Street snacks and tea-time bites
- Falafel: crisp fritters of soaked raw chickpeas and herbs, the Levant’s favourite street food, eaten in pita with tahini sauce.
- Fatayer: soft triangular pies filled with tangy spinach, onion and sumac.
Tips
- For falafel, always use soaked dried chickpeas, never cooked ones.
- Squeeze spinach well and seal fatayer firmly so they don’t open in the oven.
- Both freeze well: shape falafel and fry from frozen; bake fatayer and reheat in a hot oven.
For iftar
Both are favourites at Ramadan iftars across the Arab world, alongside shorbat adas and fattoush. South Asian cooks can think of falafel as a herby cousin of daal pakoras, and fatayer as a soft, baked spinach samosa.