Abu Shalhoub

One of the older Damascene dishes. Coarse bulgur swells in water while diced courgette is fried with onion in ghee or olive oil, and the two meet in the pot. Garlic and coriander carry the smell. Cooks who want it add minced or diced meat; those who leave it out lose nothing.

The dish has three names

The story of the name gets told more often than the recipe. By one account the dish came from the kitchens of the Jews of Turkey and Syria, where it was known as muslim harban. When Muslims took it up they began calling it yahudi musafir. The third name, the one in use today, is abu shalhoub. Some versions put aubergine and pine nuts in beside the courgette.

What it is like

It looks like a bulgur pilaf, but the courgette loosens it and takes the weight out. It is eaten hot and it survives being warmed the next day. Yoghurt goes alongside, and it is cooked most in the months when courgettes are cheap rather than in winter.

Where to eat it

A home dish. In Damascus it turns up now and then in the daily pots of neighbourhood eating houses, though it is not a fixed menu item — in places that cook whatever is in the pot, you ask. Without meat it is a sound choice for a vegetarian lunch.