Instant Pot Hummus (No Soak Recipe) (2024)

My recipe for Instant Pot Hummus is easy to make and full of authentic flavors. You’ll never want the extra cost of buying it at the store after making it at home.

The main ingredient in traditional hummus is cooked chickpeas. Cooking them in an Instant Pot electric pressure cooker instead of on the stove top allows you to make your own hummus in a fraction of the time and it yields the creamiest hummus ever.

This hummus recipe is not only quick and easy to make it’s full of so many layers of amazing flavors. Even kids will gobble up this healthy snack with their favorite crackers and raw veggies.

Ingredients

• 1cupdried chickpeas
• 12clovesgarlic–peeled (8 whole; 4 crushed)
• 1teaspoonsea salt
• 4cupswater
• ½teaspoonground cumin
• ¼teaspoonpaprika–plus more for garnish
• ¼cuplemon juice
• ¼cuptahini paste
• 2tablespoonsextra virgin olive oil–for drizzling
• 1tablespoonfresh parsley–for garnish

Equipment

• Measuring cups and spoons
• Knife
• Cutting Board
• Fine mesh strainer
• Mixing bowls
• Blender or food processor
• Serving spoon
• Serving bowl

By the Numbers: How to Make Instant Pot Hummus

Follow these simple steps to make one of the best hummus recipes you’ll ever taste.

Step 1: Prepare Ingredients

Gather all of your hummus ingredients, including 1 cup of dry chickpeas, 12 cloves of garlic, 1 teaspoon of sea salt, 4 cups of water, ½ teaspoon of ground cumin, ¼ teaspoon of paprika, ¼ cup of fresh-squeezed lemon juice, ¼ cup of tahini paste, 2 tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil and about a tablespoon of fresh parsley.

Step 2: Rinse Chickpeas.

Rinse the chickpeas in a fine mesh strainer. Discard any dry garbanzo beans that look bad.

Next, pour the rinsed beans into the inner liner of the Instant Pot with 4 cups of cold water, 8 cloves of garlic and 1 teaspoon of sea salt.

Step 3: Pressure Cook Beans and Garlic.

Next, seal the lid on the Instant Pot, make sure the pressure valve is pushed back into the sealing position (if your IP model requires it), push the Manual button for High Pressure and set the cooking time for 60 minutes.

When your Instant Pot beeps that the cook time is up, allow for a natural pressure release for at least 20 minutes, then you can release any remaining pressure manually by opening the sealing valve. It’s also fine to allow for a full natural pressure release whenever you cook beans. When the pressure is released, open the lid.

Step 4: Strain Chickpeas and Reserve Liquid.

Strain the chickpeas and garlic through a fine mesh strainer, reserving the cooking liquid in a bowl.

You’ll need this liquid, so don’t discard it.

Step 5: Add Ingredients to Blender.

Next, add ¼ cup of fresh-squeezed lemon juice, 4 cloves of crushed raw garlic, ½ teaspoon of ground cumin and ¼ teaspoon of paprika to your blender along with the drained cooked chickpeas, garlic and ¾ cup of the reserved cooking liquid from your Instant Pot.

Alternatively, you can use a food processor to make hummus if your blender isn’t strong enough.

Step 6: Blend Hummus Ingredients Together.

Once everything is in your blender or food processor, blend on high until all of your ingredients are well combined and you have a nice, smooth hummus texture. As you blend, you may want to add more of the extra liquid to thin it out a little bit.

Step 7: Blend in Tahini.

After the consistency has reached your desired state, you can add in ¼ cup of tahini.

Blend until your hummus is smooth. At this point, you’ll want to taste it and add salt, if necessary.

Step 8: Serve Your Creamy Hummus.

Transfer your creamy dip to a shallow serving bowl (easier for dipping).

When ready to serve, drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil and sprinkle with paprika and chopped fresh parsley.

Serve with crackers, chips or veggies.

Tips for Making Instant Pot Hummus

Answers to all of your questions about making this delicious pressure cooker hummus recipe.

1. What does hummus mean and where is it from?

The word hummus is an Arabic word that simply means, “chickpeas.” That makes sense because hummus is essentially a dip made from mashed chickpeas, garlic, olive oil, lemon juice and tahini.

It’s traditionally served in Middle Eastern countries and areas around the Mediterranean. However, it’s also easy to find in most grocery stores in the US.

2. What is tahini? Is it necessary?

Tahini is ground sesame seeds. It is one ingredient that gives hummus its distinct flavor, and I don’t recommend omitting it. I use less in this recipe than you’ll see in most other hummus recipes, but I find this to be the perfect amount to use when you don’t want it to overpower the other flavors.

There are a lot of different brands of tahini out there. You want to look for one with no additional ingredients and especially no sugar.

3. Shouldn’t chickpeas be soaked first?

When cooking beans in the Instant Pot, it’s not necessary to soak. If you did soak them, cut about 10 minutes off the cook time and reduce the water from 4 cups to 3 cups.

4. What to serve with hummus?

Hummus is typically served in a shallow bowl at room temperature with foods for dipping like gluten free crackers, carrot sticks, celery sticks and gluten free pita bread or pita chips.

5. Hummus flavor variations?

The first time you make this recipe, I recommend you prepare it as instructed. Then, after you get comfortable making it, there so many different flavors of hummus you can make with a few simple tweaks to this recipe.

1. Red Pepper Hummus. Add ¾ cup roasted red bell peppers to the blender with the other ingredients. Top with feta cheese and pine nuts.
2. Spinach Hummus. Add about 2 cups of packed raw spinach to the blender with the other ingredients. You may need to more of the cooking liquid to thin out spinach hummus vs plain hummus. Top with caramelized onions and garlic.
3. Mexican Hummus. Add about a tablespoon of fresh jalapeno, ½ cup onion and ½ cup red bell pepper with the other ingredients. Swap the cumin and paprika for taco seasoning. Top with Cholula hot sauce and diced jalapenos.

6. Tips for extra smooth and creamy hummus?

There’s one extra step you can take for super creamy and smooth hummus, which is removing the chickpea skins. I don’t find this is as much of an issue when you cook chickpeas in a pressure cooker vs cooking them on the stove top.

You can remove the outer skins after cooking though if you are adamant about serving the smoothest hummus possible.

1. After pressure cooking, pour the strained garbanzo beans into a large bowl (remember not to discard the liquid).
2. Wash the chickpeas by agitating the beans between your hands to help the skins release from the beans.
3. The skins will float to the top of the water as you keep washing the beans.
4. You’ll want to change the water 3-4 times during the process.
5. Once the skins have been removed, you can strain them again and add them to the blender at that point.

I don’t typically go to these extra lengths myself, and everyone always raves about this recipe when I make it!

7. Why use a full natural pressure release with garbanzo beans?

Beans can get really foamy when they’re cooked in an Instant Pot, and if you try to quick release all of the pressure, it can cause hot water to spray out of the valve.

Instead, it’s best to always allow beans a natural release for at least 20 minutes. If you want to use your Instant Pot to cook beans regularly, I have an entire Instant Pot Beans Guide you need to read.

It has instructions for making Instant Pot Chickpeas to use in other recipes besides hummus as well as everything else you might want to know about pressure cooking beans, including cooking times, water ratios and more.

8. Can you make hummus with canned chickpeas?

Yes, you can make super easy homemade hummus with canned chickpeas and omit the entire pressure cooking process. I find fresh-cooked chick peas to have a better flavor and texture though.

One can of chickpeas contains approximately 1 ½ cup of cooked chickpeas. One pound of dried garbanzo beans yields about 6 cups of cooked beans. That means you’d need 4 cans of chickpeas to make this hummus recipe.

You’ll likely want to cut back on the garlic if you’re not pressure cooking ⅔ of it too, or you’ll end up with an extremely strong garlic taste (pressure cooking is known for mellowing flavors).

If you have a bunch of canned garbanzo beans you want to use up, another snack recipe we like to make with them are Crispy Roasted Chickpeas.

9. How to store leftovers?

Homemade hummus can be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 3-4 days.

It may also be frozen in an airtight container in the freezer for up to 4 months. If you like to eat hummus in small portions, you can also freeze portion sizes individually, then store those portion sizes in a freezer bag for easy use.

More Gluten Free Instant Pot Recipes