Lentil Porridge (Mujadara Makhbousa)

Savoury Lebanese lentil porridge is known as Mujadara Makhbousa. A wholesome, warming bowl of goodness made with lentils and rice.

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Jump to:

• 🍚Mujadara Variations
• 🥄Serving Suggestions
• ⚙️Equipment
• 🥘Ingredients
• 🔪Cooking Instructions
• 💭Recipe Tips
• 🗒️Recipe Variations
• 📝Recipe Notes
• 🔖Other Lentil Recipes
• Lentil Porridge (Mujadara Makhbousa)

Another traditional mujadara recipe that we loved as kids.  

It’s a delicious savoury porridge made with the same ingredients (plus vegetable stock) as the lentils and rice mujadara version, yet the quantities are different. Check out the different types of mujadara.

It excludes caramelised onion and it’s blended. Resulting in a completely different meal.

Homemade Porridge...

Now you might be used to your homemade porridge being a (sweet) breakfast meal, but in fact there are several types of porridges in the Mediterranean/Middle Eastern diet.

These feature sweet and savoury ingredients from fruit, vegetables, meats which are typically mixed with some form of grain such as rice, wheat and pearl barley.

Mujadara Makhbousa is known as a poor man’s food, as it is very cost effective to make.

It is also called Mjadara Msafaya, prior to when blenders were invented, this was made manually using a hand held food mill/mincer.

What I love about this meal, aside from the flavour;

• You don’t need to eat a lot of it to feel full
• It’s nourishing and wholesome
• It can be made in one pot
• It’s quick and easy!
• Mujadara is naturally gluten free and this recipe is also vegan friendly. So it caters for some special diets too

The literal translation of the word makhbousa is mush, everything mixed together in a nonsensical manner. This is why this recipe is fabulous, only one pot is needed and everything is thrown in together.

🍚Mujadara Variations

Did you know there a couple of other types of mujadara recipes that you must try;

• Mujadara recipe for lentils and rice pilaf
• Mujadara hamra for lentils and bulgur
• Mujadara safra - red lentils and rice

Honestly, you should try all varieties and figure out which is your favourite. I personally love to cook all of these, I'm living life large haha.

Let me know which is your favourite below in the comments.

🥄Serving Suggestions

This lentil porridge is served warm

Mum always pairs lentil porridge with stuffed kibbeh balls, which I am yet to share, but you should check out this Lebanese kibbeh recipe. We love dipping our kibbeh into the porridge.

Enjoy with a simple side salad, or tabouli or with cut up vegetables, we always have radish, fresh white onion and cucumbers.

Or read this round-up of what to serve with mujadara.

⚙️Equipment

Immersion blender* - you’ll need this to blend the contents into a porridge. If you don't have one these, you could do it the old fashion way through a food mill*

🥘Ingredients

Brown lentils - use the dry variety, some know this lentil as green lentil. Wash, sort and pre-soak lentils for at least 30 minutes prior to cooking

Water - I always use room temp filtered water

Vegetable stock - I like to use the brand Massel* it’s plant based. What I love about Massel*, is that they have chicken and beef flavours too (all plant

White rice - jasmine or basmati are good

Brown onion - I find this onion to lends the best flavour in this recipe

Olive oil - always opt for extra virgin

Parsley - use fresh always to garnish

Salt - I like to use pink salt or sea salt, this may not be needed as the vegetable stock contains ample salty-ness

🔪Cooking Instructions

Step 1 - In a pot, heat up olive oil on high heat

Step 2 - Add onion and sweat until golden 

Step 3 - Add lentils, stock and water and bring to the boil, turn heat to medium and simmer until lentils are par boiled

Step 4 - Add rice and allow to cook

Step 5 - Once all cooked, use an immersion blender to blend contents until smooth

Step 6 - serve warm in a boil and garnish with parsley

💭Recipe Tips

Wash lentils in cold water

Pre-soaking lentils isn’t mandatory, but I like to do this as it speeds up the cooking process

Pre-soaking rice also isn’t mandatory but you can do this. My mum does this, I do not.

Whilst cooking, keep an eye out on the water levels, you may need to add more water

This savoury porridge will thicken into a pudding as it cools

Sometimes I like to thin out my porridge by simply adding a couple of spoon fulls of water before reheating

Refrigerate sealed in a container for up to five days, reheat as you would any other soup or porridge

Optional: serve with some fresh lemon juice

🗒️Recipe Variations

To make this recipe oil free - use a bit of veggie stock instead to sweat onion

For more lentils, use half the amount of rice

If you’d like it a bit chunkier, just let the lentils and rice naturally become mushy in the pot (basically when the rice starts to break apart) by cooking a little longer and serving it without blending

Spices - whilst this recipe doesn’t require any added spices as it has loads of flavour already, you can add a touch of cumin and Lebanese 7 spice if you desire.

📝Recipe Notes

As the lentil porridge cools down, it will naturally form a skin due to the starch in the rice. Mix porridge prior to heating up and serving.

🔖Other Lentil Recipes

If you love lentil recipes then you should definitely try Lebanese lentil soup or lemon lentil soup. It’s a vegetable and lentil soup that our whole family adores. It makes the best winter warmer.

One of my childhood favourites is lentils and pasta soup called rishta.

You should also try barley porridge made with curry and red lentils.

For a rice meal, you must check out Malfouf - this is Lebanese stuffed cabbage rolls and it's so good! Or if you are a legume lover, try my easy curried mung beans.