Recettes Egypt

Mahshi

Mahshi means stuffed, and the dish is exactly that: vegetables hollowed out, filled with a mixture of rice and minced meat, and cooked in a tomato and cumin sauce. It is the archetypal dish for feeding people. Making mahshi is slow, repetitive work, hollowing, filling, packing the pot, which is why it belongs to occasions and to households cooking for numbers rather than to a weeknight. The vegetable used varies by country and by season, and this variation is much of the pleasure of the dish. Courgette, particularly the pale Lebanese kusa, is among the most common. Aubergine, bell peppers, tomatoes and potatoes are all used, and vine leaves and cabbage leaves are rolled rather than stuffed but belong to the same family. Egyptian versions frequently combine several in one pot. The filling is rice and minced beef or lamb with herbs, and it is packed loosely, the rice swells substantially as it cooks and a tightly packed vegetable will split. A vegetarian version made with rice, herbs and no meat is entirely standard rather than an adaptation, and is often served cold.

MediumEgypt · Middle Eastern

Recette de Blessing · Africook

Macarona Bechamel

Macarona béchamel is Egypt's pasta bake, penne layered with a spiced minced meat sauce, covered in béchamel and baked until the top browns. The dish arrived through the same routes that carried béchamel across the Mediterranean, and Egypt made it its own. It is a close relative of Greek pastitsio and of the wider family of baked pasta dishes that runs around the Mediterranean rim, but the spicing is Egyptian: the meat sauce is seasoned with cinnamon, allspice and nutmeg rather than with oregano or basil. It is comfort food in the fullest sense, and it is what appears at family gatherings, on Fridays, and at any occasion where a large dish that feeds many people is required. Most Egyptians have a strong opinion about how their mother makes it. The béchamel is the part worth getting right. It should be thick enough to sit on top rather than sink into the pasta, and it is usually enriched with egg, which helps it set into a firm golden layer rather than staying loose. It reheats well and is often better the day after, which is part of why it is made in quantity.

MediumEgypt

Recette de Blessing · Africook

Egyptian Koshari

Koshari is Egypt's national dish and its most famous street food, rice, lentils and macaroni layered together, topped with a spiced tomato sauce, crisp fried onions and a sharp garlic-vinegar dressing. It is a dish of components, and none of them is complicated. What makes koshari work is that all of them are made separately and assembled at the end, so each keeps its own texture: the rice and lentils soft, the pasta firm, the onions properly crisp, the sauce sharp with vinegar and cumin. It is cheap, filling and entirely plant-based as standard, which is why it feeds an enormous number of people every day. Koshari shops exist across Egypt doing nothing else, and it is eaten as often at home. Its ubiquity is genuine, the comparison to macaroni cheese in the source is about how ordinary it is rather than what it tastes like. The daqqa, the garlic and vinegar dressing, is what stops the whole thing being stodgy, and it is the element most often underdone by people making it for the first time. Be generous with it. Chickpeas are usually added on top.

41 minMediumEgypt

Recette de Blessing · Africook

Tarb (Grilled Kofta Wrapped in Lamb Fat)

Tarb is kofta wrapped in caul fat and grilled, and the caul is what the dish is named for. Tarb is the Egyptian word for the lacy membrane of fat that surrounds a lamb's stomach, and wrapping seasoned minced lamb in it produces something that ordinary kofta cannot: the fat renders during cooking, bastes the meat from the outside in, and crisps to a golden shell. Its occasion is Eid al-Adha, the festival of sacrifice, and the connection is direct rather than customary. Eid al-Adha involves the slaughter of an animal and the distribution of its meat, and caul fat is one of the parts that becomes available when a whole lamb is broken down at home. A dish built on caul is a dish that belongs to the moment when a whole animal is being used, which is why tarb appears then and rarely otherwise. Kofta itself runs across Egypt and the whole Middle East, minced meat with onion, parsley and spices, formed and grilled. Tarb is the version that takes it somewhere richer, and Egyptians treat it as a heavy dish for a family celebration rather than everyday food. It is found in the grilled meat restaurants that specialise in kofta, kebab and grilled chicken across Egypt, served with rice or pasta.

★★★★★Les mieux notées

1 hr 55 minMediumEgypt

Recette de Blessing · Africook