Boulfaf (Liver Skewers)

Boulfaf is cooked within hours of the Eid al-Adha sacrifice, and the timing is the point. Liver deteriorates quickly, so it is cooked first while the rest of the animal is prepared for the days ahead, and the whole household eats boulfaf on the morning of Eid before anything else. Algeria has a close cousin called melfouf, and the practice is shared across the Maghreb.

Caul fat — the lacy membrane from around the stomach — is the technique and it is genuinely ingenious. Wrapped around a cube of liver, it holds the piece together, seasons it, and melts away over the fire, basting the liver from every side at once. Nothing else does this job as well, and liver is the ingredient that most needs it.

The liver is seared briefly to firm it, then seasoned with cumin, salt and paprika before wrapping, and the cook is short — six to eight minutes total over hot embers, turning once. Liver has a very narrow window between silky and grainy, and the caul fat buys a little grace but not much.

Fresh lamb liver, membrane peeled and larger tubes removed, seared briefly in thick slices and then cut into three-centimetre cubes. Caul fat from a butcher, soaked in warm water so it becomes pliable and can be stretched thin. Both are sold specifically around Eid in Moroccan and Middle Eastern butchers.

Cumin, sweet paprika and salt, with a little cayenne if you want heat. Some households add a pinch of ras el hanout. Metal skewers. If caul fat is unavailable, thin strips of lamb fat wrapped around each cube is the substitute, though it does not melt as evenly.

Straight off the skewer with khobz, cumin-salt, and a glass of mint tea, on the morning of Eid. Raw onion and a squeeze of lemon. It is eaten standing, communally, while the rest of the animal is still being butchered.