Food Lust People Love: Arabic recipes

Made with fava beans, asparagus, fresh broad beans and halloumi cheese, this Duck Egg Najissiya is my delicious adaptation of an ancient Arabic recipe. It's great for brunch or even dinner.

Food Lust People Love: Made with fava beans, asparagus, fresh broad beans and halloumi cheese, this Duck Egg Najissiya is my delicious adaptation of an ancient Arabic recipe. It's great for brunch or even dinner.

To quote TasteCooking, whence came my introduction to this recipe, “Narjissiyeh literally means “like narcissus” and refers to a class of dishes made with sunny-side up eggs and fava (broad) beans described in the tenth-century cookbook Kitab al-Tabikh. It is believed the name was given to the dish because of its vibrant green, white, and yellow colors, just like the narcissus (daffodil) flower.”

Kitab al-Tabikh or Kitab al-Ṭabīḫ (Arabic: كتاب الطبيخ, The Book of Dishes) is the name given to three medieval Arabic language cookbooks. The oldest one, written in the 10th century, is credited to Ibn Sayyar al-Warraq, an Iraqi author from Baghdad. According to Wikipedia, “This is the earliest known Arabic cookbook. It contains over 600 recipes, divided into 132 chapters.” There are several translations available.

In case you were wondering, like I was, the very earliest written recipes we are aware of can be found in the Yale Babylonian Collection. Previously thought to contain pharmaceutical formulas, they were decoded by French Assyriologist and gourmet chef Jean Bottero. The three Akkadian tablets, dating to about 1700 BC, revealed, Bottero wrote in a description of his find, “a cuisine of striking richness, refinement, sophistication and artistry, which is surprising from such an early period. Previously we would not have dared to think a cuisine 4,000 years old was so advanced.” Source: The LA Times archive, 1985.

Now that we’ve had our little history lesson, let me tell you that we loved this dish! Some versions have ground meat but I chose to go vegetarian and upped the number of vegetables. If you've never eaten halloumi, it's salty and so good, especially when fried till golden!

Duck Egg Narjissiya

I happened to have duck eggs on hand but you can, of course, make this with regular hen’s eggs. Use whatever combination of green spring vegetables you love. Fava beans are traditional but asparagus, green beans, garden peas, young broad beans or even baby spinach will work. This recipe is adapted from one in New York Times Cooking. It serves two generously for brunch or dinner!

Ingredients

1 cup or 150g fresh or frozen fava beans (I used frozen)

~1 tablespoon olive oil

5 1/3 oz or 150g halloumi

3 oz or 85g fresh asparagus, trimmed

4-5 young broad beans (~ 25g)

3 cloves garlic

2 duck eggs

Fine sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Toasted bread, for serving

Method

Drop your fava beans in boiling water and then simmer them for 3-4 minutes. Refresh them in cold water. Pinch the skins off and discard, revealing the lovely green color inside.

Trim the young broad beans and cut them into diagonal pieces.

Cut the asparagus into diagonal pieces and finely slice the garlic then chop it a little.

In nonstick frying pan, heat a good drizzle of olive oil over medium flame. Add the slices of halloumi in a single layer. Do not move them around or flip them over until the side down has browned, about 2 minutes.

Turn them over and cook for another minute until the other side is browned. Transfer to a small plate and set aside.

To the same pan, drizzle in the rest of the olive oil, again over a medium flame. Add the asparagus and young broad beans. Cook, tossing around, just until bright green and glossy, about 2 minutes.

Sprinkle with fine sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Add fava beans and garlic and continue to cook for another minute or so stirring often.

Crack the eggs one at a time into a small bowl, then add them to the green vegetables in the pan.

With the tip of the spoon, spread the whites around slightly to ensure they cook evenly.

Return the browned halloumi slices to the pan, dispersing it evenly over the whites and greens.

Cook until the egg yolks are at your desired level of doneness. We like ours really runny!

Made with fava beans, asparagus, fresh broad beans and halloumi cheese, this Duck Egg Najissiya is my delicious adaptation of an ancient Arabic recipe. It's great for brunch or even dinner.

Remove from the heat and serve hot with toast for dipping.

Enjoy!

Welcome to the 14th edition of Alphabet Challenge 2026, brought to you by the letter N. Many thanks to Wendy from A Day in the Life on the Farm for organizing and creating the challenge. Check out all the N recipes below: