This was pretty good. The chicken was very simple: just a bit of salt and pepper for seasoning, but it went well with the fava beans. And the wine and broth combine to make a nice sauce for the beans. The beans themselves were nice. But I found peeling them pretty annoying. It's fairly labour-instensive for something that's good, but not great. I think, if I did it again, I might try using peas or a combination of peas and lentils. The fava beans definitely provide a unique flavour and texture, but it's not special or desirable enough for me to want to go to the effort of peeling a kilo of legumes for it! I think other legumes would be different, but still quite good.

Chicken Breasts with Fava Beans

Slightly adapted from Dish of the Day by Kate McMillan

Ingredients

• 900g fava beans, shelled
• 4 skinless boneless chicken breasts
• 1 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1 Tbsp. schmaltz (or other fat)
• 1/2 tsp. black peppercorns, ground
• 2 Tbsp. unsalted butter, divided
• 4 green onions, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 c. white wine
• 3/4 c. chicken stock, divided

Directions

1. Bring a pot of water to a boil, add the fava beans, and cook for ~5 minutes.
2. Drain and set aside to cool.
3. Once cool enough to handle, peel the tough outer skin off of the beans.
4. Bisect the chicken breasts lengthwise to form 8 wide, thin pieces of chicken.
5. Season with the salt and pepper.
6. Melt the schmaltz over medium heat.
7. Add the chicken to the pan and cook until browned on both sides and cooked through (4-5 minutes per side).
8. Remove chicken from pan and set aside.
9. Add 1 Tbsp. of butter to the pan.
10. Add the green onions and garlic and cook for ~2 minutes.
11. Pour in the wine and cook until nearly evaporated.
12. Add 1/4 c. of the stock and the fava beans, cover, and cook for ~5 minutes.
13. Uncover and add the remaining 1/2 c. of broth.
14. Season to taste with salt and pepper and cook for another few minutes.
15. Remove from heat and stir in the remaining 1 Tbsp. of butter.
16. Serve the beans topped with chicken.
17. Garnish with some parsley and extra green onion if desired.

I've been trying to work my way through all the khliî recipes in the book while I have a bit of khliî substitute on hand. This one made a very nice, if somewhat thick, soup.

Khliî, Chickpea, and Pasta Soup

Slightly adapted from the Food of Morocco by Paula Wolfert

Ingredients

• 3/4 c. dried chickpeas
• 1/4 c. split, peeled, dried fava beans¹
• 8 c. water, divided
• 1/3 c. brown lentils, rinsed
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1/2 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 2/3 c. khliî or 1 c. khliî substitute
• 2 Tbsp. fat from khliî or substitute
• 1/2 c. diced tomatoes²
• 1 Tbsp. chopped flat-leaf parsley
• 1 tsp. black peppercorns, ground
• 1/2 tsp. sweet paprika
• 1/8 tsp. cayenne or ground Kashmiri chilies
• 3/4 tsp. ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp. ground turmeric³
• 1/2 tsp. ras el hanout
• 1/8 tsp. saffron threads, crushed and mixed w/ 2 Tbsp. hot water
• 2 Tbsp. crumbled dried aged goat cheese⁴
• 280g mhamsa or small Italian pasta (acini di pepe, orzo, bird's tongue, etc.)⁵
• 150g chopped kale⁶ (optional)

Directions

1. Soak the chickpeas and fava beans in separate bowls. Allow to soak for ~12 hours.
2. Drain the fava beans and transfer them to a pot with 3 c. of the water.
3. Bring fava beans to a boil and cook for 30 minutes, skimming as needed.
4. While the fava beans are boiling, soak the lentils for 30 minutes.
5. Drain the chickpeas. (Wolfert recommends peeling them at this point, but I never bother.)
6. Toss the onion with the salt and fat from the khliî and cook over medium heat for 10 minutes.⁷
7. Shred the meat and add it to the pot.
8. Add the tomatoes, parsley, chickpeas, drained lentils, pepper, paprika, cayenne, ginger, turmeric, ras el hanout, saffron water, and the remaining 5 c. of water.
9. Reserving the cooking water, drain the fava beans.
10. Add the cooked fava beans and 1 c. of their cooking water to the soup.
11. Add the cheese.
12. Bring to a boil, cover, and cook over low heat for 45 minutes.
13. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and set a steamer over it. Steam the pasta, partially covered, for 10 minutes.⁸
14. Add the kale (if using) and the steamed pasta to the soup and simmer for a few minutes.
15. Serve hot. Goes nicely with a bit of extra cheese on top and buttered toast on the side.

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¹ I didn't have any fava beans on hand and I didn't want to go out and get a bag just for the 1/4 c. that I needed for this recipe, so I just tossed in an extra 1/4 c. of chickpeas instead. ^Back
2 The original recipe calls for grated roma tomatoes, but I didn't feel like faffing around with a grater and I had some diced tomatoes in the fridge that needed used anyway, so I just tossed them in. ^Back
3 The original recipe calls for 1/3 of a tsp. of turmeric. Who uses thirds of teaspoons?! I just bumped it up to 1/2 tsp. and called it good. ^Back
4 Wolfert recommends Cypress Grove Midnight Moon. I've never seen that cheese for sale here and I doubt I could order it from the States, so I searched for alternatives. I ended up using a nice goat beemster. I think a high-quality, well-aged goat cheddar could also work. I recommend getting a bit more cheese than you need and sprinkling more onto each portion as you dish up the soup. It's very tasty that way. ^Back
5 I had ~250g of stellette pasta left over from an earlier recipe, so I just tossed that in. I think that was plenty of pasta for this amount of soup. But feel free to experiment with putting in the full amount if you like. ^Back
6 The original recipe doesn't call for any greens, but I really felt like a bit of kale would go nicely with the tomato and legumes. We actually ended up topping our soup with some leftover kale and beans and I think that wonderfully so, in the future, I think I'd be inclined to just add some kale directly to the soup. ^Back
7 Because my khliî substitute ended up shredded rather than sliced, I have found it fairly difficult to separate the fat from the meat. I ended up just using 1 c. + 2 Tbsp. of it for this recipe and putting it all in with the onion. I figured that since the next step was to add the meat anyway, it wouldn't make that much of a difference. ^Back
8 I steamed my pasta for nearly 30 minutes and it still didn't seem cooked yet. Also, it ended up clumping together in the steamer. I don't know if the issue was the style of steamer I had or the shape of the pasta or what, but it was definitely not done after 10 minutes. Or 30, for that matter. I ended up just dumping the partially cooked pasta into the soup and letting it finish cooking in there. Unfortunately doing this caused it to suck up most of the broth. I think it probably would've been better to drop it into the boiling water that I already had going below the steamer. Let it finish cooking in there, then drain it and transfer it to the soup. Oh well... ^Back

Wolfert describes this dish as "soupy". And Wikipedia describes it as either a soup or a dip. My byssara did not come out soupy. The instructions say to cook it down to a "nice thick consistency" and I think I may have overshot a bit. Don't go for "stand a spoon in it" thick when you're making this because it will thicken up even more as it cools. My byssara ended up sliceable!

Byssara

Slightly adapted from the Food of Morocco by Paula Wolfert

Ingredients

• 2 c. split dried fava beans¹
• 6 c. water
• 3-4 cloves garlic
• 6 Tbsp. olive oil, divided
• 1 Tbsp. cumin seeds
• 1 tsp. coarse sea salt
• 1/2 lemon (optional)
• 1/2 Tbsp. sweet paprika
• 1/4 tsp. ground cayenne or Kashmiri chilies
• extra olive oil, to serve

Directions

1. Soak the fava beans overnight in 6 or 7 c. of water. Discard any beans that float.
2. Wash and drain the beans.
3. Bring the water to a boil.
4. When the water is boiling, add the beans and reduce heat to medium-low.
5. Cook, uncovered, for 1 hour, skimming as needed.
6. Add the garlic and 2 Tbsp. of the oil and cook for another hour or two. (Aim for thick soup, rather than hummus consistency.)
7. Remove from heat and allow to cool.
8. Combine the cumin seeds and salt and grind to a powder.
9. Add half of the cumin-salt mixture to the beans and reserve the other half for garnish.
10. Press the beans through a fine sieve and beat in the remaining 1/4 c. of olive oil.
11. Add salt and lemon juice to taste.
12. Garnish with the cumin-salt blend and a bit of paprika and cayenne.
13. Serve with olive oil and toasted bread.

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¹ In other recipes, Wolfert calls for "split dried peeled fava beans". Here she simply calls for "split dried fava beans", no mention of peeling. I couldn't find split fava beans, so I got a bag of whole (unpeeled) fava beans. Since this recipe refers readers to a note explaining that unpeeled favas require longer to soften, I figured that whole, unpeeled beans would be fine. But once the beans had soaked, I realized how thick and tough the skins were and ended up peeling them anyway. Next time I'd just seek out skinned split fava beans. Zehr's didn't have them, but it turns out that Ethnic does! ^Back

Couscous with Seven Vegetables

Wolfert gives a lot of variations for this seven-vegetable couscous. The "default" is the Fes version, but she also offers a Marrakech rendition as well as "mountain-style" and "with lamb's head". I haven't had a chance to try the mountain-style couscous with seven vegetables yet and I'm not planning on making the lamb's head version¹ at all, but I've now tried the other two, so I figured it was time for a write-up!

I am not completely confident that I managed to do the Marrakech version as I was supposed to. The Fes version involves separately cooking pumpkin with raisins and then adding them to the couscous afterward. Since I wasn't using pumpkin in the Marrakech version, I omitted the raisins as well, but I now wonder if I should have included them. (The couscous was still delicious either way. I'm just not sure if what I made was what the author intended.)

It's been a while since I made the Fes version, so I'm mostly going to be transcribing the recipe out of the book for that one without much in the way of additional notes or personal commentary. The Marrakech version is fresh in my mind though, so that one should be a little more fleshed out. As for the mountain-style and lamb's head variants, those I can't offer any insights on at all. But I'll include them anyway in case there is any interest. I can always come back and update this post if and when I get around to making the mountain-style recipe.

Couscous with Seven Vegetables in the Fes Manner

Slightly adapted from The Food of Morocco by Paula Wolfert

Ingredients

• 1 c. dried chickpeas
• 2-3 cracked lamb shanks
• 4 chicken wings + 2 backs
• 1 Tbsp. coarse sea salt
• 1 Tbsp. black peppercorns, ground
• 2 Tbsp. saffron water²
• 1/2 tsp. ground turmeric
• 2 onions, quartered
• 2 (7-8cm) cinnamon sticks (preferably cassia)
• small bundle of cilantro & parsley, tied together
• 4-5 very ripe tomatoes, quartered
• 8 Tbsp. unsalted butter, divided
• 3.5L water
• 200g carrots, peeled and cut into 5cm sticks
• 200g turnips, peeled and cut into 5cm chunks
• 450g sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
• 450g instant couscous³
• 200g pumpkin, peeled and seeded and cut into chunks
• ~1/4 c. dark raisins
• 200g zucchini, trimmed and quartered
• 1 small cabbage, halved
• 1 Tbsp. ghee (optional)
• red pepper sauce (or harissa and extra broth)

Directions

1. Place the chickpeas in a bowl and add enough water to cover them by several cm. Soak overnight.
2. The next day, drain the chickpeas. Peel if desired⁴.
3. Place the drained chickpeas in a pot and add enough water to cover them by several cm. Bring to a boil and cook for 20 minutes. Drain and set aside.
4. Place the lamb, chicken, salt, pepper, saffron water, turmeric, onions, cinnamon sticks, herbs, tomatoes, and half the butter in a very large pot and cook, covered, over low heat for 10 minutes.
5. Add the water⁵ and bring to a boil.
6. Reduce heat and cook, partially covered, for 3 hours. Remove the chicken wings and backs after ~90 minutes of cooking.
7. Remove from heat and allow to cool.
8. Skim and discard fat from the surface of the broth.
9. Cut the meat into chunks. Discard any fat, gristle, or bones. Return the meat to the broth.
10. Bring broth to a boil and add the carrots, turnips, sweet potatoes, and chickpeas. Cook for 30 minutes.
11. Prepare the couscous through to the end of the second steaming (third steaming if using hand-rolled/non-instant couscous).⁶
12. Soak the raisins in water for 15 minutes. Drain and set aside.
13. Label a bit of the lamb broth into a separate pan and add the pumpkin and raisins to it. Cover, bring to a boil, and cook until the pumpkin is tender. Drain and set aside.
14. Steam the couscous once more (just 10 minutes this time).
15. Add the zucchini and cabbage to the broth and bring back to a boil. Cook until the vegetables are tender.
16. Strain the broth, reserving the meat and vegetables.
17. Correct the seasoning of the strained broth and return to a boil. Cook down to a volume of ~8 cups.
18. Dump the couscous into a serving platter and toss with the remaining 4 Tbsp. of butter.
19. Toss with the ghee (if using).
20. Use a fork and/or a whisk to break up any clumps and ensure the grains are all light and separate.
21. Gradually add up to 1 1/3 c. of the lamb broth to the couscous. (Hand-rolled couscous may be able to take up to 1 2/3 c. of broth.) You may find that you do not need all the broth.
22. Toss the grains again, making sure to break up any lumps. Let stand for 10 minutes.
23. Make a well in the centre of the couscous.
24. Use a slotted spoon to transfer the meat and vegetables to the well.
25. Add the drained raisins and pumpkin on top.
26. Serve with red pepper sauce and any remaining broth.

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Variations

Couscous with Seven Vegetables in the Marrakech Manner

Ingredients

• 1 c. skinned split fava beans⁷
• 2-3 cracked lamb shanks⁸
• 1 Tbsp. coarse sea salt
• 1 Tbsp. black peppercorns, ground
• 2 Tbsp. saffron water
• 1/2 tsp. ground turmeric
• 2 onions, quartered
• 2 (7-8cm) cinnamon sticks (preferably cassia)
• small bundle of cilantro & parsley, tied together
• 4-5 very ripe tomatoes, quartered
• 8 Tbsp. unsalted butter, divided
• 3.5L water
• 200g carrots, peeled and cut into 5cm sticks
• 450g sweet potatoes⁹, peeled and cut into chunks
• 450g instant couscous
• 1/4 c. raisins (optional)
• 2 bell peppers, cored and sliced
• 200g zucchini, trimmed and quartered
• 1 Tbsp. ghee (optional)
• red pepper sauce (or harissa and extra broth)

You may also optionally include pumpkin, turnips, hot peppers, and/or cabbage.

Mountain-Style Couscous with Meat Confit and Seven Vegetables

Ingredients

• 1 c. dried chickpeas
• 450g lamb neck
• 450g shredded "express" meat confit
• 1 Tbsp. coarse sea salt
• 1 Tbsp. black peppercorns, ground
• 2 Tbsp. saffron water²
• 1/2 tsp. ground turmeric
• 2 onions, quartered
• 2 (7-8cm) cinnamon sticks (preferably cassia)
• small bundle of cilantro & parsley, tied together
• 4-5 very ripe tomatoes, quartered
• 4 Tbsp. unsalted butter + 4 Tbsp. meat confit drippings, divided
• 3.5L water
• 200g carrots, peeled and cut into 5cm sticks
• 200g turnips, peeled and cut into 5cm chunks
• 450g sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
• 450g instant couscous³
• 200g pumpkin, peeled and seeded and cut into chunks
• ~1/4 c. dark raisins
• 200g zucchini, trimmed and quartered
• 1 small cabbage, halved
• 1 Tbsp. ghee (optional)
• red pepper sauce (or harissa and extra broth)

Couscous with Lamb's Head and Seven Vegetables

Ingredients

• 1 c. dried chickpeas
• 2 lambs' heads
• 1 Tbsp. coarse sea salt
• 1 Tbsp. black peppercorns, ground
• 2 Tbsp. saffron water²
• 1/2 tsp. ground turmeric
• 2 onions, quartered
• 2 (7-8cm) cinnamon sticks (preferably cassia)
• small bundle of cilantro & parsley, tied together
• 4-5 very ripe tomatoes, quartered
• 8 Tbsp. unsalted butter, divided
• 3.5L water
• 200g carrots, peeled and cut into 5cm sticks
• 200g turnips, peeled and cut into 5cm chunks
• 450g sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
• 450g instant couscous³
• 200g pumpkin, peeled and seeded and cut into chunks
• ~1/4 c. dark raisins
• 200g zucchini, trimmed and quartered
• 1 small cabbage, halved
• 1 Tbsp. ghee (optional)
• red pepper sauce (or harissa and extra broth)

The lambs' heads will need to be soaked in water, halved, cleaned, and tied together before cooking. Wolfert does not specify how long they need to be soaked for or how to cut or clean them. Perhaps this is something that is normally done by the butcher?
Once the heads have been sorted out, you may proceed with the recipe as outlined above.

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¹ I'm not put off by the lamb's head itself, but I worry about prions... I'd honestly really love to try brains at some point, but I don't think I ever will because it's just not worth the risk. ^Back
2 I don't use saffron water in large enough quantities often enough for it to be worth it for me to keep it on hand in the fridge. I usually just mix it up as I need it. In this case I crushed a scant 1/8 tsp. of saffron threads and poured over 2 Tbsp. of boiling water. ^Back
3 The original recipe was for 680g of couscous, but I got mixed up and only did 450g. That said, I don't think I would've been able to handle more than ~500g in one go anyway, so it was just as well. Even with just 450g, this produced A LOT of couscous. I'd advise against making more than that in one go unless you a) have a very large steamer/couscousiere, b) have a very large platter and c) have a huge number of people to feed! Seriously, we fed 7 people out of this, sent leftovers to two different households, and still have a huge container of couscous sitting in the fridge the next day. Proceed with caution! ^Back
4 I never bother peeling my chickpeas. I don't mind the skins and I find peeling them annoying (despite Wolfert's clever tips). ^Back
5 I could only fit 3L of water into my pot. Given the reduced amount of liquid, I opted to cook my broth fully covered rather than partially covered. This seems to have worked out fine. ^Back
6 Wolfert notes that the dish can be prepared in advance up to this point. Warm everything back up 30-60 minutes before serving and continue with the recipe as directed. ^Back
7 The instructions for this variation said to omit the chickpeas and chicken, but to optionally include fava beans. It was unclear whether fresh or dried fava beans were intended. Looking at the recipe again, I think it was probably meant to be made with fresh fava beans, but I made it with dried, so that's what I've written instructions for here. That said, feel free to leave out the fava beans entirely and substitute some other vegetable instead. ^Back
8 Although the recipe calls for lamb shanks, we were already having a lot of lamb for dinner and we have a lot of beef in the freezer right now, so I opted to use two beef shank steaks in place of the lamb shanks to make the broth. ^Back
9 I was intending to use sweet potatoes for my couscous, but I was unsure of the quality of my remaining sweet potatoes and I had some lovely fresh potatoes out of my parents' garden, so I just used those instead. Different flavour, for sure, but still very nice. ^Back