Saltah

Ingredients

• Fenugreek seeds — soaked overnight60 g
• Lamb — diced600 g
• Potatoes300 g
• Tomatoes4
• Onion2
• Garlic6 clove
• Zhug sauce3 tbsp
• Eggs2
• Rice — cooked150 g
• Flatbread — to serve4
• Vegetable oil60 ml
• Salt and pepperto taste

Salt and spices grow more slowly than the rest: doubling a dish does not double the pepper.

Weight converts to ounces and volume to cups. Grams of flour are not turned into cups, because that depends on how tightly it is packed.

Method

1. 1

   Drain the soaked fenugreek, rinse it several times and grind it to a paste.

   15 min

2. 2

   Whip the paste with cold water for ten minutes, by whisk or mixer, until it turns into a white froth.

   12 min

3. 3

   Fry the onion and garlic, add the meat and brown it.

   15 min

4. 4

   Add the tomatoes and potato, cover with water, season and stew an hour, until the meat is tender.

   65 min

5. 5

   Heat a stone or cast-iron pot until very hot and transfer the boiling stew into it.

   10 min

6. 6

   Break the eggs into the boiling stew and stir; they set into threads.

   3 min

7. 7

   Spoon the hulba and a spoon of zhug on top and carry it to the table still bubbling. Serve with bread and rice.

   5 min

About the dish

Hulba — whipped fenugreek — is made separately and over hours: the seeds soak overnight, then are beaten with water into a white mousse-like froth. There is no fast route.

The madra, a pot of volcanic stone, is heated red hot and the dish comes to the table boiling. It goes on bubbling for several minutes, and that is part of the serving.

It is eaten by hand, dipping bread and taking stew and froth together. A spoon is not used, and eating the layers separately is not done.

Worth knowing

• — Rinse the fenugreek until the water runs clear. Poorly rinsed, it is bitter, and whipping only concentrates that.
• — Whip with cold water, added a little at a time. With warm water the froth will not rise at all.
• — Zhug, the hot Yemeni sauce of coriander and chilli, can be made ahead and keeps a week in the fridge.

Nutrition

Per serving at the base yield, calculated from the ingredients rather than measured in a lab.

Calories

620 kcal

Protein

38 g

Fat

32 g

Carbs

44 g

More from Yemen

• Bint al-sahn — A many-layered enriched bread brushed with ghee, drenched in honey and scattered with nigella.