Ronen Givon and his business partner Christian Mouysset, founders of food chain Hummus Bros, are used to cooking up their own variations of the chickpea snack. But after encouraging others to try their luck, they are so impressed with what they have seen — and tasted — that they have decided to serve it.

Mr Givon and Mr Mouysset were among the judges at the Jewish Community Centre for London’s recent HummusFest, a hummus-making competition held in North London. Also judging was restaurant critic Victoria Prever.  “The popularity of hummus is going up,” Israeli-born Mr Givon, 31 (pictured right), tells People.

“If you go into a supermarket and look at the amount of shelf-space hummus takes up, it shows how popular it is, and not just among Jews.” He adds that sales of hummus have gone up. “People have less money to spend and hummus is relatively cheap and filling.”

The winning entry consisted of walnuts and coriander, plus chickpeas, tahini, olive oil, lemon juice, water and salt. Mr Givon and Mr Mouysset have agreed to serve the recipe in their two London-based outlets for a week, donating £1 per portion sold to charity.

But were they not concerned about the competition? “There was a lot of interesting inspiration to us,” says Mr Mouysset, 27. “Although I’m not sure what we can do with the chocolate-chip one.”