Tsur Shezaf

“Why are you rattling your brain so much over hummus?” scolded George Bahu, a craftsman welder and lives in Jaffa all his life. “It’s just a spread that you wipe up in the morning to stave off hunger until afternoon when you return home to mama’s cooking.”

He was right, of course. And utterly wrong.

There’s no doubt that hummus is a type of paste, a spread, a dense dip that moves through delicate shades of brown via gold to frothy white. But it seems that never has a dip—spread—foam—paste managed to penetrate the hearts (their stomachs, minds, and souls) of so many people.

What’s surprising about this story is that it’s ancient on one hand, but no one has taken it seriously despite it being one of the most serious and important stories there is. For about ten years now, it’s been the most serious culinary story here. Serious to the point of terror. Something that can break up homes and send people on hungry expeditions to the corners of this small land. And responsibly (though limitedly, of course), there’s no better place to eat hummus (in all its varieties and derivatives) in the Middle East than the State of Israel within the Green Line borders (though great experts like Yehuda Litany would argue there are magnificent hummus joints in Nablus, Jenin, and Tulkarm, while others would crown Damascus as the world’s hummus capital, saying that Hashim in Amman feeds the king). Hummus became a mythological national dish not so many years ago by the Israelis. The Jews, naturally, whose eyes opened to a revelation that’s been here since the dawn of history, rooted in Haran from which came the shared father of most of the monotheists—Abraham.

The dish became cement connecting Arabs and Jews, Zionists and Palestinian nationalists, right and left, constituting the true infrastructure upon which (if and when) true peace will be established—content, smiling, and pot-bellied between the Euphrates and the River of Egypt. One proof is an advertisement on Israeli commercial channels entirely in Arabic and aimed at the Hebrew-speaking audience. An advertisement for hummus. The quality is Arab—the dish is Israeli national. End of days. Or at least there’s hope.

And hummus is indeed ripe and ready for the Middle Eastern peace role, for to a great extent, hummus is the father of human civilization, and it’s no wonder more and more people are addicted to it.

This may seem grandiose for this tiny legume whose entire size is less than half a centimeter (approximately), but if we relate to its capabilities (not necessarily of the fruit but precisely of the nodules in the plant’s roots), we discover that the chickpea (as it’s called in Hebrew, Cicer arietinum in Latin) belongs to a family (leguminosae) that developed a capability no other family possesses. For legumes (chickpeas, fava beans, peas, and more) can take the nitrogen from the air that’s usually unavailable to living creatures, and with the help of bacteria (rhizobium) that develop within the nodules in their roots, transform it into something available. Not only for themselves, but also for other plants that need it. That is, if I have agricultural land I want to improve and strengthen so I’ll have higher yields next year, I should plant legumes there whether I eat them or not. And why is this important (to us and the rest of the creatures of the animal and plant world)? Because nitrogen is one of the building blocks of amino acids, which are the building blocks of protein. And protein is the father of everything. Most of us know the genetic code cracked in 1953 by Watson and Crick, and it seems to us that genetics’ entire role is deciding whether we’ll have blue or brown eyes. But the truth is the gene sequence on the double helix determines which proteins will be produced, and that determines how we look. We are all, like the white of an egg, not human and not alive without protein.

Other plants and fruits don’t match legumes. Their fruits do contain proteins, but not in quantities found in legumes, from which it’s easiest to obtain the amino acids necessary for building proteins—especially if the animal world isn’t available to us—meat and fish that contain large amounts of proteins. And if we have no sources from animals and no good sources of legumes—we have a problem.

This problem was solved about 11,000 years ago in the Middle East through domestication of legumes and eating them in all the forms legumes are eaten. Lentils, fava beans, chickpeas, and peas. This way we succeeded—farmers like us who decided not to rely on heaven’s mercy and the abundance of natural hunting and gathering—to push back the desert’s boundaries, maintain our livestock that would give us milk and hair without investing wasteful energy in slaughtering them for meat, and we thrived beautifully with the expansion of chickpea fields with additional water we brought in channels from the great rivers into the Middle Eastern deserts—creating the Fertile Crescent.

But the surprising discovery, raised by Professor Avi Gopher, a prehistorian from Tel Aviv University working on chickpeas with Professor Shahal Abu Zohar Karem from the Faculty of Agriculture and Professor Simcha Lev-Yadun from Haifa University, is that there were three types of chickpeas that looked identical. We (that is, humans) chose and domesticated the most successful among them. The domestication occurred in a circle with a radius of 200 kilometers centered in Karacadag, between Diyarbakir and Urfa in eastern Turkey.

An Israeli researcher, Professor Gideon Ladizhensky from the Faculty of Agriculture, devoted many years of research to finding the father of the chickpea (the parallel of Aharon Aaronson’s mother of wheat) and found it in that same original circle centered between Urfa and Diyarbakir. That’s where it began.

This chickpea, with all its local adaptations—we’ve been eating for at least 10,000 years.

While hummus is currently the Israeli king, we must remember that in our region it almost never goes without wheat (a grain that completes the essential amino acids building the proteins we need), and in India they add the cultural lentil that starred here until the state’s establishment and of course rice (and chapati) grains.

Pita (from grains) and hummus. The complete meal since the dawn of human civilization.

Did civilization give birth to hummus or did hummus give birth to civilization?

Hummus contains a substance called tryptophan. Chickpea domestication caused a threefold increase in tryptophan (an essential amino acid) found in the grain. Tryptophan causes increased synthesis and secretion of serotonin from the brain. Serotonin calms and makes a person content. Content people have no complaints and are compliant. Americans used to give this to their soldiers to discipline them. When human society develops and crowds together, it needs to know how to behave as a group. Hummus is social food. It builds society. It plasters and unifies.

Was this known in ancient times? Probably not, and perhaps this is one of evolution’s random and cumulative tricks. In an experiment with pigs offered several types of food in a trough, the pigs went to gorge themselves on food with the most tryptophan. On hummus. In many respects, a pig is an animal very similar to humans. And it too has aspirations for happiness and contentment.

Hummus integrated into culture as a type of evolutionary adaptation; the taste speaks to us and convinces us to love precisely the texture of this particular grain. But also the fact that its grains can be stored for up to a year—enables guaranteed vital and filling food all year round.

Perhaps no less fascinating is that cultural hummus became a summer crop—the yield indeed dropped between 10-90% because it didn’t receive winter rains (each place and its water supply), but in contrast, it stopped suffering from winter fungi that sometimes caused destruction of the entire yield. The seasonal reversal is also a decision by Neolithic farmers. Taste, choice, adaptation = revolution.

Through this, hummus enabled, with its introduction and spread, the stratification and discipline of societies that grew larger and larger. Moreover, hummus gives a feeling of satiety (since satiety is an internal warning light whose extinguishing signals that the tank is full and content). A crying, hungry child causes stress for parents and investment of great energy, preventing a mother, or family, from raising more than a small number of children. With the feeling of satiety that hummus provides—the gap between meals grows significantly, children are calmer, parents are calmer, you can make more children at half the price. Society can grow. Recent research also shows that hummus increases chances of successful ovulation in women and egg fertility.

Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth is a hummus-dependent commandment.

The chickpea legume is rich in so many good things that there’s suspicion something unexpected happened here—we love the right thing:

Hummus contains about 70% water. Despite tahini (fatty extract of sesame seeds) being mixed into every portion in various concentrations depending on who prepares the mixture, usually hummus won’t have more than 10% fat with great advantages since it has a nice concentration of omega-3 fatty acid (between 150-300 mg per serving of hummus, depending on size and tahini dosage included—good for memory, alertness, lowering blood pressure, and many other excellent things). The rest is mainly proteins and carbohydrates.

Hummus contains vitamins C and B6 (which plays a role in synthesizing neurotransmitters and various receptors in the brain and nervous system, positively affecting mood and proper production of sex hormones) and vitamins E and K, thiamine, and more. Minerals like manganese, calcium, iron, magnesium, zinc, and potassium. But the important part is the amino acids (protein building blocks)—hummus and tahini are rich in them, especially in three amino acids linked to brain activity and the nervous system: tryptophan (already mentioned), phenylalanine, and tyrosine. All three serve as building blocks in producing serotonin and norepinephrine, two central neurotransmitters in (positive) influence on mood—calming and reducing aggression. This explains two things—why hummus can bring peace to the Middle East and why most sane people are addicted to it.

Since legumes are the main source for obtaining proteins not from animals, they became the stronghold of vegetarians and the foundation for developing agricultural societies that can extract their bread from there. It’s cheap, fresh, filling, and satisfies all needs. True energy food.

An anthropologist named Nurit Bird-David from Haifa University worked on hunter-gatherer groups in southern India but also examined hunter-gatherer groups from the American continent and Africa. Among all these groups, nature was family—a caring father, a big brother we need to thank. Neolithic man is the opposite. This is the revolution of hummus and wheat. Changing the relationship to nature, as Professor Gopher says, leaving nature and taking control of species for your benefit. Changing the conception—a type of social argument that hasn’t ended to this day when the hunter-gatherers among us claim this is how we’ll destroy the world while hummus lovers claim this is the only way to manage the world, to build, be built, and constantly increase population.

Sometimes it seems we’ll soon know the answer to who’s right.

What was the motive for finding hummus and selecting it for our benefit along with other plant species and certain animals? According to Avi Gopher, there are three theories:

Coping with climate change, demographic pressure that caused a response yielding discovery of an all-purpose food grain, and the explanation opposite to the other two—not pressure and not necessity but abundance. Since in the cultural center, an increasingly complex society is created where people want to show their wealth and influence through abundant meals. They seek to elevate their social status and invest in development while competing.

It’s not impossible that all three theories can converge into a shared explanation.

All this happens in one hummus plate—or as Gopher says, we made excellent choices 10,000 years ago and nothing has changed since.

When did the tradition of cooking hummus begin and until when was it eaten raw? Hard to know, though researchers claim that already in the fourth millennium BCE, about 5,000 years before our time, chickpeas were eaten in Egypt and Mesopotamia.

The Phoenicians, our ancient ancestors whose capital Gebal (Byblos) on the Lebanese coast gave its name to the Bible—they are the great disseminators. They are the ones who wandered tirelessly around Mediterranean shores and brought, while navigating, hummus to Greece, Italy, Spain, and North Africa (Carthage) where they settled. For hummus is a classic travel legume. Hard and durable for long periods, only long soaking in water causes it to soften, and then it must be cooked more, though in modern times (and perhaps not so modern) hummus makers use baking soda that accelerates the chickpea’s softening process.

The first mention of hummus in Jewish sources of the Land of Israel (according to a short article by writer Meir Shalev) is the story of the meeting between Ruth the Moabite and Boaz, David’s grandfather: “Come hither, and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar” (Ruth 2:14). In the Talmud, hummus is mentioned as “hametz.”

The Greeks, who loved legumes, incorporated hummus into their menu. The Romans added chickpea grains to various dishes or ate them roasted. Cicero’s name, the Roman statesman, apparently derives from “cicer,” the Latin name for chickpea (at least according to the Hummus for the Masses website).

There are 22 types of chickpeas. Humans domesticated one of them, and from this species, with domestication, improvement, place, time, and soil, 200 varieties spread. Anyone who asks a bit in restaurants will learn they prepare it from different varieties—from the local variety (Hadas or Ayalot), Turkish, Bulgarian, Spanish, Mexican, and more.

Not Hummus Alone

Almost everything served in our places is a mixture, in different proportions and according to the place’s quality, between hummus and tahini. Tahini is sesame seed oil—only a little of the sesame is grown locally, most imported from various places worldwide. Sesame (originally African though the important species is Indian sesame) was apparently known over 5,000 years ago and reached the Fertile Crescent region from India via Persia.

A later mention (and apparently) the first documentation of preparing hummus from cooked grains with added tahini in the Land of Israel (again according to the book by Yehuda Litany and Naim Aridi quoting the great Crusader researcher Pryor) is from the Crusader period.

Chickpea grains have other uses. One of them (ground and fried) is falafel, which was the Israeli king before hummus’s rise. Falafel is apparently an Egyptian invention, though Egyptian Copts 2,300 years ago didn’t use chickpeas but fava beans, which they still use today to make falafel.

But hummus also goes sweet since its flour is used to make halva and Turkish delight.

Health Restaurants

After the introduction explaining why we’re rightly addicted and what gives us pleasure and no one disputes it, and no one forbids it and you can eat as much as you want however you want, you can cruise the land among several satisfying places.

Yehuda Litany writes in his book that all the great hummus began washing over the State of Israel following the Six-Day War in 1967. Maybe. Except if my memory doesn’t deceive me, the last ten years, perhaps fifteen, are the great wave. Hummus’s victory over falafel. Falafel was embraced by Jewish natives, children of immigrants. Perhaps because nighttime hummus is home food for early risers. But falafel with tahini drizzle is a type of standing street snack. Hummus enables what falafel doesn’t—sitting. The feeling of a meal, even if hasty, cheap, and affordable for everyone. Hummus suits rich and poor and gives everyone pleasure.

So I went to Abu Hassan. Abu Hassan’s place, or Ali Qarawan, is located on my street’s continuation. Every time I pass by his house’s basement where hummus is cooked, on its way to becoming the wonderful masabacha they have, my mouth fills with saliva for the first time. When I pass by the small shop where it all began on Dolphin Street in the Maronite neighborhood—the smell hits me again, and if I’m unlucky and need to pass through Tribes of Israel Street where there’s a branch opposite Abu Hassan’s branch—my day isn’t complete until I stop, do what everyone does, and finish a plate in a few vigorous minutes.

Masabacha is Abu Hassan’s wonderful thing, that morning dish intended for workers, containing mainly chickpea grains with tahini poured over them and all this with the dip of olive oil and lemon. Abu Hassan has been making hummus for 40 years. He used to work for others. Today, at 80, he still makes hummus. Not by hand. Too few hummus joints make hummus by hand. Too much material for too many people. When I asked him what chickpeas he uses for masabacha, he said Turkish grains brought by the big hummus importer to Israel—Hama Mlevinsky. Here perhaps lies the big difference between him and what I think is the second-best hummus I know—Said in Acre. At Said’s you can get mashawashah (the Galilean parallel to masabacha) but I prefer his smooth hummus. Said, who opened the restaurant 25 years ago, learned from Abu Hassan. The result is completely different. After a plate of wonderful hummus (my table neighbor who also ordered meat passed me half, and the combination was wonderful), I stood by the cash register behind which Said sat. He explained that he buys his chickpea grains from a special field near Afula where a farmer grows Bulgarian chickpea grains for him. Maybe, I thought unscientifically, that’s why Said’s hummus is so smooth and the mashawashah dense and not airy and light like Abu Hassan’s—maybe because of the differences between the broad-hearted and bodied Turk and the dense and tough Bulgarian.

Countless hummus joints in the country. Yehuda Litany counted several dozen in the Galilee (upper and lower) and Haifa area, going down to the Triangle, Wadi Ara, Ramla, Beer Sheva, and of course Tel Aviv and Jaffa.

And there are Jerusalem’s. There are several nice hummus joints in the Old City’s Muristan area and Hummus Ta’ami at the corner of Ben Yehuda Street and Rahmo’s hummus. But this time I followed a recommendation to “Lina” (what used to be “Linda” and moved and changed a letter) located in Aqabat al-Khanqah 42 in the Christian Quarter, a bit above the market and not far from the Via Dolorosa intersection.

Ghalib, sitting by the cash register, explained that most hummus joints I knew as a child no longer exist. That what was my childhood’s wonderful hummus is long since somewhere else entirely. That places close and open. That actually there are few veteran hummus joints. If the accepted rule is that everything started in 1967—then you can understand why Abu Hassan celebrates 40, Said 25, and Lina 17 years in her new location.

Lina’s hummus was of course different. Jerusalemite. Not bad at all, though like other hummus I ate in the Old City—I couldn’t find wonderful uniqueness. It’s all hummus. As George Bahu says.

So I returned to Tel Aviv, the first Hebrew city, and went to the Yemenites in Kerem.

The Yemenites specialized in falafel. And fava beans. Fava beans are hummus’s faithful companion in our places and joint ruler in Egypt where, by Muhammad Ali’s citadel’s back gate, I used to eat fava beans in the morning around a wheeled cart with masses of soldiers, policemen, and ordinary people clinging to the bowl of hot fava beans with lemon and onion and pitas from whole wheat.

According to Avi Gopher, fava beans don’t receive hummus’s royal status only because no researcher has yet identified their ancient father. But they’re definitely in the opening eight of revolution plants (barley, 2 wheats, peas, lentils, chickpeas, flax for fibers, and fava beans). And there’s a place where they receive their rightful place.

At 28 Yishkon Street is Shlomo and Doron’s Hummus Ful. Shlomo’s father, Mr. Shor, opened the place in 1937. We arrived there 25 years ago when we walked through Kerem’s alleys and with young people’s curiosity asked someone where it’s worth eating hummus. He led us by hand to what was then a dim nook with wicks and seated us with Shlomo. Ten years ago the third generation—Doron—understood there’s interest in hummus. That something opened among Israelis and the place expanded. The fava beans come from England. Not Egyptian and not inferior. And here, unlike other places, I go for what’s called in local parlance the “complete”—hummus with wonderful fava beans and an egg brown in the center with pitas and onion alongside. All protein components in one portion. Perfect.

One of my Jaffa daughters prefers Abu Marwan. Faiz, called Abu Marwan, makes his hummus on Mendes France Street in Ajami neighborhood. A relatively new hummus joint. Fifteen years; before that he worked for Abu Nader who had a hummus joint on Mendes France Street and today has another on Jaffa Street. With Abu Marwan (airy hummus, uses Hadas legumes he brings from Hama) I conducted the conversation about hummus’s partner—tahini. The good tahinis in the country are considered Shkhemite—the Dove (al-Hamam), the Camel, and al-Alul (the Rooster), though some insist the best of all is produced in Nazareth. Abu Marwan uses the Dove. So do I.

There I finally understood there’s no escaping baking soda that softens the beans and that hummus joints in the country use lemon juice in mixture, and what we get on the plate is therefore influenced by the grain, the tahini, the amount of soda, the amount of lemon juice, and the spices the hummus chef uses in the mixture. And none of these will affect the amino acids and everything happening in brain and soul following hummus addiction.

At the tour’s end, I only had to return to George Bahu and the scolding: “Why are you rattling your brain so much over hummus, it’s just a spread you wipe up in the morning to stave off hunger until afternoon—”

He’s right, of course. And utterly wrong.

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Restaurant Guide:

Jaffa: Abu Hassan open from 7:30 AM, 3 branches: Dolphin Street in Maronite neighborhood, Tribes of Israel corner Yehuda Hayamit (closed Shabbat), another branch on Tribes of Israel east side of street—also serves meat, open all the time with adjacent window where you can take hummus home. Recommendation: masabacha

Abu Marwan open from 8 AM until night all week, Mendes France Street, Ajami, Jaffa. Recommendation: masabacha

Tel Aviv: Shlomo and Doron’s Hummus Ful, 28 Yishkon, Kerem Hateimanim (accessible from Carmel Market’s southern third toward the sea) open morning until 3 PM. Recommendation: complete hummus ful egg.

Acre: Said inside the Old City market in Jaffa. Open early morning until afternoon. Closed Shabbat. Recommendation: hummus and hummus with meat. Mashawashah for those who like density.

Jerusalem: Lina—Aqabat al-Khanqah 42, Christian Quarter, Old City Jerusalem. Open morning to evening all days. Recommendation: masabacha

And there are of course many more hummus joints, each according to taste, location, and preferences.

Further Reading:

• Not on Hummus Alone by Danny Litany and Naim Aridi, Daniela Dinur and Modan Publishers, 2000
• Vegetarian Celebration, Phyllis Glazer, Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1980
• Encyclopedia of Flora and Fauna, Volume 12, p. 28
• Hummus for the Masses website