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I grew up on Lebanese food. While in a restaurant you may have many side dishes, at home it was more usual to have one dish. That said, going to a less fancy restaurant, it wouldn't be weird to grab a plate with nothing else, like at home. Some examples of things we'd eat as the entire meal: * Fatteh/tisi'yeh, a dish made with a layer of bread, then boiled chickpeas, then yoghurt, and topped with some toasted pine nuts, melted ghee, paprika. Sometimes in a restaurant, this is part of a larger spread of food. * Any variety of kebbeh (there are many). We'd eat this with bread. In a restaurant, kebbeh would not be the singular dish. * Various things referred "tabakh" (lit. cooking lol) which we'd usually eat with rice or burghal (crushed wheat) cooked with vermicelli noodles. You can then say that's multiple dishes, but it's kind of like bread. Examples: bazala (peas, carrots, maybe potatoes, coriander in a tomato sauce) on rice, fasulya (white beans in a tomato sauce) on rice or burghal, al-asiyeh (potatoes, carrots, corriander stew) on burghal, spanegh (spinach, minced meat, pine nuts) with rice, and many others. Most of this is sometimes cooked with diced lamb of shredded chicken. * Lahm bi ajeen (minced meat cooked with onions and molasses on dough with pinenuts) would be sufficient a meal, sometimes perhaps with a quick salad. Not a complete meal in a restaurant typically. * We were more than happy to throw diced lamb (skewered with some onions), kafta, or chicken on the barbecue and eat with bread, maybe a garlic dip for chicken, occasionally with a salad, occasionally throwing some potatoes or similar vegetables on the barbecue. In a restaurant, a barbecue dish would have many sides. * We'd pan fry some diced lamb in ghee, drizzle some pomegranate molasses and eat with bread. * Pan fried potatoes with eggs on top, eaten with bread. * Pasta cooked in yoghurt + coriander and garlic. * A leafy green like spinach called sili', not sure what it is in english, cooked with black eye beans, then a squeeze of lemon and eaten with bread. * Foule which is just fava beans stewed, we'd eat with bread. Squeeze of lemon. Maybe some pickles, olives, tomato, and cucumber on the side. In a restaurant, this'd probably be part of a wider breakfast spread. All this is to say, it was normal to serve food from a single pot or tray and eat with utensils or bread, or from two pots placing rice/burghal on the plate then scooping the "tabakh" on top. For us bread is very normal throughout the day, it is thin, we'd rip off a bit to grab food, not very heavy. Modern bakeries make bread looking like https://www.yum.com.au/d-lebanese-bread-bag-x-6.html All said, my parents grew up poor, so that background could reflect our norms. (edit) We also did not grow up around much family, so large gatherings were uncommon for us, which differs from typical Lebanese culture. |
I knew a couple from south Lebanon "Si and Sue" Haddad. Si would make me cardamom flavoured coffee and some baklava. Sue made the food eggplant always seemed to be on the go.
Very friendly and a very wide range of food, a great culture to grow up in.