We visited the Lebanese restaurant Mounè in Marseille, where we met Najla and Serje, who introduced us to the rich world of Lebanese cuisine, the use of spices, and some key ingredients in their dishes. Together, we prepared two traditional Lebanese recipes: meatballs in tahini sauce, originally called Dawood Basha, and a vegetarian dish, fava beans and rice. Here, we also learned the technique of Maqluba, if you don’t know what it is, make sure to watch the video!
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00:00 Introduction
00:50 Welcome to Mounè
01:10 The word Mounè
01:31 From Beirut to Marseille
02:25 How is Lebanese Food?
03:28 The menu
04:06 Dawood Basha
06:02 Tahini Sauce
08:35 Fava Beans and Rice
09:52 Maqluba Technique
12:34 Lunch time
13:20 Conclusion
[Music] Why we chose Mar also is because it looks like a bit of Beirut. Mun is um very personal cuisine. We tried couple of places and we’re like no this is not our culture. This is not our food. We started looking for a restaurant for a place to show people what our culture means. What do we know about Lebanese cuisine? Today we’re discovering more with Nashla and Serge who after moving to Marseilles reinvented themselves and gave life to a beautiful project. Muna. [Music] The Libanese community is one of the most deeply rooted and historic in Marcelia. It represent a key part of the city’s social and cultural fabric. Let’s go discover what happens when Libanese cuisine meet Marcilia. Mun is a Libanese term from traditional foods preserved for the winter such as olives, jams, pickles, tomato sauce, and neck plant in oil. This is the name of the restaurant of this episode, genuine and responsible. There is this uh popular thinking in Lebanon that whenever you need something, you go, you open and you you open the pantry in your house and you take the money and you cook with it. For example, when you’re away from home for a long time, you start to miss the tastes and smells you grew up with. Cooking the food you ate with your family can be a great way to feel close to home again. And uh whenever we used to come to Europe, we never found a place where we could eat like you eat at home in Lebanon. The thing is once you move to another place like you Italians, you eat Italian food and we have this nostalgia if you’re outside of Italy for a long time, you go like I need a pasta. I need to go eat pasta. It’s the same for us. We want to eat Lebanese food. So we wanted to really have a modern restaurant food uh with lots of influence because actually in Lebanon we have lots of influence in our food and that’s how everything came together. But what is Libanese food like? We didn’t know much about this type of cuisine. So we asked them to tell us more about it. In our culture there’s always someone cooks at home. In France once we came here in France people work a lot. So eventually the couple in the family they work a lot etc. In Lebanon the man works and there is housewives or the wife doesn’t work much etc. So eventually there’s someone cooking at home. So eventually Lebanese food is cooked food. Well it’s very uh healthy food. People think that it’s very heavy, but actually there are some heavy things in it, but it’s basically the Mediterranean diet. It’s also very seasonal uh because we have in Lebanon lots of uh regions with different climates. So, we always have uh vegetables all along the year. Every day they offer two dishes. One of them is always vegetarian or vegan. It’s a system that works because Muna is a small restaurant and more importantly the supplies they work with don’t have large quantities of products. [Music] Well, it’s often on daily basis. It depends on what I have ordered and uh it depends on the mood actually. So, what’s on the menu today? And more excitingly, what tasty dishes we will try. The first dish is meatballs in tahini sauce. [Music] The traditional recipe is in um it’s called dud basha is with um tomatoes, but we it’s not yet the season of tomatoes. So, we’re going to do it in tahini sauce. Uh, first of all, you have to prepare the meat. Uh, you have to use a good meat, of course. Uh, then with the meat, like you make basic meatballs like you do even in Italy. You put a little bit of bread in it. And you put uh we put garlic in this one. And we put uh seven spices, Lebanese, seven spices, cumin, coriander, powder, and paprika. Now the next steps. Cut the onion and cook them in a special oil. The meat oil here. Nothing goes to waste. And of course the spices. So I like to put the spices with the onions. That’s how actually we cook at home. My mom, my grandmom. It’s important. So you know the onion tastes like the spice. It takes all the the flavors. We use a lots of spices in Libanese food. It’s not particularly uh hot spices, but it perfumes the food. It’s very important for us. This is, for example, a typical uh mix of Libanese uh spice. And there’s a little bit of it in the meat. Yeah. And uh garlic and many other spices. Can give you the recipe later. Now it’s time for the sauce that makes this dish special. Tahini sauce. Watch closely and soon you’ll be able to make it perfectly too. So this is the tahini paste we get from uh Lebanon. We use a lot of tahini here. So you start by putting lemons. Then we’re going to need water. And we continue to stir it until it’s uh soft. So at the beginning it doesn’t look uh nice. It’s normal, completely normal. Then we will get better. [Music] But do we know what tahini is? It’s from the sesame seeds that are um roasted and then squeezed. This is basically the oil of the sesame seeds. We use it a lot uh in Lebanon for the hummus for example. We do sauces cold and hot sauces. So, it’s a bit tricky to cook it, but it’s very good when it’s cooked as well. So, we have to make it a little bit liquid because we’re going to cook it. We’re going to so put a little bit of salt and a little bit of paprika. [Music] Now that we have all the ingredients ready, it’s time to combine them. When the onions are soft, add the meatballs and then the tahini sauce. After that, stir everything well and let it cook slowly for 40 minutes. Yes, it take patience. Nla told us that the longer it cooks, the better it tastes. After letting it cook for a few minutes, a special ingredient very common in Lebanese cooking is added. So, this is ingredient that we use a lot in our food. It’s pomegranate molasses. for now. We’re going to add this here. And we’re going to stir this. Take note of these little tricks. If the sauce gets too thick, add some water. Now we close again. While the meatballs cook slowly over low heat, let’s check out today’s second dish, the vegetarian one. Fava beans and rice. We have lots of vegetarian dishes in Lebanon. So, it’s important. And I think now there is a demand as well. There are lots of vegetarian and even people who eat meat, they don’t want to eat meat every day. And we here in Marseilles, we have uh the opportunity to have good vegetables. As you might guess, this dish is pava beans. They need to be boiled for 5 minutes. Then start a nice hotel of onions in good olive oil. While it cooks, crush the garlic with a mortar and chop the coriander. You can make a pesto for the if you Yeah, it’s like a pesto. Then add both to the onions and of course the spices. Nula gets her spices straight from Lebanon and creates her home blends. There are a few of them that we buy uh from Lebanon. So yeah, we make many of them. Almost the last step is to add the fava beans and mix everything together. Here comes a key cooking technique. Okay, now we’re going to put the rice. Add the rice and leave it on top without steering. Then add the water. [Music] After that, put a weight on top like a plate to create layers so that the rice it stays whole. We’re going to leave it. When it’s cooked, we’re going to put a plate here and we’re going to turn it upside down. So, if the rice and the fava beans are mixed, you won’t have like two uh layers anymore. Let’s keep going. Here’s how to make the sauce for this dish. Fresh yogurt with fresh lemon, salt, garlic, and mint. When the dish is ready, it’s time to call in the expert, Sarah. Ready. [Music] We um make lots of dishes like this where actually when you flip the the the the dish, you have all the topping on top and the rice beneath. So if you have uh people at home, so you bring the dish and you put it and it’s beautiful. And this is called maaloo and it’s h very popular in Palestine especially. We do it as well in Lebanon and in Syria, but it’s really malub is Palestinians because some people just, you know, put the rice and mix it and put water just I prefer to do it that way. Now there’s just one thing left us tasting everything because between a bava and a cook meatball, it’s time for lunch. Sure, during the filming, someone has already tasted a few things here and there, but now she’s also see the guilty one. How all these flavors come together. [Music] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] The dishes are simple, creative, light, and incredibly tasty. Fresh ingredients carefully prepared. We learned the importance of tahini and ate one of the best humumos we’ve ever had. But the most beautiful part is the love, warmth and authenticity that fills the air and comes to in every flavors. Mun is a place for me since I don’t work in the kitchen. Always facing the clients where clients became friends. It’s a community. It’s a culture. It’s uh when people meet and enjoy something which put them together, you know, which is the food. We connect people together. We like people and it’s a place to to have a good time. And voila, we have a 7year-old boy and we have money. Really, it’s we did it uh with my husband together from scratch. we started everything and uh we even didn’t do a lot of communication. So really people it’s it’s people who appreciate our work who got what we wanted to do and uh that’s yeah it’s important for us. Okay. Thank you. Mun is a link to the land tradition and family roots. That’s what Serge and Najla wrote here. A part of their home and their story. Meeting them was a beautiful, enriching and moving experience. [Music]
1 Comment
Their story is so beautiful! I learned a bunch of things about Lebanese cooking! Najila and Serjie seem like such lovely people! Bravissimi!