MA AND THE OUTHOUSE

Egyptian cuisine has a lot of flavorful recipes that evolved as a way to use leftovers. This hearty dish features rice, pasta, lentils… and a lot more. You can think of Koshari as the second cousin of Mujaddara but has much more flavors as it is topped with a spiced tomato sauce and a delicious cumin sauce.
While Falafel and ful are the traditional breakfast dishes in Egypt, Koshary is usually consumed in lunch and mostly dinner.
Spicy, delicious, saucy and frugal, the only downside in my opinion, it just needs lots of pans. Although the dish will take sometime to put together, each element is fairly simple to prepare.

Koshari recipe was the first to post in this space on the internet when it was named arabianmama in 2012.
Put lentils in a colander and wash with running cold water.
Place lentils in a pot and cover with water 2-3 inches. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to minimum and simmer for 25-30 minutes until almost done. Drain.
In the same pot add oil, chopped onion and suate until fragrant.
Add semi-cooked lentils, cumin, salt and tomato sauce.
Cook for 15 minutes on medium or until tender but not mushy. Set aside.
Prepare short grain rice as directed on the package or in your rice cooker. Traditionally, short grain rice is used. Some people like using Basmati rice or even Jasmine rice, this is ok but not the traditional way to prepare this dish.
Making Koshari with vermicelli is not traditional but highly recommended. I have a motto that anything is better with vermicelli. So go get some from the store and make it, you’ll never regret it I promise.
Roast vermicelli in some oil, then gradually add water until it absorbs the water and becomes tender and not clumpy or mushy. This steps depends greatly on the kind of vermicelli you are getting.
Cook Pasta according to package directions, drain then mix in salt and pepper and oil.
You should have soaked chickpeas overnight or if you forgot you can soak for an hour in hot water and baking soda.
KOSHARI SAUCES: THIS PART IS WHAT IS GOING TO SET YOUR DISH APART
We need to prepare two types of sauces, tomato sauce which is a must and kammuneyah or cumin sauce
Assemble the dish by just adding and mixing everything together, or make them in a decorative way as shown above. Top with both sauces, cooked chickpeas and may be a sprinkle of cayenne powder??.

SOME NOTES ABOUT KOSHARY:
Some people feel that rice should not be so white in the koshari recipe so they do one of 1) cooking rice using the water from cooking lentils, 2) when lentils is halfway cooked they add it, without its water, to the rice pot and cook both together. Obviously I do neither because my kids do not like much lentils in their koshari and I like everyone to assemble his dish according to his liking.
Reserve about 1/4 cup of the onion oil , the one in which you’ve fried the onions, and add them to the cooked rice and mix. This gives the rice some shine plus an unbelievably great smell and taste.
One of my friends does something strange, she soaks some raisins in hot water then drain and serve it alongside the koshari. She is the only person in my life I’ve seen doing so, I tried it once, it is not bad. But I feel that raisins, vinegar and garlic do not quiet match here. So may be dried cranberries will do better if you want to try it.
Some people like adding onion instead of, or with, garlic in the tomato sauce, I only add garlic. Many people spice up the tomato sauce with cayenne pepper but I do not do that as I have little kiddos at home. Instead I add it on my plate.
You can use a can of Garbanzo beans instead of cooking the chickpeas yourself, I do not like using the cans but sometimes it is more convenient.
That’s it guys, one of the very best Egyptian vegetarian comfort dishes that you need to try at least once in your life. Amazing flavors and textures, it is a feast in your mouth.

Mr Needy. What planet are you on
Miss Sweet. That's friggin hilarious
I think the old boy needs to fix the crack