beans & pulses

An Egyptian soup made with sprouted fava beans.

A traditional soup from Morocco and Algeria with lentils, beans, rice,vegetables and meat.

Dal is the Indian name for lentils, includinng red split lentils. You can make a dal dish wiht the consistency of a soup or thicker, to serve as a wholesome vegetarian stew.

Pasta e fagioli is an old Italian stew that the peasants ate because it was easy to make, inexpensive, and hearty. Serve with crusty Italian bread.

Lentil soup is popular in the Greece menu when the Greek Orthodox Church prohibits eating meat or fish, especially during the Great Lent and Good Friday. Lentils are a good source of iron and proteins. Lentil soup is straight forward to make and it can be prepared without oil, if necessary.

This is the Galician white bean soup recipe, known as caldo gallego adapted to the ingredients at hand.

Far east of Verona is a town called Trieste. From this city hails a soup that shows how the cuisine of Italy has been influenced by other cultures. It uses sauerkraut!

Despite the large number of ingredients, preparation of this traditional soup from the north is really simple. All the work is in simply chopping and slicing the vegetables and the ham.

This Sicilian lentil salsa is a sauce that takes just a bit more preparation but, oh my, are the results ever worth it!

In a land with so many cultures living side by side, you would expect India's desserts to be equally varied. Even the venerated vada or vadai - a type of fritter or donut - shows this spread of ideas. Here is a type made from urad dal, a type of black lentil that mashes nicely into a dough.