Yesterday, as I was making myself a small little supper before undertaking my return journey from Rhode Island to New York, I made a fun new discovery that has spawned some new recipe ideas. I was looking around in the fridge for something healthy to eat. There was not much food at all, so I decided on tomatoes, potatoes, leftover leek and potato soup, and hard boiled eggs. I then saw some packaged hummus in the fridge labeled "Extra Spicy". I never eat packaged hummus. Ever. I pride myself on my Lebanese everything-from-scratch version, so the little plastic containers full of preservatives never have appealed to me. Yet, I was intrigued by the "Extra Spicy" flavor. We did not have any bread at this point, and I did not want to stick nachos in there, so I spread a bit over some cold sliced potatoes. I ate each potato slice as if it were a canape with the hummus spread on top. 'Wow', I thought, 'This is really good'. But why would a cold sliced potato taste so delicious with hummus? It was then that I realized that it tasted very similar to Papas a la Huancayina, the Peruvian classic dish of cold boiled potatoes with a sauce made of everything draped over top. Yet this version was a bit healthier (because of the use of garbanzos rather than cream cheese).

Cold boiled potatoes with hummus is a great meal, and so inexpensive. Not only that, but there are gorgeous potatoes out at the markets right now. And anyone can make hummus. Even if you don't make it from scratch, you can make it halfway from scratch with a can of organic chickpeas. It seems simple enough, so I am sure we will be eating this a lot for dinner this Spring.