Most likely if you have had hommus before it was of the supermarket variety, and you may even have quite liked it. However once you try home-made hommus your opinion of the supermarket hommus will change radically, to that of absolute disgust, and you will spit it out like Wayne's girlfriends spit out unplanned children.

Making hommus is very easy, and also very cheap, generally at less than half the price of the supermarket brands.

Ingredients:

- Can of 440 gram chick peas.
- Jar of Tahini.
- Half a lemon.
- Garlic.
- Ground Cumin.
- Salt.

My preferred type of chick peas are 'Annalisa', as they seem to have a more consistent quality from week to week than the other brands that I've tried. They are available from both Woolworths and Coles, currently about $1.40 a can, they were $1.20 not so long ago, but went up like everything else. Thanks Krudd.

Some hippies with too much time on their hands will insist that you should use dry chickpeas and soak and boil them yourself, because when capitalism fails we'll all have to grow our own chickpeas and prepare them ourselves. Ignore this lunacy as the gas used to boil them for an hour will probably cost more than the meagre amount you'll save over tinned chickpeas, and you'll just make a big mess in the kitchen anyway.

The most widely available brand of Tahini is 'Mayver' which can be found in the health food section of both Woolworths and Coles, and is about $4.60 a jar, but you don't need very much.

Then there is cumin, and you should make sure to find the ground variety rather than seeds.

Preparation:

1. Get a blender or food processor, and then open the can and drain out the salty water from the can, then pour the chickpeas into the blender/food processor.
2. Add about three or four teaspoons of tahini. This is the magic ingredient that does the job of turning chickpeas into hommus.
3. Add two teaspoons of garlic.
4. One teaspoon of cumin.
5. One teaspoon of salt.
6. With the half a lemon, juice it and pour the juice in with everything else.
7. Add a small amount of water, perhaps about double the volume of water as lemon juice. The more water you add the runnier it will be, so basically enough for it to blend well, but not enough to turn it into slop.
8. Blend for 30-60 seconds, it doesn't take long for the magic to do its work.

And that's it! Pour it into a bowl, a lot will stick to the blender or processor, so scoop it out with a spoon.

You can use your hommus in lots of different dishes, like making salad or falafel rolls, but you can also just eat it as a dip which is very yummy. For a dip just put pita bread or pappadums in the microwave for a minute and you have everything for a healthy lunch.