Fasting shapes Ethiopian Orthodox cooking more than almost any other tradition. The church’s own calendar puts the fasting days at “about 250 a year, of which about 180 are obligatory for all”, with “total abstention from meat, fats, eggs and diary [sic] products”. Not everyone keeps them all: a 2021 study estimated that Orthodox adults actually keep around 140 days, and children, pregnant and breastfeeding women and the sick are exempt.
On those days the food is built on pulses. In a study of breastfeeding mothers in Ethiopia, “almost all mothers ate pulses in fasting” periods. Red lentils stewed in berbere, the country’s hot spiced pepper powder, are among the best known of those dishes outside Ethiopia, and they need nothing that will not keep. One caution: the church’s page also asks for fasting food “devoid of fats”, and how strictly that is read varies. This recipe uses oil. If you are keeping the fast, your own church and household decide.
Berbere is the hard part. Researchers describe it as “made with at least 12 different herbs and spices”, varying by place, and analysed one blend built on hot red pepper, garlic, ginger, Ethiopian cardamom and nigella seed. A UK cupboard can manage the first three. What follows is a stand-in, not berbere, and the substitutions say what is missing.
- Rinse the lentils until the water runs clear.
- Warm the oil and add the dried onion. Cook it gently for five minutes, stirring, until it swells, softens and starts to colour.
- Add the garlic, ginger, chilli, paprika and pepper and stir for a minute, then the tomato purée for another minute, until it darkens and the oil turns red.
- Add the lentils and 800 ml of water. Simmer, stirring now and then, for 20 to 25 minutes, until the lentils have collapsed into a thick, spoonable stew. Add water if it catches.
- Season with salt. It should be hot, deep red and thick.
Eat it with flatbread, scooped up by hand.
Serves 4.