The word fatteh comes from the Arabic verb fatta, meaning “to break up” or “to crumble,” and it refers to the bread element of this composite dish made of bread, meat (lamb, chicken, or sheep’s trotters), and/or chickpeas and yogurt and topped with toasted pine nuts. The bread is toasted or fried, then broken up and spread on the plate before being covered with the other ingredients. The recipe varies from country to country, and within each country there are different ways of making fatteh. The Arabian Gulf version is known as tharid and it is reputed to have been the Prophet Muhammad’s favorite dish. The Egyptian version is somewhat more complex, with added rice and tomato sauce, while the Saudi version below is made with fried vegetables. Most versions of fatteh are main courses, but when made with chickpeas alone, it becomes a breakfast dish in both Lebanon and Syria.

SERVES 4

INGREDIENTS

• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 small onion (about 3½ ounces/100 g), thinly sliced
• 1 medium tomato (about 3½ ounces/100 g), cut into small dice
• ½ teaspoon finely ground black pepper
• Sea salt
• ½ cup plus 1 tablespoon (140 ml) sunflower oil
• 3 medium zucchini (about 10½ ounces/300 g in total), cut into sticks as for French fries
• 2 small Japanese eggplants (about 5 ounces/150 g in total), cut into sticks as for French fries
• 2 cups (17 ounces/500 g) Greek yogurt
• 3 cloves garlic, minced to a fine paste
• 2 medium pita breads, split horizontally into 4 disks, or 4 Turkish durum breads, toasted in a medium oven until golden brown
• ¼ cup (50 g) pine nuts, toasted in a hot oven for 5 minutes

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Heat the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the onion and sauté until golden, about 10 minutes. Add the tomato, black pepper, and salt to taste and cook until the tomatoes have softened but have not turned completely mushy.
2. Set a fine-mesh rack over a rimmed baking sheet or line it with paper towels. Heat the sunflower oil in another large skillet over medium heat. Fry the zucchini until cooked through, crisp and golden. Place on the rack to drain or drain on paper towels. Sprinkle with salt to taste. Repeat with the eggplants.
3. Mix the yogurt with the garlic and season with salt to taste.
4. To assemble the fatteh: Put a disk of toasted bread on a plate. Arrange twice as much zucchini as eggplant in a nice pile in the center of the bread. Top with one-quarter of the onion-tomato mixture. Drizzle one-quarter of the yogurt over the vegetables without entirely covering them. Garnish with one-quarter of the pine nuts. Quickly make the other 3 plates in the same way. Serve immediately.