A confession by Anthony Reinhart
by Tony Reinhart
My name is Anthony Reinhart, and I have a thing for Black Market Hummus.
I will not freely confess to an addiction, because that would imply that I have a problem. And if my affinity for Black Market Hummus is a problem, then I think we’re all in trouble.
It was not long ago that I found myself on assignment, in New York City, with my friend and former colleague Nabil. We were on a business trip when we took a moment for pause and pizza at John’s Pizzeria on Bleecker. We were celebrating a fruitful trip with some Waterloo Region tech CEOs, fresh from an inspiring fireside chat with the formidable New York tech investor, Joanne Wilson.
I remember Nabil asking me, “How do you impress a woman who seemingly has it all?” But Nabil being Nabil, he already knew the answer – to have his mother cook for her.
Enter the hummus.
Nabil’s mom has run her own restaurants for 30 years, and Joanne was so blown away by the hummus – which Nabil had somehow spirited across an international border, on a commercial aircraft – that she blogged about it.
As soon as my wife Tenille and I got a sample of this transcendent fusion of chick peas, tahini and gastronomic sorcery, we too were blown away, as it was easily the best hummus we had ever tried. At the first taste, we knew that any attempt to replicate it on our own would be a fool’s errand.
Fast forward to three months ago, as Nabil, his pilot and I were enjoying a drink on my freshly installed backyard patio, whilst discussing various topics in general, and hummus in particular. Fresh off a photography assignment that I carried out for Nabil’s Waterloo Poker Classic – whereby I insisted he pay me in hummus – I told Nabil what he needed to do.
I told him he should launch a hummus business, and encouraged him to consider calling it Black Market Hummus. Why the cheeky name? Well, there were rumours floating around town that Nabil was involved in street-side hummus deals with former Canadian diplomats – rumours I believed to be true, but could not confirm, despite my nearly three decades of journalism experience.
In any case, I am guilty of playing a small part in willing the world’s first HaaS (Hummus-as-a-Service) company into existence. So please, don’t squander this opportunity. This is your chance to obtain your portion of the early commercial batches of the best hummus on Earth. Your chance, in other words, to taste history.
This is the kind of hummus that could start wars, or end them.
At a half-kilo per package, it’s worth every penny.
