Side · The Levant and the wider Arab world
Mujadara
Lentils and rice under a heap of deeply browned onions.
About the dish
Mujadara is a dish of lentils and rice, or sometimes bulgur, topped with deeply browned onions. It has been eaten across the Arab world for centuries as a filling, inexpensive meal, and it is a common dish during Lent. The name is often explained as meaning pockmarked, for the lentils scattered through the rice.
The onions are the heart of it. A large heap is sliced thin and cooked slowly in a generous amount of oil until deep brown, and part of them is often fried further until crisp. Some of the onions and their flavored oil go into the pot, where brown or green lentils are partly cooked, then the rice and cumin are added with water until both are tender and the liquid is absorbed.
The rest of the onions go on top. Their sweetness and the slightly bitter edge of the darkest pieces sit over the earthy, savory lentils and the warm cumin. Mujadara is served warm or at room temperature, often with plain yogurt and a sharp salad of tomato and cucumber, which bring the sour notes the dish itself leaves out.
Written from general cooking knowledge, as background on a dish from the game’s recipe book. It is not a tested recipe.
The flavors it leans on
Mujadara in Night Kitchen
In the game, Mujadara is a side in the recipe book. A plate is named Mujadara when it holds these cards and is cooked with exactly this technique, with at most one extra ingredient.
Ingredients
- Red lentils
- Rice
- Onion
Technique
- Caramelize
How those cards taste
Cooked from just these cards for an average ticket, before tonight’s mood and quirks, it would please Theo (3 stars) most.
“Lentils and rice with onions fried almost black. Cheap as a song and twice as good.”
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