Made from chickpeas, hummus is chock full of health benefits. What many people don’t recognize, however, is that chickpeas are very calorie heavy. Though those calories are packed full of nutritional value, they should be monitored carefully. Only one cup of chickpeas contains 729 calories, and a recipe for four servings contains nearly two cups.

Classic hummus recipes use chickpeas, lemon juice, garlic, olive oil, a sesame seed paste called tahini, and a few spices. Most of those ingredients are healthy for you, but the chickpeas and olive oil both kick in significant amounts of hummus calories. Between the 1460 calories from the chickpeas and the 240 added by the olive oil, hummus can be a very calorie heavy dish. Hummus spreads a