Mansaf recipe

Bone-in lamb simmered in a sauce of rehydrated jameed, dried fermented sheep's milk, then served over rice on a platter lined with torn shrak flatbread soaked in the same sauce.

14 hours and 50 minuteshard11 ingredients

Ingredients

• 500 g jameed
• 1500 g bone-in lamb shoulder
• 4 shrak bread
• 2 cup short-grain rice
• 4 tbsp ghee
• 50 g almonds
• 50 g pine nuts
• 1 onion
• 5 cardamom pods
• 2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp black pepper

How to make Mansaf

1. Soak 500 g of dried jameed in 1.5 L of water overnight, then blend and strain it, or use 1 L of ready liquid jameed. Plain yogurt gives a different dish: jameed is fermented and dried sheep's milk, and its salty sourness is what mansaf tastes of.
2. Brown 1.5 kg of bone-in lamb shoulder in 4 tbsp of ghee, cover with water, add 1 onion, 5 cardamom pods and 2 tsp of salt, and simmer 1.5 to 2 hours, skimming. Keep the pieces whole.
3. Cook 2 cups of short-grain rice in 3 cups of the lamb broth with 4 tbsp of ghee for 20 minutes, then rest it covered for 10 minutes.
4. Pour the jameed into a pot with 500 ml of broth and bring it up slowly while whisking constantly in one direction. Once it has boiled it will no longer split. Simmer 20 minutes and season with 1 tsp of black pepper.
5. Slide the lamb pieces into the jameed sauce and simmer 15 minutes so they take on the sourness. Do not shred the meat.
6. Line a large platter with torn shrak bread and ladle hot sauce over it until it is soaked through.
7. Spread the rice over the bread, lay the lamb pieces on top, pour more sauce over, and scatter 50 g of almonds and 50 g of pine nuts fried in the remaining ghee.
8. Bring the rest of the sauce to the table in a jug; mansaf is eaten from the shared platter with the right hand.

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