Fatteh – baked chickpea/pita dish

[ChefCrash]

Thanks Hassouni

I was introduced to this dish on my trip to Lebanon this past summer and was reminded of it by Hassouni in his blog.

Glad I could provide some inspiration! Sahtein!

[Hassouni]

village bread, ya'ni, markouk?

[ChefCrash]

Yes

village bread, ya'ni, markouk?

[nolafoodie]

...Or village bread, ya3ni, rgheef? :-)

Great story -- a bread sandwich. That sounds like something my family would do. :-)

My sister once told me about a foreign exchange student who was shocked to learn that many New Orleanians eat red beans and rice with bread. She was incredulous: "you eat the bread with the rice? How can you eat the bread with the rice?" I told my sister not to say anything to the poor girl about mansaf. ;-)

Anyway, back to fatteh, I hadn't heard of it either until I tried it in Jordan. In our community (West Bank village), "fatt" is a generic term for torn pieces of bread topped with a liquid-based food (soup, stew, "tabikh," or "yakhni" type of thing), such that the bread becomes mushy. (It's also, at least in my extended family, the term we use for leftover mansaf.) Fatt is very popular with babies and the elderly. :-)

It really is interesting how different places have different takes on dishes, not just from region to region, but also state to state, and whatever smaller divisions (cities, villages, etc.) exist within states -- not to mention differences from family to family within the same town! That's what I like so much about this forum -- we can compare notes and try all the variations on these dishes. Cheers!