Caramelized Onion Hummus

Try taking a homemade hummus recipe up a notch by adding caramelized onion. You won’t be disappointed! Caramelized onion, along with lemon and roasted garlic, make this caramelized onion hummus one you’ll want to make again and again.

Looking for an amazing savory dip? Try Caramelized Onion Dip, a creamy sweet dip you can serve with pita, potato chips or veggies.

What You’ll Need

When you make hummus with caramelized onions, you’re gonna need a food processor or food blender. (A food processor works a bit better.) Because this homemade hummus with onions recipe uses a good amount of chickpeas, you might have to work in batches if you have a smaller food processor or blender. But it’s well worth those steps!

First step, of course, is to gather all your ingredients. You’ll likely have a lot of them in stock already. You’ll need:

• Olive oil: you’ll use olive oil both for caramelizing the onions and to add some creaminess to the hummus.
• Butter: You’ll be adding a couple packs of butter to the skillet when you caramelize the onions so that the onions don’t stick to the pan.
• 2-3 medium-sized onions: you can use any type of onion, but sweet onions or yellow onions tend to work the best. But red onions will do just fine.
• Garlic: Garlic’s not essential to this homemade hummus recipe, but adding a couple cloves of roasted garlic really takes this dish up a notch.
• Tahini: When you buy tahini, you may find it as separated from the oil. That’s totally OK and normal. Just simply mix it up before you measure it out.
• 1 lemon: You’ll be using the juice of one lemon.
• 2 cans chickpeas: Use two 14ounce cans. If you’re using dried chickpeas, you’ll want to soak and prepare them according to the directions and then use about 2 cups of chickpeas.
• Salt: Use about a half teaspoon of salt in the hummus, adding more to taste.
• Water
• Paprika or cayenne pepper (optional): Cayenne pepper makes a beautiful garnish, just be careful not to add too much.

Try making your own pita chips to go along with this caramelized onion hummus recipe! See our Homemade Flour Tortilla Chips recipe.

How to Make Caramelized Onion Hummus

Making fresh hummus is definitely worth it if you have the time. You can adjust it to your taste and add different ingredients like we’re doing with the caramelized onion here. 

Start by adding by caramelizing the onions because this takes quite awhile. Add ½ Tablespoon olive oil and two Tablespoons of butter to a pan and heat on medium high. Slice the onions very thinly and then add them to the pan after the butter has melted.

Cook about 10 minutes until onions are tender and then reduce heat. Season with a bit of salt and pepper. Simmer onions for about an hour until they have caramelized, turning slightly golden brown. Make sure to stir them occasionally.

Then, chop the caramelized onions into smaller pieces.

Next, peel off a few cloves of garlic. Mince the garlic cloves and saute for about 2- 3 minutes in the same pan you used to cook the onions. You don’t even need to wipe the pan out.

Then turn to your blender or food processor. Add tahini, 1½ Tablespoon of olive oil, and the juice of one lemon to a food processor or blender. Blend for about 30 seconds to “fluff” the tahini. Add chickpeas and salt. Blend for another 30 seconds or so. Scrape the sides of the food processor/blender and blend another 30 seconds. Add water 1 tablespoon at a time and continue to process/blend to achieve a creamy texture.

Add caramelized onions and garlic and process once more, about 30 seconds. (You may want to reserve some onions for garnish.)

Transfer caramelized onion hummus to a serving dish and sprinkle with a bit of paprika, cayenne pepper or additional caramelized onions to garnish.

You can serve your sweet onion, hummus with veggies, pita chips, potato chips, or crackers. You can even use it as a spread on toast or with sandwiches.