Maftoul

Ingredients

• 2 kg chicken, cut into 4 or 8 pieces

• 1 tablespoon olive oil

• 1.5 tablespoon cumin

• ½ teaspoon turmeric

• 1 teaspoon allspices

• 1 tablespoon salt

• 1.5 kg onions, cut into mid-sized cubes

• ½ kg chickpeas, canned or precooked 

Maftoul Ingredients:

•1 kg maftoul (Palestinian coucous)

• 1 small onion, finely chopped

• 1 tablespoon cumin

• ½ tablespoon salt

• 2 tablespoon olive oil

Preparation

For the Stew: In a large pot, sauté chicken with olive oil for 5 minutes on a medium heat. Add cumin, salt, turmeric, and allspices. Cover chicken completely with water and leave it until it’s partially cooked for about half an hour. Add onions and chickpeas to the partially cooked chicken and leave it for another20 to 30 minutes until it’s all cooked.

For Maftoul: cooking process can be done using one of two methods, both of them require a steamer or a heat-proof colander pot (which is a special kind of pot comes with holes, placed over a normal pot) where maftoul will be cooked by the steam not direct heat. Two methods are:

•  Cooking maftoul by the steam of chicken stew: Place maftoul in the the colander and put it over boiling chicken stew pot while it’s still over heat.

•  Cooking maftoul by the steam of boiling water: If the colander you have is small and does not match with the size of chicken stew pot, place it over any other size compatible pot after filling it with boiling water.

After placing maftoul in the colander, make a small hole in the maftoul, add finely chopped onion, cumin, salt. Then close the hole (as if you’re burying onion and spices inside maftoul). Cover the colander by a lid and leave it to be cooked by the raising steam for about 15 minutes until a lot of steam is rising from maftoul colander.

Our maftoul in a serving plate/pot, add add olive oil and 1 cup of chicken stew to them and stir until well mixed. Pour chicken stew in a different serving bowl and serve hot.

Lara Khouli