Must-try Eid dishes from around the world
With Eid al-Adha coming up for families around the world, many different foods from various cultures are going to be shared across different dining tables.
Here are a few of the most-loved Eid dishes from around the world, as well as how you can make them!
1. Maamoul - Lebanon
Maamoul, a type of Lebanese shortbread, is a small pastry that is very popular in the Middle East. It is usually stuffed with dates. However, people also fill the shortbread cookie with pistachios, cashews, almonds and walnuts as well. Most of the time, the pastry is covered with powdered sugar. It can be shaped in different ways, such as flattened, a dome, or a ball.
Different families have their own variations of the Maamoul. Here is one Maamoul recipe that you can try out:
This maamoul recipe takes about 15 minutes to cook, but a long time to prepare. It takes about one hour 45 minutes, and can serve up to about 45 maamouls.
Ingredients:
Dough:
3 ¼ cup extra fine wheat flour
2 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
1 cup softened butter
¾ cup icing sugar (to also dust on the outside later)
1 ½ teaspoon baking powder
¼ cup milk
¼ cup rose water
Filling:
8 oz. date paste
5 tablespoons crushed pistachios
3 tablespoon crushed walnuts
3 tablespoons crushed almonds
Equipment:
Maamoul mold press
Instructions:
- Mix all the nut filling ingredients together with the date paste for the filling.
- Mix the extra fine wheat flour, all-purpose flour, icing sugar, softened butter and baking powder in a large container for the shortbread. Mix until the consistency of the dough is like sand.
- Add the milk and then rose water. Create a smooth ball of dough, not a sticky one.
- After covering the dough with plastic wrap, let it sit for an hour at room temperature.
- Create small balls of dough from this big one of about ½ oz (15g).
- Stuff each ball with dates and nuts, make sure the dough is on the outside and fully covering the dates and nuts.
- Use the maamoul mold press to shape the balls by putting the dough inside the press, packing it well inside, turning the mold over, and then quickly tapping it to unmold.
- Cook the maamoul on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper in a preheated oven at 350 F (180 degree celsius) for about 15 to 20 minutes. Make sure pastries remain white.
- After you take them out of the oven, sprinkle the pastries with icing sugar.
Maamoul can be stored for up to eight days in an airtight container.
2. Sheer Khurma - India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Afghanistan
Sheer Khurma is a dessert made with dates, milk, nuts, ghee, sugar and fine vermicelli. It’s literal translation is “milk dates” in Persian. This classic Mughlai pudding is extremely popular, especially during Eid, in countries such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan.
Like most recipes, it differs from country to country. Some use condensed milk, saffron and mawa, etc. Here is one Sheer Khurma recipe that you can try out:
This Sheer Khurma recipe takes about 25 minutes to cook, and 10 minutes to prepare. This recipe can serve up to about six servings, and is about 429 kcals.
Ingredients:
6-7 large dates chopped, or 10 small dates
10-12 chopped almonds
10-12 chopped pistachios
10-15 broken cashews
10-15 golden raisins
1 cup broken vermicelli
1 liter whole milk
1.5 teaspoon rose water
4 tablespoon sugar
½ teaspoon cardamom powder
Instructions
- Heat up ghee in a pan, on medium flame. Add chopped nuts, raisins and dates to the pan once hot.
- Cook the nuts for 1-2 minutes until the nuts turn fragrant and golden brown, and the raisins turn plumper.
- Remove the nuts from the pan and put it aside.
- Add the vermicelli to the same pan and mix well.
- Roast the vermicelli for around 3 minutes until it turns light golden brown.
- Though this step is optional, you can add khoya/mawa and let it roast for 1-2 minutes.
- Add milk to the same pan and stir while increasing the heat to medium high.
- Wait for the milk to boil, and stir often so nothing sticks to the pan.
- After the milk comes to boil, lower the heat back to medium, and let it be as it is for 8 minutes in this heat setting.
- After this 8 minutes, the milk will reduce and thicken a little, at which point sugar should be added and mixed.
- Transfer the nuts back to the pan and mix.
- Add the rosewater and cardamom powder and mix.
- On medium-low heat, cook for 2-3 minutes and then turn off the heat.
Serve the sheer khurma, as you'd like, hot or cold.
3. Doro Wat - Ethiopia
Doro Wat is a famous Ethiopian stew with cooked chicken and spicy Berbere sauce. It is usually accompanied with boiled eggs on top and sourdough-tasting injera bread on the side.
It is usually served as a communal dish that everyone digs in and shares together.
Even though traditionally the chicken is supposed to be slow-cooked for hours, here’s a quicker recipe to get the delicious meal in a shorter amount of time that you can make in an instant pot. It takes 15 minutes to prepare, and 30 minutes to cook. There’s about four servings worth there.
Ingredients:
2 pounds of 8 piece chicken drumsticks with skin removed
2 tablespoons of fresh lemon juice
2 tablespoons of ghee
2 tablespoons of grated ginger
2 tablespoons of pressed garlic
2 tablespoons of tomato paste
2 teaspoons of kosher salt
⅓ cup of Berbere spice blend
2 large finely chopped red onions
4 hard-boiled eggs, peeled and chopped into halves
Instructions:
- Add lemon juice and salt to the chicken. Mix well and then put aside.
- Set the Instant Pot at Saute (Hi) and heat ghee. Add onions, saute them for 5 minutes, stir them. Place a lid to speed up the process.
- Add ginger and garlic and cook for a minute.
- Turn off the Instant Pot, add ½ cup of water, and deglaze the pot. Remove all the brown or stuck bits.
- Add chicken to the Instant Pot, layer over berbere, and tomato paste. Don’t mix it.
- Close the Instant Pot, make sure the valve is sealed, and set cook time to 8 minutes.
- Let the natural pressure release for 10 minutes and then open the Instant Pot. Mix well.
- Mix gently, allow it to sit and cool down for 5 minutes. The stew will continue to thicken.
- Put in the hard-boiled eggs, sprinkle chopped cilantro on top.
Enjoy the hot served Doro Wat.
4. Mansi - Russia
Mansi is a type of beef dumpling that is shared by Muslims in Russia during Eid al-Adha. It usually comes with a side of yogurt and garlic. It is popular in other Central Asia countries as well, and there are many different variations of shapes and sizes from country to country.
Ingredients:
2 cups flour
2 eggs
2 peeled onions
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon red pepper flakes
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 (8 ounce) container plain yogurt
½ teaspoon salt
½ pound ground beef, or as needed
Salt and pepper to taste
Instructions:
- Put the flour and salt in a mixing bowl. Add the water and eggs, and mix well with hands to form a soft dough. Add more water if needed. Then, cover the bowl and set aside if needed.
- Shred the onions and drain out the juice using a sieve set. Combine the onion, ground beef, salt and pepper. Mix the meat well with a spoon until mashed.
- Divide the dough into two portions lightly flour over the surface. While one piece of dough is covered so it doesn’t get hard till its turn, roll out the other one into a rectangle as thin as you can. Cut this rectangle out into 2-inch squares with a knife or pastry wheel. Repeat with the second piece of dough.
- Put 2 teaspoons of meat filling in the center of each square. By gathering the edges of the dough and pinching them together at the top to form a bundle, seal the dumpling. Transfer these mansi pieces to the plate with flour and lightly sprinkle them with flour again to prevent the mansi from sticking.
- Heat red pepper flakes and oil in a small skillet over low heat until the pepper flakes start to color the oil, not until the point they burn though. Remove from the heat and keep warm.
- Stir minced garlic into the yogurt and set aside.
- Boil a large pot of salted water over medium-high heat, and cook the mansi until the filling isn’t pink anymore, and the dough is tender, 20 to 25 minutes. Drain the water well and divide the mansi into four plates. Put a dollop of yogurt on top of the mansi and drizzle each serving with hot pepper oil.
5. Kabsa - Qatar
Kabsa is a highly popular dish that is shared in Qatar and in demand during Eid al-Adha. Kabsa is long-grain rice which is cooked with a mixture of spices and flavors as well as barbecued meat such as chicken, goat or sheep. People often mix in vegetables too.
While many Qatari families opt to order this dish than cook at home, here is an easy recipe for those that prefer a home-cooked Kabsa:
This recipe takes about 25 minutes to prepare, and 1 hour 40 minutes to cook. It will be about two servings.
Ingredients:
For the spice mixture:
⅔ teaspoons coriander seeds
⅓ tablespoons paprika powder
⅓ teaspoons whole cloves
⅓ tablespoons peppercorns
⅓ tablespoons cumin seeds
⅓ sticks cinnamon sticks (about 2 inches long)
3 green cardamom pod seeds
Pinch of ground nutmeg
For the kabsa:
5 large thinly sliced cloves
5 green cardamom pods
3 tablespoons ghee
3 diced garden tomatoes
3 dried limes
2 cups basmati rice
2 teaspoons vegetable oil
2 ½ teaspoons salt
2 ½ cups chicken stock
2 ⅓ pounds marinated chicken chunks
⅛ ground cloves
1 teaspoon turmeric
1 large onion
1 tablespoon baharat
1 seeded and diced hot green chile
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
1 stick cinnamon
Rosewater to sprinkle
Directions for spice mixture:
- Place all spice ingredients, except paprika and nutmeg, in a frying pan. The whole seeds, cinnamon stick, cloves.
- For 2 minutes, dry roasts on medium high heat. Or until it is very fragrant.
- Transfer to a spice grinder and let it cool.
- After it is cool, add the paprika and nutmeg, and then grind everything to fine powder.
Directions for the kabsa:
- Chop the onion. Mix the ginger, garlic and green pepper in one bowl. In another bowl, mix the turmeric and baharat. In a third bowl, mix the limes, tomatoes, cardamom, cinnamon, and cloves.
- Heal oil in a large pan over medium-high flame and fry the chicken pieces on both sides until the skin is brown and crispy. Transfer the chicken to a plate and leave the oil in the pan.
- Add ghee, reduce the heat to medium, and fry the onion for about 10-12 minutes until it turns brown.
- Mix the garlic, ginger, and green chile pepper and saute for about 2 minutes.
- Add turmeric and baharat for another minute.
- Put the chicken pieces in the pan, along with the tomatoes, dried limes, cardamom pods, cloves and cinnamon. Add the chicken stock and stir to combine. Bring to boil, reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer for one hour.
- Add rice and stir. Boil it again, and then reduce the heat to low. Cover the pan, simmer for about 15-20 minutes until the rice is done and has absorbed the liquid. Stir every 5 minutes
- If the rice is still dry, add another cup of boiling water and cook longer.
- Transfer the rice and chicken to a serving dish and sprinkle rosewater on top.
There you go! Five popular Eid al-Adha dishes to try out this week with the excitement leading up to the occasion. Happy eating!
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