I am addicted to Ethiopian food. There, I said it. It is just so good, but going often to the Ethiopian restaurant can be expensive and since I’ve banned myself from eating out except for birthdays networking and the occasional Vokü here in Berlin, I had to find a way to feed my addiction. I had bought some berbere (Ethiopian spice mix) online awhile back, and it was time to use it!

What surprised me is that all the ingredients for the two dishes above were quite cheap. I bought a huge green cabbage, bag of red lentils, tomato paste, bag of carrots and bag of potatoes for less than €13 at Netto and I have plenty of veggies after making two dishes for plenty of other things. Let the money saving begin!

I used the recipe from Vegan Richa for Atakilt Wat for the dish on the right made from cabbage and potatoes. You can find the recipe here.

The red lentil dish Yemiser W’et was made from Kittee’s recipe over at Cake Maker to the Stars. You can find the recipe here.

I had some teff flour sitting in the freezer (because I’m afraid of moths) for ages and finally got to use that too.  I used this recipe from Yum Universe, but I fermented the batter two more days until it was more sour and added a teensy bit of sugar. It came out okay, but I must say this is the one place my food vastly differed from an Ethiopian restaurant. I’m not sure if it’s because they mix the teff with other flours at an actual restaurant or if they use an older teff sourdough starter or if there is just some magical touch, but the homemade version I made didn’t quite match up. Ah well, room for improvement!

Overall, once you have the spices, making your own Ethiopian food is not as hard as it seems!

Let me know in the comments, have you experimented with Ethiopian food? Favorite recipes? Any injera tips or tricks? Inquiring minds want to know! 🙂