Lablabi
A Tunisian workers' breakfast, sold in Tunis from dawn. The soup is startlingly plain — chickpeas, garlic, cumin and water — and all the complexity comes from what is layered into the bowl. Two things are compulsory. The bread must be stale, since fresh bread collapses to mush instead of absorbing broth. And the chickpeas are cooked until they break down — some grains must disintegrate and thicken the broth, because this soup has no other thickener.
Your own work in that: 10 min.
- Soaking the chickpeas 720 min
- Cooking 75 min
- Harissa and toppings 10 min
- Building the bowl 10 min
Step by step
0 / 8 doneSoak the chickpeas with soda
Cover the chickpeas with cold water and half a teaspoon of bicarbonate and soak overnight (10–12 hours). The soda softens the skins and noticeably shortens the cooking — in this soup the grains have to break down, so the help is welcome.
Ingredients: 300 g chickpeas · 2000 ml water · 6 cloves garlic · 2 tsp cumin · ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda · 2 tsp salt · 60 ml olive oil
Cook until completely soft
Drain and rinse the chickpeas, cover with 2 litres of fresh water, add the peeled garlic cloves and simmer gently 60–75 minutes, until the grains start falling apart. Not al dente — a grain should crush against the tongue. The salt goes in near the end, with the cumin.
Ingredients: 300 g chickpeas · 2000 ml water · 6 cloves garlic · 2 tsp cumin · ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda · 2 tsp salt · 60 ml olive oil
Cooked to collapse — some grains must thicken the broth.Crush some of the chickpeas
Lift out a cupful of chickpeas, crush them with a fork and return them to the pot. This is the only thickener in the soup — without it the broth stays watery and the bread floats instead of soaking.
Ingredients: 300 g chickpeas · 2000 ml water · 6 cloves garlic · 2 tsp cumin · ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda · 2 tsp salt · 60 ml olive oil
Season with cumin and oil
Add the cumin and salt to the pot, pour in 60 ml of olive oil and stir. The oil blends into the thickened broth and gives the soup body and shine. Add the cumin only now — added late it keeps more of its aroma. Simmer for another 5 minutes and taste for salt.
Ingredients: 300 g chickpeas · 2000 ml water · 6 cloves garlic · 2 tsp cumin · ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda · 2 tsp salt · 60 ml olive oil
Tear stale bread into the bowls
Tear the stale bread into uneven pieces by hand and half fill deep bowls with it. By hand, not with a knife: ragged edges soak up broth far better than clean cuts.
Ingredients: 300 g bread · 4 pcs eggs · 120 g tinned tuna · 60 g olives · 2 tbsp capers
Torn by hand — ragged edges soak better than cut ones.Poach the eggs in the broth
Pour some of the broth (without the chickpeas) into a wide pan, bring to a gentle simmer and crack the eggs straight into the broth. Cook 3–4 minutes, until the whites set and the yolks stay liquid. Poached in broth rather than water, they pick up the cumin and garlic. Return the broth to the pot afterwards.
Ingredients: 300 g bread · 4 pcs eggs · 120 g tinned tuna · 60 g olives · 2 tbsp capers
Straight into the broth, at a gentle simmer — the yolk must stay runny.Pour boiling broth over the bread
Spoon the chickpeas over the bread, ladle over the boiling broth and wait 1–2 minutes for the pieces to swell. The bread should stay moist but still present in the mouthful — soaked through it turns the soup into uniform mush.
Ingredients: 300 g chickpeas · 2000 ml water · 6 cloves garlic · 2 tsp cumin · ½ tsp bicarbonate of soda · 2 tsp salt · 60 ml olive oil
Add the toppings and serve at once
Add the egg, tuna, olives and capers, set a spoon of harissa to one side, drizzle with oil, dust with cumin and parsley and squeeze over lemon. Leave the harissa apart — everyone stirs in as much as they want.
Ingredients: 4 tbsp harissa · 1 pcs lemon · 4 tbsp olive oil · 1 tsp cumin · 3 tbsp parsley
Before you start
A soup of toppings, not broth
In Tunisian bars you often tear the bread into the bowl yourself, and the vendor ladles over the broth and adds toppings to order. The broth is the background here — the character comes from the harissa, cumin, oil, egg and capers.
Harissa homemade or from a tube
Tunisian harissa is a hot paste of dried chillies with garlic, coriander and caraway. If using a ready one, loosen a spoonful with a spoon of oil and lemon juice — straight from the tube it is too thick to disperse in the broth.
The broth keeps three days
The chickpea broth alone keeps three days in the fridge and thickens daily — thin it with water when reheating. Always build the bread, egg and toppings fresh in the bowl — an assembled soup quickly turns to mush.
