The Precise Blending Method Kwame Onwuachi Uses For Perfectly Textured Hummus - Exclusive

On August 24, 2023, for The US Open's "Flavors Of The Open" event, a selection of our culinary gods will serve a single signature dish. Alex Guarnaschelli will cook pasta. Masaharu Morimoto will roll sushi. Pat LaFrieda is putting together prime rib sandwiches. As for Kwame Onwuachi — the rising star of the culinary scene has chosen hummus. The celeb chef's hummus (need we even specify this?) does not contain your run-of-the-mill ingredients. Instead, it's a black bean hummus, that he pairs with sweet pickled raisin-adjacent sultanas, m'sesmen, and a berbere spiced lamb.

Onwuachi's hummus is remarkable when it comes to technique, as well. In an exclusive interview, the NYC-based restauranter to us that to achieve the perfect hummus texture, he blends his hummus three separate times. Onwuachi detailed, the first step is "getting the ratio right of lemon juice and olive oil with your cooked beans, then blending it once, and then letting that sit and then blending it again ... making sure you're passing it through a fine mesh strainer." When you've finished the extensive blending process, the resulting hummus should be smooth — just as "cornmeal will go on a plate," he described. 

Eager to try Kwame Onwuachi's black bean hummus? According to a recipe he shared with Eater back in 2020, the chef whips one up with a few simple pantry ingredients, combining equal parts chickpeas and black beans with tahini garlic and lemon juice. 

No one's here to argue that hummus alone isn't a stunner of an appetizer, but you can easily do as Onwuachi has and treat it as the foundation for a spread that's far more elaborate. For the US Open recipe, the celebrity chef gushes, "I love that with the addition of the lamb, it feels like a full meal." Concerning the other half of the plate, he went on to say that prepping ground lamb to complement hummus is not a wildly different process than prepping other ground meats, and one very simple pantry ingredient can give it a next-level texture. "It's similar to ground beef," he told us. "I do add a little bit of baking soda to it, and that gives it a really tender, succulent mouthfeel."