Lubia – runner beans in tomato sauce
Lubia is a hearty dish with runner beans in tomato sauce. It is also known as Lubjeh b’säth (runner beans in/with oil) and is a classic of Lebanese cuisine. It tastes absolutely delicious, is vegan and is quick and easy to prepare.
You can also follow me on Instagram for even more inspiration about Levante cuisine.
Recipe for Lubia – runner beans in tomato sauce
Ingredients
Zubereitung
- Peel the onions, halve them and cut them into thin slices.
- Peel and roughly press the garlic.
- Wash the runner beans, remove the stalk and break into approx. 3 – 4 cm long sections.
- Heat the olive oil in a saucepan over medium heat and sauté the onions and garlic in the olive oil for approx. 5 – 10 minutes over medium heat.
- Add the tomato paste and fry briefly.
- Add the runner beans and sauté for about 5 minutes.
- Deglaze with tomatoes and water and season with cinnamon, harissa and salt.
- Simmer with the lid closed for approx. 20 minutes on a rather low heat.
Lubjeh is perfect served with buttered rice or pita bread.
Notes
Nährwerte
It’s quicker with two
My mother loves to talk on the phone! She used to be constantly on the line while I hungrily pranced back and forth in front of her. When cordless phones came along, at least she could clean the runner beans for Lubia with one hand – the phone was in the other, of course!
I hungrily walked past her every five minutes to see how far she had got. She hadn’t got very far – not even in conversation. So I just took the opportunity to help her prepare the bean dish.
The next time, my mother was sitting at the table and told her friend on the phone that she was going to be cooked for this time. From me. The kitchen looked like a battlefield afterwards, but I had made dinner!
And it even tasted good! Over the years, I got better and better and then wrote down the Lubia recipe. Now I would like to share it with you.
The ingredients and preparation for Lubia
For the fresh runner beans in spicy tomato sauce, you will of course need runner beans, onions, plenty of garlic, chopped tomatoes and spices such as cinnamon and harissa. If you have some fresh and aromatic tomatoes at home, you can of course do without the canned tomatoes.
Runner beans are in season from summer to late fall – so you can prepare this dish with fresh beans for a few months.
This bean recipe is super easy to prepare. All you have to do is clean, peel, chop, fry and simmer a little – that’s it!
What goes well with it as a side dish?
I served it with flatbread. I now serve the dish with buttered rice. But you can also serve it with buttered bulgur, potatoes or a spicy olive bread.
If you don’t need a side dish at all, it’s an excellent low-carb meal. It’s also great to prepare as a meal prep, so you only need to heat it up the next day.
And my mother? She now has a smartphone… now it’s all video calls!
I advise you to put your cell phone to one side when you want to prepare Lubia. That way you can concentrate on cooking and enjoy the preparation process.
I hope you enjoy it and, of course, bon appétit.
Just can’t get enough of beans? Then be sure to try the lukewarm bean salad, creamy bean puree or fasolada, a white bean soup.
