The Qatar Grand Prix Goes Well With Madrouba
Welcome to Grand Prix Gastronomy! This week, I’m cooking madrouba, a rice porridge hailing from Qatar.
This project is pretty simple. As a complement to each race weekend, I’ll be cooking the national dish of that race’s host country and sharing information about the process and that dish’s history along the way in an effort to grow more deeply immersed in the local culture from my own home.
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What Is Madrouba?
Here we are again: Another country that recognizes a version of machboos as its national dish! If you want to cook that tasty chicken and rice creation, I whipped it up for the first race of the year, in Bahrain. Today, to celebrate the Qatar Grand Prix, we’ll instead be making madrouba.
Madrouba’s name comes from the Arabic word for “hit” (darb) and roughly translates to “beaten rice.” It is, essentially, a spicy and savory porridge made with chicken, overcooked rice, and tons of spices — and it gets its name from the fact that you beat the mixture with a wooden spoon until it starts to look like oatmeal. Honestly, it sounded like the perfect dish for a cool, rainy day. And if you cooked up machboos, great news — you’ve got another excuse to use loomi, the dried limes you needed for that dish!
This Week's Recipe
All my recipes this week come from International Cuisine, a website dedicated to cooking around the globe! The site has a ton of delicious recipes that are compounded by an attention to historical detail that I just love — I don't just want to make a dish, I want to know why folks in that region make it.
So, I've nabbed my madrouba recipe from there, but I'll also be pairing it with a delicious Omani salad and khubz, a pillowy Arabian bread.
Cooking Madrouba
I started my Qatari cooking adventure with khubz, which I will admit did not turn out for me the way it was intended. Essentially, khubz should turn out like lil pita breads: all puffy and pillowy and hollow inside. Mine did not do that! I ended up with some delicious bread circles nevertheless, but I'm looking forward to trying this recipe again! I've found that my first go at a bread is usually a little bit of a disaster. On the second attempt, I can usually make things click! I won’t go into too much depth on the cooking process here; there are some videos on YouTube that I think will be far more instructive than anything I have to offer!
Next I whipped up my salad to give the flavors plenty of time to mingle. You'll thinly slice cucumbers and add it to a bowl with finely diced red onion, some halved cherry tomatoes, mint and parsley, lemon juice, and preserved lemon before letting it stand for an hour. The preserved lemons will probably take some legwork to source; I had to order mine online! They're basically pickled whole lemons, and while you only need a bit in this recipe, you'll probably have to buy an impressive jar of them. I've been cooking with them lately, and they make great salad dressings, cocktail ingredients, and sauces! Basically, anywhere you might add some acid and salt, pop in some diced preserved lemon.
Once the flavors have mingled, stir in some pepper and oil to finish things off.
And now, the main course: the madrouba!
Prep is pretty simple. First, rinse your rice until the water runs clear, fill up a bowl with water, and let it soak for about 30 minutes. Finely dice a red onion, then thinly slice another red onion. Mince some garlic and plum tomatoes (or, in my case, if you've forgotten to buy tomatoes: throw in a can of diced tomatoes). Chop your chicken into pieces, then assemble your spice blend of turmeric, cumin, coriander, ginger, cinnamon, black pepper, cardamom, cloves, cayenne, and nutmeg (whew!). You'll also need the black, papery flesh of four dried limes. If you don't already have a nut cracker, you'll want one for this!
Throw some ghee into a big pot and cook your diced onions until they're nice and brown. Then add in the tomatoes and garlic, cooking for a few minutes, until you add your chicken and the spice blend. Stir it all together, then fill your pot with water. Bring it to a boil and let it cook your chicken, about 10 minutes.
At that point, you'll add your rice, bring it back to a boil, then cover your pot, reduce the heat, and let it simmer for anywhere between one to two hours. You'll want to stir pretty frequently to prevent the rice from sticking to the bottom of the pot, and you'll know your meal is done when the rice is really mushy and starting to fall apart.
That's when you'll make your toppings. You'll fry your thin onion slices in some hot oil, then melt ghee and add cardamom, keeping it warm until things are nice and fragrant. In the meantime, you'll then “beat” or whip your madrouba with a wooden spoon. Basically, you just want the chicken to break up into small pieces and make sure the rice is nice and mushy.
You'll serve your madrouba by sprinkling your rice-and-chicken mixture with your fried onions and then drizzling some cardamom ghee over it. Use your khubz as silverware, and use your Omani salad to help cleanse your palate. I intended to serve it all up with some chenin blanc, but it appeared that I drank it before my meal! Instead, I opted for a chilled rosé, which is a nice, inoffensive compliment to the warm blend of spices.
So, What's the Verdict?
Oh. My. Goodness. Madrouba is like a hug in a bowl, and I am firmly obsessed.
My husband referred to this dish as “Middle Eastern risotto,” and he's not really wrong — even though it has more of a porridge-y texture in my eyes. Each bite is a comforting blend of flavor and texture. I've never had porridge before, since I was always a bit skeptical about the texture, but now I'm a convert.
I really do recommend some sort of greenery to go alongside this meal. Madrouba is really rich and delicious, but I found myself thankful to have a fresh bite of salad to pierce through all that flavor. The rosé I served also had a similar effect; a little freshness will go a long way.
You'll also want to make the toppings outlined by the recipe. The fried onions are so freakin’ good that I had to stop myself from snacking on them before I actually sat down for dinner. They add some much needed textural oomph, and they have a sharp, almost bitter flavor that makes each spoonful all that much more delicious. And the cardamom infused ghee? Amazing. A drizzle over your serving is a must, but I also found myself dipping my khubz right into the aromatic ghee and eating it as such.
This dish makes a ton of servings, so if you're only feeding one or two people, be prepared for leftovers. I froze a bunch of mine, and I also pondered making some Middle Eastern inspired arancini with a preserved lemon mayo-based dip.
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