Ful (pronounced “fool” - no pun intended) is our family's go-to brunch dish. It is a quick sauce of fava beans and spices served with bread. It’s a nutritious meal, packed with fibre and flavour. We have been cooking this delicious recipe for years now, usually as a part of a breakfast spread alongside an array of other dishes. It goes well with our green chilli and kale eggs recipe and some fresh flat bread.
Ful is a Somali dish with origins in Egypt and Lebanon. It’s inexpensive and it can make you feel ‘full’ for hours. This aspect of the dish resonates with the Egpyptian saying that it is like “a rock in the stomach”. In his documentary about Egyptian cuisine, Anthony Bourdain described it as the “utility breakfast for working people in Cairo”.
Across different countries in the Middle East it has a working class label. And perhaps, this is why such a delicious and simple meal has been overlooked.
It is not a traditional Somali breakfast, but there are small groups (mainly from Yemen) who have immigrated to Somalia and brought the recipe with them. The dish then evolved with the influence of Somali cuisines and seasoning into the recipe we are sharing with you.
Tinned fava beans can easily be found in Turkish, Indian and Arabic stores in the UK, although they are less common in the large supermarket chains. If impossible to find, you can swap them for a mixture of butter beans and black-eyed beans.
We recommend eating it with flat bread: homemade or shop-bought khobez, pitta or turkish bread will do and toasted is preferable. Rip chunks of the steaming bread with your hands (similar to how one might eat canjeero) and scoop up the porridge like substance.
Depending on how you prefer the consistency, you can mash the beans into a thick sauce, or leave some whole. You can also add more or less olive oil and lime juice at the end of cooking.
Serves: 4-5
Cooking time: Approx 15-20 minutes
Ingredients
2 tbps olive oil
1 large onion (chopped)
1 large fresh tomato (chopped)
4 garlic cloves
1 thumb of ginger
1 - 2 fresh green chillies
2 tins of cooked fava beans
1 tsp Black pepper
1 tsp of cumin
1 tsp of turmeric
1 tsp of paprika
Salt to taste
½ lemon juice
A small handful of fresh coriander
Method
Using a frying pan, fry the onions in one tablespoon of the olive oil over a medium heat until they become slightly golden. Add the chopped tomato and fry for a couple of minutes until the tomato is broken down and absorbed.
Mash the garlic, fresh coriander (reserving a few leaves), chilli and ginger together in a pestle and mortar until a rough green paste. Add this to the pan fry for a further two minutes, stirring continuously so the paste doesn't burn.
Drain and wash fava beans, and add to the pan with half the lemon juice and salt.
Add all dried spices stirring into the mixture. Put a lid on the pan and cook on a medium heat for five minutes, checking intermittently to make sure nothing is sticking to the pan.
Remove the lid and mash the beans with the bottom of a glass, or using a fork or potato masher so the mixture develops a porridge-like consistency.
Add the remaining lemon juice and olive oil at the last minute of cooking to give a silky, glossy shine to the beans.
Toast your chosen bread (in a toaster, under the grill, in an oven, tossed over a gas flame - however you prefer!).
Decant into a serving dish and sprinkle the remaining fresh coriander leaves on top. Eat immediately with the bread.
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