Despite the name ('Indian kebab'), a thoroughly Syrian home dish of cinnamon-scented kofta simmered with onions in tomato sauce and eaten over rice. The name likely nods to the spicing, which struck Damascene cooks as exotically eastern.
Also known as: kabab hindi, dawood basha (related), Syrian kofta in tomato sauce
Watch it made
Ingredients
- 500 g beef or lamb mince
- 1 small onion, grated (for the kofta), plus 2 onions, sliced (for the sauce)
- 1 tsp ground cinnamon, divided
- 0.75 tsp allspice
- 700 g tomato passata (or 800 g grated ripe tomatoes)
- 30 ml olive oil
- 20 g pine nuts (optional but lovely)
- Salt
- Vermicelli rice, to serve
How to make it
- 1
Season the mince with the grated onion, half the cinnamon, the allspice and salt, then roll it into finger-length torpedoes.
- 2
Brown the kofta briefly in olive oil on two sides and lift them out; they finish cooking later.
- 3
Soften the sliced onions in the same pan for 10 minutes, scraping up the meat residue.
- 4
Pour in the passata with 100 ml water, the rest of the cinnamon and salt; return the kofta and simmer gently 25 minutes.
- 5
When oil beads at the rim of the sauce, scatter with toasted pine nuts and serve over vermicelli rice.
Pro tip: Despite the name there is nothing Indian here: the seasoning stays at cinnamon and allspice. Syrian cooks judge doneness by the sauce releasing its oil back to the surface.
