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Tunisia rivals the mainstay tourist destinations of the Old World. It offers beautiful beaches, wonderful weather, and a unique blend of Arab and Berber cultures.

The whole point of travel is to experience local life. What better way than to enjoy traditional Tunisian cuisine when you’re in Tunisia? These dishes are brimming over with flavor.

Traditional Tunisian Dishes You Should Try While In Tunisiz

 

Shakshouka

Shakshuka - A Tunisian Dish

Shakshuka | Credit: Probody

A healthy meal served in the Middle East and North Africa, Shakshouka, also known as chakchouka, is a simple combination of simmering tomatoes, onions, peppers, garlic, spices, and gently poached eggs. An authentic Tunisian chakchouka should have crushed garlic and caraway powder as supporting ingredients in the filling.

Shakshouka’s taste and nutritional properties lend the dish protein from the eggs, as well as vitamins and minerals in the peppers, garlic, onion, cumin, and paprika. Often served with harissa and spicy tomato sauce, Shakshouka is a healthy dish traditional to the cuisines of the MENA region (Middle East and North Africa).

 

Lablabi

Lablabi - Tunisian dish

Lablabi | Credit: Habib M’henni

A traditional Tunisian everyday lunch or dinner comfort food dish, Lablabi- which started as a poor man’s dish, is now regarded as a staple, much like Pizza is in Italy. Originally a simple flatbread topped with lard and garlic, Lablabi is now one of the most popular foods in Tunisia, dating back to around the 16th century.

While the original lablabi recipe hasn’t changed much through the centuries from being a thick chickpea soup made with garlic and cumin, served over pieces of crusty bread, it now comes with a set of complements, including poached egg, tuna, capers, pepper, olives, and the omnipresent harissa. While it’s popular during the colder season, lablabi is available in Tunisia any time of the year.

 

Tunisian Brik

Brik

Brik | Credit: Meriemou

The MENA region and places around the Mediterranean Sea are famous for pastries stuffed with various ingredients, deep-fried to a savory, delicious result. Brik, much like Greeks have boureki or tiropitakia, Lebanese and Turks have burek, and people of the Balkans have boureka, Tunisia offers its version: Brik.

A traditional Tunisian dish or snack, the most common version of Tunisian brik is a malsouka dough triangle stuffed with tuna, egg, mashed potatoes, chopped onion, parsley, and harissa, often sprinkled with lemon juice before consumption. Thought to date back to the Ottoman Empire, Brik is a ubiquitous street food in Tunis and elsewhere in Tunisia.

 

Couscous

Couscous

Couscous | Credit: AnouarNACH

Couscous, the national dish of Morocco, is made with tiny steamed granules of durum wheat semolina, often mistaken for a grain. Usually served with meat, spicy stews, and vegetables, Couscous is the Berbers’ ( a people living throughout the entire Northern Africa) contribution to Tunisian cuisine

Although Morocco, Algeria, Mauritania, Libya, and others have their own variation of couscous, they all feature steamed semolina, granules of durum wheat, as the core ingredient. Known as kosksi in Tunisian dialect, the traditional way of cooking it is with meat, vegetables, and chickpeas.

Tunisian couscous is based on tomato sauce, not turmeric, and almost never contains fruits, with raisins being the rare exception, which sets it apart from other variations found throughout the region.

The extra ingredients are entirely dependent on the preferences and opinions of those making the dish, as is the cooking method employed. Some Tunisian couscous is prepared in a double-decker pot, with meat and other ingredients boiled below a layer of semolina as it steams in the upper section.

Because of the variations, it’s a good idea to try Tunisian couscous in several different local restaurants while you’re in Tunisia.

 

Mechouia Salad

Salad Mechouia

Salad Mechouia | Credit: Citizen59

Mechouia (mashwiya), a traditional Tunisian salad meaning “grilled.”Mechouia Salad, also known as slata mechouia, is a popular starter dish in a multi-course meal in Tunisia. Although there’s no written history on the origins of the dish, most think the recipe was refined in Tunisia, as grilled vegetable salads are not unique to Tunisian cuisine.

While cookbooks of the Caucasus and other places suggest a similar dish, Mechouia salad is skewered, roasted over fire, and then chopped into an ideal starter mix. The tomatoes, peppers, onions, eggplants (optional in mechouia), and garlic feature in most versions, but Tunisian grilled veggie salad contains tuna fish and boiled eggs, making it a heartier meal.

Despite the way it’s cooked, Mechouia salad could be considered healthy because of the vitamins and nutrients in its plant components

About Olivia Marsh

Olivia Marsh - Author - Professional chef and Travel enthusiast.
Culinary Institute of America (CIA) graduate. Chef Marsh has traveled the globe from France, Italy, Germany to China, Thailand, India, Tunisia and more.
Olivia lived in Tunisia for almost 10 years now.
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