Food in Libya is one of the most important activities of any Libyan family. The Libyans always say: one must eat well. Olive oil is the main ingredient of nearly any dish or meal in Libya, and it is almost impossible to cook or prepare any Libyan food without it. Its use in North Africa goes back thousands of years, and its healing goodness and life-prolonging properties were well known to the ancient Libyans and Egyptians. Offering of the olive branch to the Libyan oracle of the God Amon at Siwa indicates its sacred nature and antiquity.

Its use in Mediterranean diets has always been associated with good health and preventing major diseases like stroke, heart disease and lung cancer. The healing properties are found mainly in the extra virgin olive oil (and virgin olive oil), which is naturally produced, unrefined oil (also called "cold pressed"); while the active ingredients of the second type, known as "pure oil" or "olive oil ", were badly destroyed by the chemical processes used to extract the oil. According to recent research extra-virgin olive oil contains a natural painkiller similar to ibuprofen (found in headache tablets), and its active ingredient oleocanthal inhibits the activity of enzymes involved in inflammation just as ibuprofen does. Olive oil is also widely used as a skin ointment for its healing properties and in perfumes and medicines.

Ancient oil lamps in Libya were also kept alight by a regular supply of olive oil; adding a bit of salt around the wick prolongs the life of the lamp and reduces the consumption of oil. In fact the first commercial advert in the world was said to have been a Carthaginian oil lamp which went for sale for one penny.

"Your balanced diet is your medicine."

Dates & Date Syrup in Libyan Food:

Dates at various stages: yellow when first ripen, dark brown when mature, black-dark-red as date syrup (rreb). The image on the right shows the seed, housed inside the date, which will go on to become another Palm.

There are four main ingredients of  traditional Libyan food: olives (and olive oil), palm dates, grains and milk. These are very ancient foods and their use must go back to neolithic times, when humans first began to harvest their produce and make use of the natural surrounding ingredients. Grains are roasted, ground, sieved and used for making bread, cakes, soups, bazin, and other dough-based dishes. Dates are harvested, dried and stored for the rest of the year; they can be eaten as they are, made into syrup or slightly fried and eaten with "bsisa", or eaten with milk as a delicious delicacy. This traditional breakfast was very common in Libya until recently, when many of the traditional dishes and foods began to slowly disappear into the corridors of darkness, and supplanted by modern, bland, fat-rich foods.

Anthropologists tell us that early neolithic societies never "end the life" of female cattle and that it is always the male who is subsequently consumed; females are a regular source of both: milk and more females, to continue the cycle of families. Thus milk by itself becomes a meal of its own; and from milk one obtains ghee, yogurt, butter and cheese. Sahara's slim and dignified Tuareg can easily live on dried dates and fresh milk provided by the palm and the goat respectively. Date syrup, olive oil, and boiled dough make one of the most ancient and popular dishes in Libya: "a'eish", "utshu" or "bazin" -- names which also mean "food" and "life".

Palm dates, bsisa and a glass of milk: prehistoric dish.

Libyan Traditional Sand Ovens:

Baking Bread in Hot Sand, Ghadames.

The sand in Libya gets really hot in the summer that walking slowly on it with bare feet becomes unbearable; one needs to walk fast just like some walk on embers. Adding some real fire to that, one can imagine the effect on tender dough: instant baking.

Traditional Tuareg way of cooking bread by burying it in hot sand, which is as effective as an oven. The technique can also be used to bake potatoes (jacket potato) and eggs by burying them whole beneath the hearth. A good shake and a couple of whacks renders the bread clean and ready to eat (see photo below).

Local Libyan Bread From Ghadames.

Modern bread: the one on the right is made in the bakery, and the one on the left is home-made tajeen-bread, some of which is made of real wholemeal flour and thus very filling and tasty.

Libyan Black & Green Tea

One of the most important social occasions in Libya is the daily session of tea drinking. Brings families together, to chat, laugh, discuss and gossip about the highlights of the day and about life in general. Talking in Libya is very important social activity; it firmly bonds the family.

Libyan tea is rather very strong, thick, syrup-like black tea. After boiling water in a traditional tea pot, one adds a handful of red tea leaves, and leaves to boil for a long time (ten to twenty minutes). Remove the pot from the fire, open the lid, add some sugar, and boil again for a few more minutes. The ready tea is then removed from the fire, left to settle for a few seconds, and served in small glasses (as shown in the photo). Normally this is prepared during a chat session, around which members of the family gather together to socialise for an hour or so before they each carry on with their own separate paths, and during which one drinks two rounds of tea (each round prepared as above and lasts about half an hour). The third round is served with roasted peanuts or roasted almonds (mixed with the tea in the same glass).

In special occasions and for those who still follow the old tradition, the tea is first poured into another mug, and then using two mugs, one continuously empties the content of one mug into the other and then back into the original mug for at least twenty or thirty times, to produce what the Libyans call reghwet or reghwa, which can be translated as froth or foam, which is steadily added to one glass at a time as being made. After all the empty glasses are half-full with froth, the hot tea is poured over the froth and served hot. The trick to produce the froth is to lift one mug as high as possible, by stretching your arm over your head, while pouring the content into the other mug, and then repeat the process by lowering the raised hand and rising the other one, and so on until enough froth has been produced.

After meals, the Libyans traditionally always use green tea to aid digestion, and also help eliminate stomach problems after a heavy meal. It really does work. Green tea is better for you, especially when drank without milk. Adding milk destroys much of the powerful effects of its antioxidants.

One of the main components of tea are antioxidants. The process of oxidation in the human body causes damage to our cells. A free radical is a charged atom that steals an electron from a healthy cell in order to re-establish its own stability, leaving you with a bit of damaged DNA. Given time, the damage accumulates and as a result one ages faster or even dies quicker.

Now comes the important role of antioxidants. They talk to free radicals and say: hi, I have some free electrons, do you want some? The free radicals, being lazy, care less where the electrons come from and thus happily take up the free offer and spare your helpless, healthy cells the loss of much-needed electrons.

The process of oxidation is accelerated by pollution, alcohol and smoking, and therefore regular supply of green (or red) black tea and vitamins help keep the supply of antioxidants. Ask your Libyan guide to prepare some Libyan tea for you and taste the difference. The above photo is of a tea session we prepared for an Italian group while camping in the desert - in Adiri.

Garlic

Garlic and lemons for sale in a local market.

Garlic is also one of the most important items in Libyan food, as it is usually added to most dishes that involve preparing tomato sauce or stew, especially for couscous and pasta sauce. It is finely chopped over the sauce as it boils, just before taking it off the ring (or the fire source) to preserve its goodness and flavour; and then served immediately while its rich aroma still in the air. Garlic can also be crushed and then either mixed with honey and eaten with bread, or mixed with olive oil and spread over food and salads.

Garlic in fact is the most important medicinal food on the planet. It contains nearly 60 minerals, vitamins, antibacterial, anti-fungal and anti-cancer chemicals, all of which are almost essential to human's health, and many of which are said to ward off many types of cancer.

The way nature compacted the individual cloves into one uniform head is instantly comparable to a jar of multivitamin tablets - except that the manufactured multivitamin tables are said to be devoid of any goodness and many scientists still think they are a complete waste of money. If nature has already made them for us, why then buy expensive artificial ones? Is there anybody in my head that is not me?

Utshu, A'eish or Bazin

One of the main and most popular dishes in Libya. A traditional, and probably neolithic, dish made of dough and sauce. The dough is kneed into a semi spherical ball and placed in the middle of a large bowel, around which the sauce is poured, making the dish look like a rock island surrounded by water.

The Dough: the first stage is to prepare the flour which then can be stored for up to two years and used when needed: roast the grains in an empty frying pan until golden brown; grind into fine flour; sieve well and store away in a jar. To prepare the dish, take about one kilogram of flour from the mix, boil about third litre of water in a large deep saucepan, and then as the water is boiling keep adding a bit of flour with your hand while mixing with the other hand, using a large wooden ladle. Once you start this, do not stop, just keep adding flour with one hand while mixing in a circular fashion with the other, until the dough becomes hard to stir and the mixture solidifies into dough. Remove the saucepan off the ring, take out the dough, place in a larger bowel, and while wetting your hand with a bit of water (because the dough is still hot) start kneading the mixture into consistent dough, just as you kneed bread, and shape it into a ball, and finally place  in the middle of a large bowel and pour the sauce all around. It is eaten by hand by breaking a small bit with your fingers, pulling a small bit down into the sauce and kneading it with the sauce into a tasty lump which you throw into your mouth for further chewing. The traditional type of bazin, especially the one prepared by the mountain people, is very hard to drive the fingers in and thus known as "mountain bazin". This stiff consistency is achieved by boiling the final dough (after it has been prepared as described above).

Doughing: making the dough.

The consistency is solid and thick, where a bit of force is required to push your fingers through the finished dough. It is nothing like bread. And if you want a really tough bazin you need to visit Nafousah Mountain (say Jado) and ask for a traditional mountain bazin: very hard. Although in the above photo the cook is using one hand to mix the dough, usually women sit on the floor, wrap a thick cloth around the hot pan, and hold the pan between their feet, while both hands holding the wooden ladle (aghenjay) to mix the dough with their full strength - something many modern women cannot do, or instead they use white flour wich produces light and soft bazin, instead of the traditional wholemeal flour.

The dough then is worked into a solid dome-shaped lump and placed in the middle of the plate.

The Sauce: any kind of sauce can be used with this. Normally a simple meat and a couple of vegetables is used as follows: fry two large onions, add garlic, turmeric, chili powder, salt and tomato puree, then throw in the lamb chops (or beef or fish) and water, and then cook until the meat nearly done. Add potatoes and pumpkin pieces and further cook until vegetables are done. Pour the sauce around the dough, and serve while hot with lemon (ready to be squeezed into the sauce).

A simple version of white bazin (made of white flour) is normally cooked for breakfast, but eaten with olive oil and date syrup: instead of mounting the dough like a mound, spread flat onto a plate, then sprinkle with olive oil and pour some date syrup in the middle (or alternatively use honey, or sugar, or fenugreek powder instead of date syrup). It is eaten in a similar way: break a small piece of dough, mix thoroughly with oil, dip into the syrup and mix with your fingers a few more times before throwing it into the mouth for further chewing.

The sauce used for this one is made of tomato puree, turmeric, chili powder, potatoes, chicken and fenugreek seeds (still visible at the top). The fenugreek seeds are really unique: strong in flavour and slightly bitter.

The sauce used for this one is made of sour milk (milk that tastes like yogurt) and topped with fenugreek powder. Delicious, to say the least. Again, this is an ancient dish, possibly neolithic.

Libyan bazin with fish & potatoes

Zummeeta

Z'ummeeta or zumita is yet another ancient Libyan dish. It is a doughy dish made of mixing water with flour until it is firm and doughy. It is eaten by dipping a small bit, taken by hand, in olive oil, and with the option of dipping in chili sauce. It is usually eaten for breakfast, but some times it is eaten whenever one is hungry, as it takes only few minutes to mix.

The flour mix is made of whole grain barley or wheat, a bit of coriander and cumin seeds. These are dry roasted in an empty frying pan until golden brown, then ground into powder, sieved and finally placed in clay jars and put away. Normally this process is done once a year, although the mixture can last for even two years. Whenever you need some z'ummeeta, just take some flour, add a pinch of salt, mix thoroughly with a bit of water, spread on a plate, and pour the olive oil on top. The mixture breaks up in the hand nice and dry, and smells fresh with a hint of coriander and olive oil. The modern way of making it is to mix the oil with the mixture and serve it ready mixed, as in the above photo, normally with a bit of harisa in the middle as a dip.

Couscous (Kesksoo)

Traditional couscous meal, covered with a straw-madecover.
I can see the chickpeas (chick peas): an essential ingredient. From Ghadames, Libya.

Couscous is one of the most widely popular dishes in Libya and, for that matter, in the whole of North Africa. Its recent spread in Europe is a testimony to its unique qualities and special taste, rarely found in other dishes. The dish involves cooking two things: the couscous, made of wheat or barley, ground into coarse flour just like semolina (but without the stickiness), and the vegetable and meat sauce to go with it.

The couscous: to start with, sprinkle some salt, pepper, olive oil and a bit of water over the couscous grains, then mix thoroughly by hand, from right to left, slowly rolling the couscous grains into larger balls. Keep mixing and adding a few drops of water at a time until the balls become round and about a third the size of a rice grain. Keep mixing in this manner until all couscous has been used. (Nowadays you buy it mixed and ready to steam.) Place the mixture in a special saucepan called "keskas", which is like a steamer or a saucepan with lots of holes, and cover with the lid.

This steamer is then placed on top of the other saucepan containing the vegetable and meat sauce, so that the couscous will be cooked by the steam rising from the simmering sauce, thus transferring the flavour to the couscous itself. The modern, commercial way of cooking couscous by placing the contents of the ready-mixed couscous bag in a saucepan and covering it for a few minutes with boiling water does not produce a good quality couscous, but some tasteless stuff you buy in supermarkets.  Real couscous needs to be steamed over a good sauce for the flavour to soak in, and then needs to be thoroughly mixed with a bit of extra virgin olive oil to further enhance the flavour, before covering the couscous with the lamb and vegetable sauce.

Couscous with meat, vegetables, chickpeas, chips, and A fried hot green pepper on top.

The sauce's recipe:

• olive oil, water
• onion & garlic
• spices: chili powder, turmeric, cumin, coriander, salt.
• tomato pure
• vegetable: potatoes, carrots, pumpkin, chickpeas
• lamb meat (or fish, or dried octopus, or chicken): lamb meat is the traditional favourite for its rich flavour.

Heat the oil, fry the onions until golden brown, throw in the garlic, the spices and tomato puree and mix for a few minutes, and then add the meat and about half a litre of water and cover the saucepan with the lid and cook for at least half an hour. Then remove the lid and add the vegetable and the chickpeas to the sauce, make sure there is enough water but not to much so that the sauce comes out nice and thick, and place the steamer containing the couscous on top and cover with the lid and leave to cook for a further 15 or 20 minutes on a slow heat.

After that, take the couscous out of the steamer and pour into a large bowl and leave to cool for a few minutes, then sprinkle some olive oil and mix again, breaking the congealed clumps into fine soft grains of couscous and place back in the steamer for a further few minutes cooking.

To serve, put the couscous in a large bowl (if the whole family eating from one bowl) or serve small portions into plates, cover with the vegetable sauce (using a good ladle), place a piece of tender lamb on top of the sauce, then finally fry some finely chopped onions until golden and mix them with a bit more of cooked chickpeas and sprinkle the mixture on top of the sauce and the meat. Some people further place peeled boiled eggs between the lumps of lamp. Finally, do not forget to eat.

Sacks of dries beans, nuts, seeds and roots in a local market.

Dried beans and grains are also a fundamental part of food in Libya. Chickpeas are soaked in water for a few hours, then cooked with tomato and meat sauce for couscous or added to pasta sauce. Broad beans are cooked in a dipping sauce of tomatoes and herbs and deliciously eaten with bread.

Mb'atten

Mb'atten is really a Libyan specialty dish, prepared on special occasions, celebrations and festivities, often with Kofta and couscous. It is a unique dish never to be found anywhere else in the world (according to our current knowledge). It is made of slicing potato lengthwise into thin slices (about 3mm thick) but keeping each two slices joined together at the base, to form a sandwich, which will be stuffed with minced meat and herbs and then fried. The remaining mix of meat and herbs can be flattened into small burgers, dipped into white flour and then fried to make Kofta.

The Stuffing: a good quantity of minced meat (beef or lamb), about half of the mixture should be meat, a bundle of fresh green dill, a bundle of fresh parsley, two bundles of spring onion, a bit of fresh parsley, 3 cloves of garlic (ground into paste), teaspoon of salt, teaspoon of hot chili, 2 teaspoon of turmeric, a touch of cinnamon, 3 tablespoons of tomato puree, and one egg. (Modern variants of the dish do not include dill any more in the ingredients.)

Weighing fresh herbs at the local market. The most common herbs used in some dishes, like Mb'atten, include spring onions, coriander, parsley, dill, and vine leaves (used for stuffing with rice).

Cutting the fresh herbs, to be mixed with mince, egg, tomato puree, spices, salt.

Finely chopped herbs (left), then mixed with mince meat, spices and the rest of the mix (right).

Preparation: finely chop the fresh herbs (parsley, dill and spring onion) and place in a large bowel. Spice and season with the spice mixture and add the tomato puree, break in the egg and mix and squeeze (with your hands to force all the juice out of the herbs). Pour some oil in a frying pan, chop in one onion very fine, and add the mince, and cook until nearly done, and then put the mince in a bowel and leave to cool down, before finally mixing it with the fresh herb mixture.

How to cut the pototo as described: you cut a thick slice, then cut each slice half way down.

The second stage involves preparing the potatoes: slice the potato lengthwise, cutting one slice three-quarters down and stopping just before reaching the bottom, then cutting the second all the way down, ending with two slices of potatoes joined at the base, each about 3mm thick. Sprinkle some salt on all the slices and dry with kitchen paper, if wet. Open the two slices and stuff with the mixture (about 2 tablespoonfuls for each sandwich), until the sand witch is full and fat, and then tap in firmly with your hand along the exposed edge.

Stuffing the potatoes with the mixture of mince and herbs.

The herbs, the sliced potatoes, the egg mix and the flour. Stuff the slice, dipped in egg then in flour and put on the side (or straight into hot sizzling oil).

Hold the two slices from the joined end and dip the exposed stuffing into white flour and then dip (only the exposed stuffing, not the rest of the potato) in egg (to hold together while frying) and throw in a deep fryer (or frying pan with lots of oil), and fry until golden brown.

These are now ready to eat, but traditionally, they can be cooked for a further few minutes in a saucepan with a bit of tomato sauce, as follows: place all the remaining potato pieces that were left over from the slicing in the saucepan, place all the stuffed potatoes on top, pour in a bit of tomato sauce, cover the saucepan, and heat over a very low heat for about ten minutes. This turns the fried potatoes into soft and sauce-covered delicious chunks, just like adding a bit of ketchup to chips.  Serve warm with couscous or salad. If there is a lot of mixture left over, then roll into small balls, flatten onto a plate containing white flour, then fry in olive oil as koftas. The stuffed potatoes are also great cold, after being kept in the fridge overnight (my favourite).

Summer Salad

Traditional Libyan "slatha" is a main meal eaten by itself and is not a side dish that accompanies a main course. This is a traditional summer salad in Libya, often prepared by the beach for an easy and light lunch after swimming in the sea.

Preparation: cut one onion very thinly into a large bowel, chop five tomatoes into six segments each, cut half cucumber into small cubes, throw in a handful of pitted green olives, cut one fresh green chili pepper into small pieces, add a pinch of salt, 3 tablespoons of olive oil, and about half a cup of water. Mix well by hand, squeezing the tomatoes and the vegetable to release some of the flavour into the water (but not to much as to mush up the contents), squeeze a bit of lemon and serve with crispy bread.

Libyan Summer Salad

The dish is eaten by breaking a piece of bread and dipping it into the salad and lifting some of the vegetables with it by folding it over the vegetables. Many of the younger generations nowadays add a tin of tuna to the salad for richer flavour and some protein.

Pumpkins at sale in the local market.

Pumpkins are cooked in tomato and herb sauce with other vegetables like potatoes and carrots (or/and meat or chicken), and served either with couscous, rice or pasta, or even eaten as a dip with bread.

Shorba (Libyan Soup)

Fry finely-cut large onion and garlic in ghee until golden brown; add the meat cubes (beef or lamb), spices (turmeric, chili, salt, a bit of curry powder, and a teaspoonful of sugar), tomato puree and water, then cover and simmer for about 40 minutes until the meat is cooked. Add in the orzo (pasta shaped like pearls of barley) and cooked chickpeas and cook for 15 minutes until orzo is cooked. Chop a bit of fresh parsley and crush one clove of garlic and mix with olive oil and add to the mixture just before removing from the ring. Serve with lemon wedges, raw chopped parsley (sprinkled at the top) and crispy warm bread.

Peel and cut potatoes into thick slices, boil until cooked, crush, and spread in a "tajeen" (a baking tray). Fry thinly-chopped two onions until brown, and add the mince and cook for a few minutes, then add the crushed garlic and spice up with chili, turmeric, salt and curry powder, and stir and simmer until cooked. Remove and spread on a large plate and leave to cool. All the ingredients cold, add to the potatoes and mix in the beaten eggs and bake for 20 minutes at mark 180. Finally, take out from the oven, sprinkle some mozzarella cheese on top and bake for a further 15 minutes until the dish is covered with a light golden crust. Serve hot with crispy bread.

Boureek: Bureek: Burik

The Libyan basic boureek, also written as bourik, burik or bourek, is a very simple and deliciously crispy dish, made as follows:

• break an egg on a flat piece of pastry
• fold the other half of the pastry over to form a triangular shape
• pinch the edges together to seal firmly
• brush the edges with a solution of egg and water (to prevent the egg leaking out while frying)
• throw in hot oil to sizzle for a few minutes
• turn over and fry the other side for a few more minutes
• then take out and serve hot and crispy

Of course, there are other flavours of the dish, made by varying the filling, including one with minced meat: fry the meat with onions, add the herbs of your choice, then take a large table spoonful and spread on the pastry, break the egg on top, fold over and then continue as above. In other North African countries, like Algeria, the shape of the boureek is like a "spring roll" or a sausage roll.

Libyan Boureek

Lebrak

Lebrak is a dish made of stuffed vine leaves (locally called esselk leaves). In fact any kind of green thick leaves will probably do the job. The mixture is made of rice, tomato pure, herbs, spices, garlic, a bit of salt, and either small pieces of meat or mince. Mix all well, put a bit on a leaf, roll over and fold the edges, then place in a saucepan, making sure you place a few leaves in the bottom of the saucepan to take the heat, and these extra leaves (or carpet) often come out burnt. Once all in the saucepan, you need a lid that is slightly smaller than the saucepan so that it will drop all the way down inside the saucepan and sit directly on the stuffed pieces. Then you need a heavy stone to put on the lid, to keep it down. All this is to prevent the stuffed pieces from opening up while cooking. Finally put a little bit of water in the saucepan, not much at all (maybe a small cup), and then place over slow fire to simmer gently for about half an hour until the rice is cooked. Take out gently, sprinkle some olive oil, and serve. Really nice cold too.