommend learning how to cook dried beans, because in many cases dried beans are much cheaper than canned.

Instant Pot Hummus Recipe

Yield: 5 cups

Equipment

• Instant Pot (I have the 8qt size and I love it for quickly cooking a lot of beans, or a big piece of meat. However, for this recipe, a 6qt Instant Pot is fine.)
• Food Processor -I love my 14 cup food processor! There are cheaper ones out there, but this one has a large capacity, so you can make the whole batch of hummus at one time. And it’s comparatively quiet. If you have a smaller food processor, cut the recipe in half and make it twice.

Ingredients

• 2 cups dried Chickpeas (also called Garbanzo beans)
• 6 cups water
• 1/2 cup Tahini paste
• 4 Tablespoons Minced Garlic
• 3/4 cup Lemon Juice
• Salt to taste (start with 1/4 teaspoon, taste, and add more if you like)
• Olive Oil
• Paprika

Instructions

• Rinse the dried chickpeas.
• Add chickpeas and water to the Instant Pot.
• Cook on high pressure for 40 minutes, with a natural release.
• Drain chickpeas.
• Pour chickpeas into food processor.
• Add tahini paste, minced garlic, lemon juice, and salt. Puree until smooth.
• Add a little water if the consistency is too thick.
• Taste and add more salt, lemon juice, or garlic, depending on how strong of a flavor you prefer.
• Spread into a shallow bowl and drizzle with olive oil, and sprinkle with paprika.
• Serve with pita bread, or as a dip with pita chips, crackers, or fresh veggies.

Notes

Hummus should be kept refrigerated. Eat within 7 days.

Hummus can be frozen. Put it in a freezer safe container and cover with a thin layer of olive oil before freezing. Thaw in the refrigerator and stir thoroughly before serving.