Let’s start off with muhummara. If you don’t know what it is, you don’t know what you’re missing. It’s a spicy red pepper dip studded with crunchy walnuts and sweetened with pomegranate molasses, and is pretty easy to make as long as you have a food processor (recipe here!).

Now enter: green muhummara. It’s as if muhummara & zhoug had a baby. Thanks to the freshness from the heavy dose of herbs, sweetness from yellow bell pepper and honey, and crunchiness from breadcrumbs and nuts, it’s become - dare I say - even better than regular muhummara, IMO. Don’t tell my grandma that though, she might get offended.

GREEN MUHUMMARA

INGREDIENTS

2-3 pieces of sandwich bread or stale bread (enough to make 3/4 cup of breadcrumbs)

3/4 cup raw walnuts

1 bunch parsley

1 bunch cilantro

1 large yellow bell pepper

1-2 jalapeño peppers

3/4 cup olive oil

2 tbsp. honey

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 tbsp. ground corriander

1 tsp ground cumin

1 tsp ground cardamom

1 tsp salt

1-2 tbsp. red chili flakes (optional)

DIRECTIONS

Make the breadcrumbs: Place bread slices on a baking dish in a 200ºF/95ºC oven for 20 minutes, or until bread is hard and dry. You don’t want to toast your bread, just dry it out.

Toast the nuts: Bump the heat of the oven to 350ºF/175ºC. Place walnuts on a baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes, until nuts are toasty.

Place breadcrumbs and nuts in the bowl of a food processor and blend until you get a fine crumb. Remove and place in a mixing bowl. Roughly chop yellow bell pepper and remove all seeds, white pithy parts, and stem. Roughly chop jalapeño peppers, keeping seeds if you want extra spice and removing stem. Place peppers in food processor, along with remainder of ingredients, and blend. You’re looking for a watery, saucey consistency; if it’s too thick, add more olive oil. (Note: you may want to blend the nuts, breadcrumbs, and green sauce all together, but don’t. Trust me.)

Add green sauce to the mixing bowl with breadcrumbs & nuts and mix thoroughly. Taste for salt.

store: in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 3 weeks or in the freezer for up 6 months.

diet: vegetarian, dairy-free, vegan if swap honey for agave, gluten-free if using gluten-free bread

eat it with: a dollop of labneh and drizzle of honey for a mezze platter, on top of cod fish for a spicy nut-crust, with soft-boiled eggs on toast.