Bazin (Libyan Barley Dome)

About This Recipe

Bazin is a dish you eat by feel. A thick paste of barley flour and water is boiled and beaten until it pulls away from the pot like glossy clay, then mounded smooth as a dome onto a large platter. Around it goes a deep red tomato-and-lamb sauce spiked with fenugreek, garlic, and Libyan hararat spice blend, with hard-boiled eggs nested in the gravy and a few wedges of potato. To eat, you pinch off a piece of bazin with the right thumb, dip it in the sauce, and pop it in your mouth. There are no forks, no plates — everyone gathers around the platter. Tripolitanians say a marriage can be judged by the bride's first bazin: too soft is a sign of weakness, too stiff a sign of stubbornness.

Ingredients

Serves 4

• 400 gbarley flour (or 75% barley + 25% wheat flour)
• 800 mlwater
• 1 tspfine salt
• 500 glamb shoulder, cut in 3 cm cubes
• 3 tbspolive oil
• 1 largeyellow onion, grated
• 4 clovesgarlic, grated
• 3 tbsptomato paste
• 400 gtinned chopped tomatoes
• 1 tbspground fenugreek
• 1 tbspLibyan hararat (or 2 tsp paprika + 1 tsp cumin + 1 tsp coriander + 1/2 tsp cinnamon)
• 1 tspground turmeric
• 1 tspharissa or chilli paste
• 2 mediumpotatoes, peeled and quartered
• 4eggs
• 600 mlwater (for sauce)
• salt to taste

Instructions

1. 1

   Sear the lamb

   Heat olive oil in a wide pot. Brown lamb cubes hard, 6 minutes. Lift out.

2. 2

   Build the sauce base

   Add grated onion and cook 6 minutes. Add garlic, tomato paste, fenugreek, hararat, turmeric, and harissa. Cook 3 minutes until thick and brick-coloured.

3. 3

   Simmer the marqa

   Return lamb. Add chopped tomatoes and 600 ml water. Bring to a simmer, season with salt, partially cover, and cook 45 minutes.

4. 4

   Add potatoes and eggs

   Drop potatoes and whole raw eggs (in shell, gently lowered) into the simmering sauce. Cook 15 minutes more — the eggs hard-boil in the sauce and take on its colour.

5. 5

   Boil bazin water

   While the sauce finishes, bring 800 ml water and salt to a hard boil in a heavy small pot. Pour in barley flour all at once. Do not stir yet. Cover and cook 8 minutes on medium.

6. 6

   Beat the dough

   Now the work begins. Beat the dough hard with a sturdy wooden spoon (mahrak) for 6–8 minutes — the dough must come together into one smooth, glossy mass that pulls away from the sides.

7. 7

   Mound the dome

   Wet a large round platter. Scrape the bazin onto it and shape into a smooth dome with damp hands — Libyans aim for the silhouette of a beehive.

8. 8

   Crown with sauce

   Peel the eggs and nestle them around the base of the dome along with the potato wedges. Spoon the lamb chunks around. Ladle generous sauce around (not over) the dome so the grey-brown stays clean. Serve immediately, eaten by hand.

Variations

• •

  Bazin bil tamr (date bazin) is a sweet breakfast version with date syrup instead of meat sauce.

• •

  Bazin malsouqa uses semolina instead of barley for a lighter, paler dome.

• •

  Some Benghazi families add a few capers to the sauce for a sharp note.

Storage

Sauce keeps 3 days; reheat gently. Bazin dough is best fresh — leftover dough can be sliced and pan-fried in olive oil the next day.

Frequently Asked Questions