What Colour Should The Beetroot And Chickpea Dip Be?

Our answer

Nigella's Beetroot And Chickpea Dip (from COOK, EAT, REPEAT) is a creamy dip ideal for tortilla chips or crudités. It is made with a combination of cooked chickpeas and roasted beetroots. It is important to roast the beetroots as roasting concentrates the colour and flavour. Using ready-cooked beetroots (in vacuum sealed packs) or steaming the beetroots means there will be more water in the beetroots, which will dilute the dip.

Nigella uses jarred chickpeas and a drained jar should be approximately 500g chickpeas. Once blitzed with the roasted beetroots it should give a pink dip, though beetroots can vary slightly in colour from dark purple to reddish-purple, so this can affect the colour. And Chioggia beetroots tend to be a pinky-red, which will affect the colour also. So the colour of the dip varying from a paler to a vibrant pink is quite normal. We would prefer not to change the proportions of the beetroots and chickpeas too much as this will affect the flavour of the dip - the earthiness of the beetroots takes over and it is more difficult to balance them - and the flavour should be paramount.