Recettes

Bessara (Moroccan Fava Bean Purée)

Bessara is dried split fava beans cooked soft with garlic and olive oil, then puréed and seasoned with cumin and paprika. It is street food across Morocco, most strongly associated with the north, and it is eaten for breakfast as often as for anything else. Its consistency is not fixed, and that is a feature rather than a vagueness. Made thick, it is a dip eaten from a shared plate with Moroccan bread. Made looser, it is a soup served in individual bowls, which is how street vendors serve it on cold mornings. The same pot produces both, depending on how much of the cooking liquid goes back in. Traditionally the beans were cooked for hours until they collapsed entirely and then passed through a food mill. A blender does the same job in seconds and gives a smoother result, which is what most cooks now use, and the source is right that nothing is lost by it. The condiments are not optional garnish. Bessara is served with olive oil, cumin, salt and cayenne or harissa on the side, and each person seasons their own bowl. The purée itself is deliberately mild, which only makes sense once you know that. Note that the same dish appears elsewhere spelt bissara; they are one thing. Some cooks make it with dried split peas in place of some or all of the fava beans, which gives a lighter texture and a greener colour but changes nothing about the method or the seasoning.

1 hr 30 minEasyMorocco

Recette de Deborah · Africook

Grilled Vegetable and Barley Salad

Pearl barley cooked and cooled, tossed with grilled courgette, aubergine and peppers in a cumin and lemon dressing, with feta, herbs and pistachios. No country is claimed. **It is finished with pistachios, which the title gives no indication of.** Barley is the interesting part and the source makes a genuine point about it. In Egypt barley is eaten as a breakfast or dessert porridge rather than in salads, and it is one of the oldest cultivated grains in the region, domesticated in the Fertile Crescent and grown around the Nile for thousands of years. Turning it into a grain salad with grilled vegetables and feta is a modern Mediterranean move rather than an inherited one, which is worth being clear about. The technique that matters is cooling the barley completely before dressing it. Warm barley absorbs dressing greedily and unevenly, and it wilts the herbs. Cooled, it takes the dressing without soaking it all up in the first two minutes. Soaking the barley for an hour before cooking shortens the cooking time considerably and helps it cook evenly. Grilling the vegetables rather than roasting them is deliberate: the char is a flavour in its own right and it is the main thing standing up to the barley's earthiness. Its health section has not been carried across.

2 hr 10 minEasyEgypt

Recette de Nympha · Africook

Ta'ameya (Egyptian Falafel)

Ta'ameya is Egyptian falafel, and the difference from every other falafel is the bean. Egypt makes it from dried split fava beans; Lebanon, Israel and most of the Levant use chickpeas, or a mixture. The fava gives a paler, softer, greener interior and a distinctly different flavour, and Egyptians will tell you theirs came first. It is breakfast food above all. Ful wa ta'ameya, fava bean stew with falafel, is the standard Egyptian morning meal, and the phrase names the pair together. The ful is cooked overnight in a large round pot called a qedra, and the ta'ameya is fried fresh in the early hours, so the smell of hot oil on the way to school or work is a shared memory rather than an individual one. Herbs are the other distinction. Parsley, coriander and dill go into the paste in quantity, which is what gives the interior its green colour, and the whole mixture is traditionally pounded in a large stone mortar. Sesame seeds are pressed onto the outside before frying in many versions, giving a crust that chickpea falafel does not have. It is eaten with tahini and baladi bread, and it is one of the cheapest complete meals in the country.

★★★★★Les mieux notées

50 minMediumEgypt

Recette de FoodChef · Africook

Wheat Porridge (Belila)

Belila is Egyptian wheat porridge: whole wheat berries cooked until they burst, served warm in hot milk with toasted almonds and cinnamon. It is a breakfast dish, and it is equally at home as a snack or a filling dessert. Whole wheat berries are the point, and they are quite different from any milled grain. Left whole, they hold their shape and burst open rather than dissolving, giving a chewy, almost popping texture that no flour or flake reproduces. The fuller Egyptian version carries anise seed and golden raisins in a light syrup alongside the milk and almonds, which is worth knowing since neither appears in this recipe's ingredient list. The method is soaking rather than long cooking. The berries are covered with boiling water and left overnight, then cooked briefly and rested off the heat until they pop open. Cooked wheat berries should be kept in the fridge undrained, and portions warmed with hot milk poured over as needed, which makes it a practical thing to have prepared in advance. It is eaten by children and adults alike and is regarded as comfort food at any hour.

40 minEasyEgypt

Recette de FoodChef · Africook