Sometimes I like to give myself little challenges.  You know, just to make life fun and stuff.  Last night I gave myself the challenge to create a simple dinner from ingredients I already had at home.  I checked the fridge.  I didn’t have much but I did have a bag of falafel balls (because everyone should have falafel in the fridge in case of emergency), a tub of organic hummus that was nearing its expiry date, and some lettuce.  Obviously my kitchen was shouting out for a Middle Eastern party!  I shimmied down to the local shop and bought some truss tomatoes, Lebanese cucumber, red onion, parsley (Italian, but luckily herbs aren’t good at geography) and lemon, and I was all set.

Excitedly I pulled out my Moroccan glasses, lit some incense, put on my best belly dancing outfit (not really), and invited my friend over for the party.  Imagining myself as some sort of Arabian Princess (without servants), I danced around the kitchen assembling the salad while I cooked the falafel balls and a splash of coconut oil in a large fry pan.  Next I made the dressing by combining hummus, lemon juice and some dukkah I found in the cupboard.  It doesn’t get any easier than that and the taste was incredible.

There was just one problem.

We sat down to eat and the conversation went something like this:

Lovely friend: “This is amazing.”
Me: “Awww, thanks!  The falafel is a bit dry, though.  I wonder how they make it less dry in the restaurants?”
Friend: “hhhhmmmm”
*munch, munch, munch*
Me: “The dressing was really hard to drizzle, too.  I wonder how I could have made it more drizzly?”
Friend: “hhhhmmmm”
*munch, munch, munch*
Friend: “You know, maybe oil would help.”

*face palm*

OIL !!!  Jamie Oliver would have a stroke if he saw this, but I completely forgot about oil!!   HOW COULD I??!!!  I mean hello, it’s only the region’s largest export!

Naturally you’ll be much smarter than me and remember to mix in a drizzle of oil (vegetable, not black gold), and then you will love this salad from here to Egypt and back.  ♥

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