Levant by Bishara Rawia

Author:Bishara, Rawia
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Octopus
Published: 2018-05-03T00:00:00+00:00

CHICKPEA SOUP WITH BABY ONIONS

Some soups spring straight out of my imagination, while others are deeply rooted in the flavours I grew up with. The latter is certainly the case with this soup, rich with warming North African spices based on the complex sauce for a dish called maftoul, one of Palestine’s oldest, most important main dishes. Maftoul consists of couscous studded with chickpeas and served with an intensely flavourful stock on the side for spooning over the top. As kids, we’d always attack that bowl, and my mum would scream at us because there wouldn’t be enough left for the rest of the table. I always wondered why that sauce couldn’t be turned into soup so there would always be plenty for everyone. So when I set up my own kitchen, that’s precisely what I did!

MAKES 8–10 SERVINGS

120ml olive oil, or 115g butter or ghee

5 shallots or 2 small yellow onions, diced

900g baby onions, peeled

Sea salt

1 tablespoon ground caraway seeds (available online)

1 tablespoon ground cumin

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 tablespoon Tanoreen Spice Mix

or

1½ teaspoons ground allspice

1 teaspoon ground cardamom

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 tablespoon ground coriander

Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg

450g dried chickpeas, soaked and simmered until tender (or 4 x 400g tins, drained and rinsed)

2.25 litres vegetable stock

Juice of 1 lemon

Heat the oil in a soup pan over a medium heat. Add the shallots and cook for about 4 minutes, until translucent. Add the baby onions and cook until they get a bit of colour, 6–8 minutes. Reduce the heat to medium-low, sprinkle with salt, and cook until the baby onions begin to soften, 15–20 minutes. Add the caraway, cumin, black pepper, and Tanoreen Spices and cook for about 2 minutes, until fragrant. Add the chickpeas and stock, bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to medium and cook until the onions are very soft. Season with salt, sprinkle the lemon juice over the top, and serve.

TIP: To revive the taste of tinned chickpeas, heat them in a pan for at least 30 minutes first, adding water as needed so they don’t dry out.

In Praise of the Chickpea. I may have omitted them from my houmous recipes in favor of pure, concentrated vegetable flavour, but that in no way diminishes how I feel about chickpeas. Whether tossed with squash and yogurt as a cooling springtime side dish or folded with a velvety slump of onions into a sustaining winter soup, nourishing, inexpensive chickpeas bring so much to the table. So there’s no need to fulfill a personal chickpea quota with houmous when it’s possible to appreciate chickpeas in so many other ways.

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