A Delightful Little Starter or Snack
I was out for dinner in a lovely local French restaurant recently and this dip caught my eye. It wasn’t the fanciest starter on offer but it was just what I was in the mood for (before I tucked into a very delicious steak frites main course).
It was so good, I dreamt about it, I still couldn’t stop thinking about it when I woke up. I had some radishes in the fridge and half a baguette in the freezer that a cooking friend baked for me, there was no excuse not to just get on with it.
A Spot of Research
I did a little light perusing of my cookbooks and Google and came up with this version, which was pretty similar to what I’d had in the restaurant and utterly gorgeous.
It’s quick and easy to put together and you could serve it with flatbreads and crudités instead of the radishes and baguette.
White Bean and Roast Garlic Dip
Ingredients
- 1 head of garlic
- 2 sprigs rosemary
- 1 tin cannellini beans
- 1 tbsp tahini
- 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tsp ground cumin
- ½ lemon
- Radishes and baguette to serve
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to gas 7, 220°C, fan 200°C.
- Remove the outer leaves from the garlic, slice the top off and wrap the garlic bulb tightly in foil.
- Roast for 25-35 minutes, until the garlic is tender. Once it's cool enough to handle, gently squeeze out the garlic.
- Very finely chop the rosemary leaves.
- Rinse and drain the beans.
- Place the beans, rosemary, garlic, tahini, olive oil, cumin and the juice of half a lemon in a blender or food processor with five tablespoons of water.
- Blitz until combined, keeping some texture to the dip.
- Season to taste and drizzle with a little extra olive oil.
- Serve with thinly sliced toasted baguette and some radishes.
