Name: Molokhieh soup with broad beans (Besara)
Yield: Serves four
Cuisine: Palestinian
Ingredients: 250 g chopped frozen molokhieh (or 400 g spinach, stems discarded (200 g), plus 150 g okra, sliced into 2–3mm rounds); Salt and black pepper; 700 g frozen podded broad beans (450g once removed from their skins); 2 tsp coriander seeds, lightly toasted and roughly crushed in a pestle and mortar; Warm bread (optional); 1 onion, finely chopped (150g); 1 tsp cumin seeds, lightly toasted and roughly crushed in a pestle and mortar; 2 tbsp olive oil; 15 g dill leaves, roughly chopped, plus a few extra chopped leaves to serve; 1 lemon, quartered; 700 ml chicken (or vegetable) stock; 15 g parsley leaves, roughly chopped, plus a few extra chopped leaves to serve; 15 g coriander leaves, roughly chopped, plus a few extra chopped leaves to serve; 3 large garlic cloves, crushed; 1 large red chilli (15 g), thinly sliced

Preparation info

Serves
four

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

Falastin

By Sami Tamimi and Tara Wigley

Published 2020

About

Besara is somewhere between a soup and a thick, warm dip. Broad beans are the main ingredient, pointing to its Egyptian origins before the dish spread across the Levant. By the time it got to Palestine, the herbs in the Egyptian version – coriander and parsley – were matched by Palestine’s flavour-packed green leaf, molokhieh. Wherever it is made across the Levant, the presence of fried onion, chilli, lemon and olive oil are a constant.

Molokhieh is a bit like spinach but its textur