Ful Medames (Egyptian Mashed Broad Beans)

This delicious dish of mashed up broad beans is considered by some to be the national dish of Egypt. Interestingly, it is eaten for breakfast. Breaking with it's traditional time of consumption, I served mine as an appetiser at a dinner party like a dip. It also makes a great side veggie dish though. It's easy to make and very tasty - you can even make most of it the day before and then just reheat it and mash it up when you want to serve it.

Ful Medames

Ingredients
600g frozen, fresh or canned broad beans (fava beans)
3 cloves garlic, minced or crushed
1 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp ground corriander
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper (or more or less, to taste)
Juice of 1/2 lemon
1/2 cup vegetable stock or water
Salt and pepper to taste
Olive oil

To Make
1. If using frozen broad beans, thaw. If using canned, drain. You can peel them if you don't like the chewy skins in there, but I like them so I didn't.
2. Put the broad beans, garlic, spices, lemon juice and vegetables stock in a saucepan, cover and simmer until broad beans are soft and cooked and the water is mostly gone, about 20 minutes.
3. Season with salt and pepper and then mash roughly with a fork or potato masher (if you'd prefer it smooth you could use a food processor), so that there are still big chunks of bean in it.
4. Drizzle with olive oil. Serve with pita bread, tahini sauce, fresh lemon wedges and, if you like, preserved or pickled chillis.

This month I'm featuring lots of delicious food from Egypt.

Check out my other Egyptian recipe posts:

Preserved Lemons

Limoonada (Egyptian Lemonade)

Mesa'a'ah (Spicy Eggplant)

Orange and Olive Salad with Cumin

'Ancient Egyptian Peasant' Beer Onions

Creamy Tahini Sauce

Khoshaf

Lentil and Sweet Potato Hummus

I rarely ever make the same dip twice. There are so many wonderful opportunities for delicious combinations! Making dip is easy, quick and a nice safe place to experiment if you're creative but not sure about your flavour combining abilities! It's also lovely to share communal food with friends. Bringing a home made dip when you visit a friend is cheaper than bringing bought food, more fun and shows that you thought they were worth a bit of effort (even if it was just a little bit!)

Dip can also be a great way to use up ingredients if you don't know what to do with them! Got a quarter of a cauliflower languishing in the fridge? Dip it. A ridiculously small amount of lentils left in the bottom of a packet after you made something else? Dip it. A tin of beans at the back of your cupboard? Dip it. A spice which you have no idea what to do with? Find a vegetable that fits it's flavour profile and DIP IT!

If that isn't enough - here are something else awesome about dips. You can use leftover dips to smear on your burgers, sandwiches or wraps. You can use this leftover dip to add thickness and flavour to a vegetable soup or a lentil soup. You could even mix it up with some fresh herbs and olive oil and make a salad dressing out of it. Endless possibilities!

How do you use up leftover dips when you entertain?

Lentil and Sweet Potato Hummus

Ingredients

1/2 cup red lentils

2 carrots

1 medium sweet potato

1 cup vegetable stock

1 tsp ground cumin

2 tbsp tahini

4 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp lemon juice

Sumac, to sprinkle on top

To Make

1. Dice the carrot. Peel and roughly chop the sweet potato.

2. Place the lentils, carrot and sweet potato in a small saucepan. Add the cumin and vegetable stock and bring to a simmer over a medium heat. Simmer, covered for 20-30 minutes, or until the vegetables and lentils are all well cooked. Set aside to cool slightly.

3. Combine the lentils and vegetables (including any cooking water remaining), tahini, soy sauce and lemon juice in a food processor and process until smooth consistency. 

4. Transfer to a bowl and sprinkle liberally with sumac.

Can be served warm or at room temperature.

Happy Australia Day! Are you celebrating anywhere this year?

Vegan Party Menus Part 2: Tomato, Olive and Red Wine Dip

This one was the perfect companion to the Sweet Potato and Sunflower Seed Dip.

Ingredients:

1 onion, finely chopped

Olive oil, for frying

2 cloves garlic, crushed

2 tsp dried mixed herbs

1/2 tsp sweet paprika

1 can crushed tomatos

3 tbsp tomato paste

2 tbsp red wine

1/3 cup sliced black olives (although if you are using 'sliced olives' from a jar rather than slicing your own deli kalamata olives I recommend using half a cup because they have a less strong flavour)

To Make:

1. Heat the olive oil in a saucepan and sauté the onions and garlic until soft and transparent. Add the mixed herbs and sweet paprika and fry for a further minute until the herbs are fragrant. 

2. Add the remaining ingredients except the olives and heat through. Simmer for about 5 minutes.

3. Remove from the heat and stir the olives through.

4. Serve warm or at room temperature with crackers and/or celery & carrot sticks.

Note: This is also a great base for pasta! If you have any leftovers (which you won't because it's awesome) you can stir it through some hot pasta with a tin of diced tomatoes and some chopped basil and you have a fantastic pasta!

Vegan Party Menus Part 1: Sweet Potato and Sunflower Seed Dip

Out there in the world there seems to exist this myth that Vegans are very difficult to cater for and inviting them to your party is just a pain - but seriously those guys from Mythbusters should get onto this one because truly Vegans are not hard to feed in fact you will find it to be cheaper than feeding your meatlover friends. The other awesome thing about Vegan party food is that everybody can enjoy it and it is so tasty that everybody loves it - that means you don't have to have separate designated food for each of your guests depending on their eating preferences. This recipe is also made Gluten Free by substituting tamari for soy sauce, which means all your guests can be eating the same thing! (Unless they have some sort of weird sweet potato allergy).

So, next time you are having friends over, Vegan or otherwise, check out this series of recipes (that I will be adding gradually) all of which I served at my most recent birthday party to very enthusiastic guests!

Sweet Potato and Sunflower Seed Dip

Ingredients:

1 medium-large sweet potato (choose the size depending on how many people you are feeding)

1 onion, chopped finely

2 cloves garlic, crushed

Olive oil, for frying

1 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp ground ginger

1 tbsp tamari (or substitute soy sauce)

1/4 cup sunflower seeds

Cracked pepper to taste

To Make:
1. Preheat the oven to a moderate temperature (about 150-180 degrees Celsius). Spread the sunflower seeds out evenly on a tray and toast in the oven for about 3 minutes or until they go brown and smell intoxicating. Watch them the whole time though or you'll burn them. Seriously do it.
2. Peel the sweet potato and chop into chunks. Boil them in water until they are nice and soft and then strain and put aside.
3. While your sweet potatoes are boiling you can heat some olive oil in a saucepan and add the onions and garlic. Sauté until the onions are completely cooked and then add the spices. Fry for a further 1-2 minutes until the spices are fragrant. Turn off the heat.
4. The next step you can do one of 3 ways 1) in the saucepan you used to cook the ingredients (this is what I did), 2) in a mortar and pestle because you ROCK and mortar and pestles are awesome or 3) in your food processor (but then you have to wash the damn thing up afterwards booooo). So... pick your vessel and combine the onion and the sweet potato and mash/pestle/process until smooth. Add the tamari and cracked pepper to taste and mash a bit more.
5. Stir in the sunflower seeds (not in your food processor because then they will get all ground up), leaving some aside to sprinkle on top so it looks pretty.
6. Set aside and serve either warm or at room temperature (preferably not chilled, so if you made it the night before (which is a very smart thing to do) make sure you get it out of the fridge a couple of hours before you are going to serve it so it can become room temp).

It's dip so serve it with carrot & celery sticks, crackers and/or corn chips.