National Tabbouleh Day, July 7th, 2012
National Tabbouleh Day (www.nationaltabboulehday.com) came about in 2001 when famous Lebanese artist Ricardo Mbarkho designated the first Saturday in July to be National Tabbouleh Day http://www.ricardombarkho.com/. The coming years saw growing momentum in support of this celebration of one of Lebanons most famous dishes and in 2007 the day received the backing of the Ministry of Tourism. This classic Lebanese mezze composed of chopped parsley, mint, tomato, bulghur and dressed simply with lemon juice and olive oil is one of my absolute favourite dishes yet consistency and indeed recipes vary dramatically. This year as in recent years, celebrations were spearheaded by the ever excellent Souk el Tayeb/Tawlet at their new saturday market site next to Biel on Beirut waterfront where they organised a competition to find the best tabbouleh in Lebanon. Whilst the recipe for the winner is not yet available online, should you find yourself in Beirut I cannot recommend Tawlet restaurant highly enough http://beirutibrit.wordpress.com/2012/05/21/loving-lebanese/ and tabbouleh is usually to be found on their daily changing menu. For the rest of us, this recipe from Cook and Eat Lebanese is a good start … http://www.cookandeat-lebanese.com/Tabouleh
