Dukkah Recipe for Middle Eastern Nut and Spice Blend – Beragampengetahuan

This easy dukkah recipe makes the Middle Eastern nut and spice blend that’s incredibly versatile. Served as a condiment with olive oil and bread, it can be sprinkled over eggs, hummus, salads, and vegetables to add texture, flavour and aroma. Originating in Egypt, dukkah or duqqa is popular all over the Middle East, where it takes many delicious forms.

Our quick and easy dukkah recipe will make you our take on the versatile Middle Eastern nut, seed and spice blend that’s fantastic with pita bread or sourdough bread and extra virgin olive oil – dip the bread into the olive oil, then dip it into the dukkah – or sprinkled over hummus, soft-boiled eggs, Mediterranean salads, or roasted vegetables.

I adore this dukkah recipe but the beauty of making your own dukkah, like any homemade condiments made from scratch, is that you can customise it to suit your taste, the cuisine you’re cooking or the ingredients you have on hand. I love a mix of pounded hazelnuts, almonds, pistachios, cashew nuts, and peanuts blended with quintessential Middle Eastern spices, such as cumin, coriander and Aleppo pepper.

But I recommend you try my dukkah recipe then experiment and create your own dukkah recipe. The Middle Eastern condiment has long been popular in Australia, for instance, where native Australian dukkah recipes feature indigenous ingredients, such as macadamias, lemon myrtle, saltbush, wattleseed, and pepper berries.

If you cook Middle Eastern food you need to add our dukkah recipe to your repertoire. But before I tell you about our homemade dukkah recipe, I have a favour to ask. beragampengetahuan is reader-funded. If you’ve cooked our recipes and enjoyed them, please consider supporting beragampengetahuan. For instance, you could make a small donation to our epic Cambodian cookbook and culinary history on Patreon, for as little as the price of a coffee.

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Dukkah Recipe for a Middle Eastern Nut and Spice Blend with 1001 Uses

Our easy dukkah recipe will make you my take on the traditional Middle Eastern nut, seed and spice blend. Ironically, we had lived in the United Arab Emirates for years and travelled all over the Middle East, to other Arabian Peninsula countries, Lebanon, Syria, and Egypt, before we first discovered dukkah – in Australia!

What is Dukkah?

So what is dukkah exactly? Dukkah or duqqa – a more correct Arabic transliteration better reflecting the Arabic pronounciation, like souk and souq – is a crunchy Middle Eastern condiment now eaten around the world, which became massively popular in Australia in the late 1990s.

Dukkah is a Middle Eastern nut, seed and spice mixture of Egyptian origin traditionally served as a condiment with Arabic flatbreads that are dunked into extra virgin olive oil first then dipped into the dukkah to form a crunchy spiced crust.

How to Eat Dukkah

Dukkah and bread have long been a popular late afternoon snack in homes in the Middle East. An Arab filmmaker friend told me it was a typical after-school snack in the 1960s and 1970s, and dukkah was also sold as a street food snack in newspaper cones, particularly in the souqs (markets) and by the seaside.

In Saudi Arabia, dukkah has long been eaten at mosques as the first snack during Ramadan to break the fast, served with flatbread and labneh (strained yoghurt). You can also serve dukkah this way as a mezze (appetiser or starter). Serve the labneh in a bowl, drizzle with extra virgin olive oil, and sprinkle on the dukkah.

And instead of labneh, you can sprinkle dukkah on hummus, muttabal, baba ghanoush, mouhammara, or any other Middle Eastern dips. More ideas for the countless uses of dukkah at the end of this post.

The Australian Dukkah, EVOO and Bread Trend

Funnily enough, it was on a trip back home to Sydney, a few years after we moved to Abu Dhabi in 1998, that we began noticing dukkah absolutely everywhere we dined. Every time bread was served at a restaurant, bistro or gastro-pub, the waiter would slide a dish of dukkah onto the table, then another empty dish, into which he’d pour extra virgin olive oil, or EVOO. Australians love to shorten things.

The sourdough and dukkah starter had replaced bread and butter and each establishment had its own take on it, depending on the cuisine being served. Some dukkah blends tasted more Middle Eastern, others more Mediterranean. If it was a Modern Australian restaurant doing fusion food, native Australian ingredients made an appearance in the mix.

Sometimes the dukkah and olive oil was served in separate dishes so you could dunk the bread in the olive oil then dip it in the dukkah as you liked. I liked to soak the olive oil up like a sponge if it was an especially delicious green Australian extra virgin olive oil, then press the bread into the dukkah to pick up as many nuts, seeds, herbs and spices as I could.

At other times a dish of olive oil with a little mountain of dukkah at its centre was served with a basket of bread, while other eateries presented dishes of olives or Med-style pickles on the side. A few of the fancier restaurants went all out and served an array of breads and a selection of olive oils with dukkahs, the waiters recommending pairings.

The bread and dukkah ritual kicked off nearly every modern Australian meal and was so commonplace when eating out that it was as if it was something that Australians had always done – which is why the presence of indigenous Australian ingredients in some dishes of dukkah didn’t seem so strange to us.

We initially assumed that this new dukkah and bread course was a homegrown Australian trend that was probably conceived in a Modern Australian restaurant in Sydney or Melbourne. When a waiter mentioned in the customary ‘how to eat dukkah’ expanation that dukkah was Middle Eastern, and that dukkah originated in Egypt specifically, we almost fell off our chairs.

“But we’ve lived in the Middle East since 1998,” I remember Terence and I saying (like a broken record). “We’ve spent time in Egypt. We’ve never been served dukkah anywhere.” And we hadn’t. Because dukkah wasn’t served in restaurants in the Middle East. As we’d later discover, Dukkah was eaten in the home, in the mosque, and once upon a time in the streets in the Middle East.

While we hadn’t yet come across dukkah in the Middle East, it wasn’t so surprising that it hailed from the region that we called home at the time, and where we’d live for eight years. Dukkah could easily have been a cousin of za’atar – a blend of dried thyme, sumac and sesame seeds that we ate almost daily in Abu Dhabi, spread on everything from traditional flat breads to croissants.

We’d soon learn that it was Greg Malouf, an Australian chef of Lebanese heritage, who in 2001 took the helm of MoMo, a modern Middle Eastern restaurant in Melbourne, who was responsible for popularising dukkah in Australia. He’d also published a cookbook in 1999, co-written with his wife Lucy Malouf called Saha, a Chef’s Journey Through Lebanon and Syria.

However, it wasn’t at MoMo that Malouf introduced dukkah to Australian diners. It was even earlier, when Malouf first began cooking modern Middle Eastern food at gastro-pub O’Connells Hotel in Melbourne, where he was appointed head chef in 1991.

“The dukkah egg popped into my head around 1996….timeless!” Malouf wrote on his Instagram account in a caption for the dish that made dukkah famous. “Soft boiled eggs peeled, dusted with flour, deep fried and rolled in a dukkah spice mix (hazelnut, cumin, coriander and sesame seeds). Incredible eating this warm with wafer thin bastourma and goats cheese.”

Traditional Dukkah Recipes

The first thing to know if you’re new to dukkah is that there is no codified dukkah recipe, so you don’t need to feel obligated to make an ‘authentic’ dukkah recipe. Essentially, anything goes when it comes to dukkah.

Dukkah recipes vary from country to country, village to village, cook to cook. A dukkah recipe is very personal and home cooks in the Middle East will have their own favourite dukkah blends – as do Australian cooks.

Spice sellers will also have their own blends of dukkah to tempt customers. If you’ve shopped traditional spice markets in the Middle East, you’d know that spice vendors often have their own unique spice blends that they sell under alluring names. The same goes for dukkah.

It’s also important to note that there’s more than one type of dukkah. While most of us know dukkah as Egyptian dukkah, a blend of nuts, seeds and spices, dukkah means ‘to pound’ or ‘to crush’ and takes many forms.

While dukkah is best known as a condiment, dukkah was historically a popular street food snack in Egypt and other Middle Eastern countries, where dukkah was sold on the streets by mobile sellers in a paper cone.

Dukkah also has different culinary uses. The other famous dukkah in the Middle East is Palestinian dukkah from Gaza, which doesn’t contain a single nut, seed or spice, yet it’s also incredibly delicious and super spicy.

A typical Gazan dukkah recipe – or dugga or dagga – is essentially a salsa or ‘pounded salad’, as a Palestinian friend called it. Made in the Gazan mortar and pestle called a zibdiya, a Gazan dugga typically contains pounded garlic, chilli peppers, tomatoes, lemon juice, delicious Palestinian extra virgin olive oil, and fresh dill.

Now let me share a few tips to making this easy dukkah recipe.

Tips to Making this Dukkah Recipe for the Middle Eastern Nut and Spice Blend

I only have a few tips to making this easy dukkah recipe as it’s super easy – and because it’s so easy my tips to preparing dukkah are more about what not to do than what to do to make dukkah.

I recommend using something like this adorable mini fry pan to toast the whole mixed nuts until they get some colour. Make sure to regularly shake the pan so that the nuts don’t burn then when they’re done immediately transfer them to a cold dish to cool.

Use the same pan to toast the sesame seeds for a minute or so, continually shaking the pan back and forth until they change colour and are fragrant, but take care to make sure they don’t burn. You want the seeds golden, not brown.

I use a mortar and pestle to pound the nuts. (I love this handcrafted KROK mortar and pestle.) I pound some nuts so that they are coarsely ground, and some more finely ground, as you want the dukkah to have texture.

It’s quick and easy to pound the nuts and seeds in a mortar and pestle. There’s no need to use a blender or food processor and I don’t recommend using a blender or food processor.

Also use the mortar and pestle to grind the toasted sesame seeds, cumin seeds and coriander seeds, so some are finely ground, others partly pounded and some remain whole. You won’t get that variety of textures if you use a blender, food processor or grinder, so don’t. Lastly, add the ground spices and salt and combine everything.

I use a spice funnel to transfer the dukkah to an air-tight jar. We use mason jars and clip-top Kilner jars. If you’re not using your dukkah regularly, store the jar in a cool dark cupboard or in your fridge.

Dukkah Recipe

Dukkah Recipe for a Middle Eastern Nut and Spice Condiment with 1001 Uses

AuthorLara Dunston

Our dukkah recipe will make you the Middle Eastern nut, seed and spice blend that originated in Egypt. Serve as a condiment with extra virgin olive oil and bread or sprinkle over eggs, hummus, salads, and vegetables to add texture, flavour and aroma. This dukkah recipe can be customised to suit your taste or dish or meal you’re preparing.

Prep Time 10 minutes mins

Cook Time 5 minutes mins

Total Time 15 minutes mins

Course spice blend, condiment

Cuisine Egyptian, Middle Eastern, Arabic

Servings made with recipeServings 200 g

Calories 7 kcal

• 150 g mixed nuts – such as hazelnuts, almonds, pistachios, cashew nuts, peanuts
• 40 g sesame seeds
• 30 g cumin seeds
• 25 g coriander seeds
• 1 tsp ground Syrian sweet paprika – or Spanish paprika
• ¼ tsp Aleppo pepper – or mild chilli powder
• ½ tsp fine quality salt
• 1 tsp ground cumin – optional

• In a small dry pan over medium-high heat, toast the whole mixed nuts for 2-3 minutes until they colour, occasionally shaking the pan so they don’t burn. Set aside to cool.

• In the same dry pan over medium-high, toast the sesame seeds for a minute or so, continually shaking the pan so they change colour and are aromatic, but don’t burn: you want them golden, not brown. Set aside to cool.

• Use a mortar and pestle to grind the nuts so some are coarsely ground, others finely ground and others in pieces so you recognise the nuts, to give the dukkah texture and colour. Transfer the nuts to a bowl.

• In the same mortar and pestle, grind the toasted sesame seeds so some are finely ground, others partly pounded and some remain whole. Transfer them to the bowl with the nuts.

• Grind the cumin seeds and coriander seeds, so you get a mix of fine and coarse grains and pieces of seeds then transfer to the bowl. Add the ground Syrian sweet paprika (or Spanish paprika), Aleppo pepper (or mild chilli powder) and salt, and stir thoroughly to combine.

• To taste, pour some extra virgin olive oil into a dish, add a teaspoon of dukkah, dip some bread in to soak up the oil and scoop up the dukkah, taste, and adjust the spices and seasoning to suit your palate. I recommend adding the optional ground cumin.

• Use a spice funnel to transfer the dukkah to an airtight glass jar and store in a cool dark cupboard or in your fridge. Serve with extra virgin olive and bread.

1. Depending on the pan-size you may have to toast the whole nuts in 2-3 batches.
2. When toasting the sesame seeds, make sure to continually shake the pan so they’re evenly coloured and also because they can burn quickly.
3. If using a spice grinder or coffee grinder, aim for different grinds to give the dukkah texture.
4. If using a food processor, take care not to over-grind, as you’ll end up with a nutty paste.

Calories: 7kcalCarbohydrates: 0.4gProtein: 0.2gFat: 1gSaturated Fat: 0.1gPolyunsaturated Fat: 0.1gMonounsaturated Fat: 0.3gSodium: 6mgPotassium: 10mgFiber: 0.2gSugar: 0.01gVitamin A: 8IUVitamin C: 0.04mgCalcium: 5mgIron: 0.2mg

Please do let us know if you make our dukkah recipe as we’d love to hear how it turns out for you.