For a straightforward green salad, this quick and easy blue cheese dressing provides a striking topping.
| Prep Time: | 15 mins |
| Cook Time: | 45 mins |
| Total Time: | 1 hr |
| Servings: | 4 |
| Yield: | 4 servings |
Ingredients
- ¾ cup brown lentils
- 4 cups water
- ¾ cup uncooked long grain rice
- 1 cup elbow macaroni
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- 2 large onions, chopped
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 (15.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes
- ¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes, or to taste
- salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- Combine the lentils and water in a large saucepan. Bring to a boil, then simmer over medium heat for 25 minutes. Add the rice to the lentils, and continue to simmer for an additional 20 minutes, or until rice is tender.
- Fill a separate saucepan with lightly salted water and bring to a boil. Add the macaroni and cook until tender, about 8 minutes. Drain.
- Meanwhile, heat the vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add onion and garlic; cook and stir until onion is lightly browned. Pour in the tomatoes and season with red pepper flakes, salt and pepper. Simmer over medium heat for 10 to 20 minutes.
- In a large serving dish, stir together the lentils, rice and macaroni. Mix in the tomato sauce until evenly coated.
Reviews
I followed UmmOmar’s instructions (under reviews)..but used 6 tsp of tomato paste and two teaspoons of cumin, added 1/4 tsp. of coriander. Added a bit more salt to taste. For a meatless dish, this tastes pretty good. The texture was a bit soft and some might find it too pasty. My 16 year old son said it was “good” and ate two helpings. We are trying to eat less meat and this meal provides protein with the lentil/rice/macaroni combo. I will probably experiment even more with this recipe in the future. It is healthy and delicious.
Could definitely use cumin and a bay leaf or two.
This recipe is missing a very key ingredient that corrects for the blandness. Egyptians use a spice mix called Baharat, which is a combination of cinnamon, cumin, nutmeg, coriander, pepper, and paprika. Recipes on other websites for Koshari either list the ingredients of baharat or provide a link to a baharat recipe. The baharat is used twice, once as an ingredient in the tomato sauce, and then more is added to each plate to taste. My household ate a helping without realizing the tomato sauce had most of the spices and flavor, and yes it is very bland and starchy without the sauce, spices, and fried onions to provide flavor and texture.
Did not add Macaroni. Awesome !!!
You absolutely cannot leave out the fried onions. Everywhere in Egypt serves this with crispy caramelized onions on top and most places have hot sauce and a garlic sauce that you can add, which makes it better (not as bland). In fact, whenever I order this in Cairo I always ask for extra onions.
The texture was different, in a good way. But it was kinda tasteless, and very spicey. I followed some of the reviews, and added lemonslices to serve, added cumin and blended the tomatosauce. But this dish wasn’t for us.
Try this for a healthier twist: I got confused and used black beans instead of lentils:-) instead of rice, use Quinoa Use whole wheat elbow macaroni Now the trick with delicious Koshary is the sauce that you drizzle on top: – first, brown the onion in olive oil very very well, when very brown, add the tomato paste/sauce. then add LOTS of crushed red pepper, a dash of cumin, and salt/pepper. after it’s cooked and your afraid the onion is going to burn, turn it off and cover the pot. Then in a separate very small saucepan, brown crushed garlic in olive oil. while it is cooking, add some ground coriander. when the garlic is very golden, turn of the flame and quickly splash with a little red wine vinegar and then take the whole thing and splash into the tomato sauce and cover it quickly. After a few seconds, open briefly, stir with a spoon and cover again. Once you’ve layered the Koshary in the serving plate, drizzle the sauce over and serve immediately.
The authentic Egyptian Koshari is a great street food, and you can find vendors all over Egypt selling it. Typically, the sauce is served to the side. Egyptians us ditalini pasta and also add chickpeas. I soak the chickpeas overnight, and then add them to the lentils to get extra cooking – they will be slightly crunchy. This does require every sauce pan I own to make, plus my skillet, but the results are yummy! Jordanian Koshari does not have the pasta. You can also make this with less rice and more lentils if you are concerned about carbs. I’ve seen this made on the streets of Cairo, and they use quite a bit of dried pepper and cumin. It should have a spicy afterbite.
I haven’t tried this particular recipe although I make Koshari fairly often. I serve the tomato sauce (dakuse) on the side and don’t mix it with the onion. I fry the onion to a crispy, golden brown. I mix the rice, pasta and lentils and serve the dakuse and onion on the side. The onion is my favorite part. I make the dekuse by boiling a can of rotel (choose your level of spiciness), I add a couple of cloves of garlic and then puree it. This sounds like a strange dish but it is delicious! Great for vegetarians! Glad someone posted it. BTW: I also cook rice, lentils and pasta separately then mix together.
I was really excited when I first found this recipe because I love the Egyptian culture and was ecstatic that I would be able to sample some of the authentic cuisine from Egypt. So I was extremely disappointed when this recipe flopped completely at my house. It was just way too starchy and way too bland. In fact, I’ve never eaten something this bland before. No amount of extra tomatoes, garlic,onions or salt seemed to make it any more flavorful, it just made it overly salty. I feel bad about the poor review, but I will not be making this again. 🙁
So wonderful! I used tomato paste & veggie stock to thin it out instead of diced tomatoes. I also added cumin as suggested by another review.
This was certainly something different, in a good way, it could certainly feed a big family on a tight budget… I am not sure if I will make it again, but it is certainly worth trying at least once.
Made this after a friend from Egypt told me about it. This recipe sounded closes to the one she was trying to explain to me. It’s actually more filling than it looks/sounds. Our family loves this cheap and tasty side dish with falafel.
I never thought this combination of ingredients would be so tasty, but it is very good!
The flavor and texture of this dish were great. However, if I make it again, I will double the sauce, as I prefer a less dry dish typically. Overall, a unique and yummy dish. I had everything in the pantry so it was easy to throw together.
Loved it! Reminds me of Cairo. 🙂
Great meal! We served lemons on the side and it added a lot. It’s hard to believe such simple ingredients can have such a great complex flavor. We’re picking a country a week to sample a meal from and this was our Egyptian meal. I’m a veg so it worked great. All four boys ate it and the 5 yr had three servings!
We love this. Over the years I have changed it just a little. I add cilantro and kalamata olives(sliced) right before serving. I always put the crushed red pepper flakes on the table; just in case anyone wants a little more heat.
I liked this, but I think I liked it better than everyone else. It was a little bland, so I added a little here and there to spruce it up. Had it with naan, and it was good!
I made this recipe using orzo pasta instead of elbow macaroni, and added an 8 oz can of no salt tomato sauce at the end (for a double batch) but other than that cooked it exactly as instructed. It came out excellent! Good thing I made a double batch, I can tell this is going to disappear fast!
First off the amount of water to lentils/rice is completely wrong. I had the original 4 cups of water which was completely gone by the end of the first 25 mins. So when I added the rice I added an EXTRA 2 cups of water. It still cooked off all the water and burned before the rice was finished. Further more, the sauce as called for is bland. I ended up adding tomato paste and curry powder to it before it had any flavor at all. This dish is also severely lacking in salt!