Tunisian chickpea soup is a real working class staple — cheap, quick to prepare, filling, and commonly found at inexpensive restaurants. Lablabi is a hot and spicy dish, also quite greasy and heavy, and typically flavored with garlic, cumin, and harissa.
It is traditionally served ladled over chunks of stale crusty bread, drizzled with olive oil, sometimes even with either vinegar or lemon or lime juice, and often garnished with cilantro, parsley, and scallions. Special versions of lablabi include capers, olives, pickled vegetables and tuna, while another variety called hergma is made with cow's hooves.
Harira is a herb-rich, tomato-based soup with a velvety-smooth, creamy texture, as the word hareer signifies velvetiness in Arabic. It's the most popular soup in Morocco, symbolizing the unification of people during Ramadan, the holy month of fasting in the Muslim calendar.
According to religious law, practitioners may not eat or drink anything between dawn and sunset. At sunset, when the cannons strike, Moroccans eat their first meal of the day - the obligatory harira soup, accompanied by dates, figs, coffee, or milk, along with fried honey cookies shaped like flowers and sprinkled with sesame, called chebakia.
MOST ICONIC Harira
Mulukhiyah is the national dish of Egypt, a soup made by cooking a large amount of finely chopped jute, which is a green leaf vegetable with a distinctively bitter flavor. Traditionally, the soup is cooked with garlic, coriander, chicken meat or chicken stock, and is usually served with white rice or pita bread, and a lemon or lime wedge on the side.
It is believed that the dish dates back to the time of the Pharaohs, its name coming from the word mulokia, meaning Kingdom of Royals, referring to the fact that it was consumed only by the kings, queens, and nobles during the era.
MOST ICONIC Mulukhiyah
MAIN INGREDIENTS
Bissara is a comforting Egyptian and Moroccan dish made with puréed beans – either split peas or dried fava beans. It can be prepared in the form of a soup or porridge, while the thicker versions are commonly used as a dip. The puréed beans are typically seasoned with olive oil, lemon juice, and garlic, and the dish is often served with paprika and cumin on the side, while crusty bread is almost mandatory.
Bissara is traditionally served for breakfast, and it is especially popular during winter.
Sharba Libiya is often considered the national dish of Libya, and it is especially popular during Ramadan. Although there are versions made with chicken or fish, the traditional version of this aromatic soup is prepared with lamb and dried mint as the key ingredients.
Apart from those, the soup consists of onions, tomatoes, olive oil, tomato paste, chopped parsley, tiny pasta, and chickpeas. It is heavily flavored with turmeric, red paprika, black pepper, cinnamon, cardamom, bay leaves, and shaiba leaves (also known as dagad phool in Indian cuisine).
VARIATIONS OF Sharba Libiya
The traditional soup known as chorba frik is one of the staples of Algerian diet. It is a tomato-based soup made with meat, chickpeas, and an ancient grain called freekeh (or frik). The dish is seasoned with traditional Algerian spices such as mint or coriander, which give the dish a typical oriental flavor.
The main ingredient, frik, is a grain that is frequently used in many Algerian dishes. This ancient cereal, familiar to the Mediterranean and Arabic countries, has an unusual green color, and resembles the more popular bulgur. Chorba frik is a dish that is usually associated with the eastern parts of the country, but it can be found throughout Algeria.
MOST ICONIC Chorba frik
MAIN INGREDIENTS
Egusi is a flavorful soup or sauce that is popular throughout West and Central Africa (most noteably Nigeria and Central African Republic) consisting of onions, tomatoes, hot chili peppers, and oil. It is traditionally thickened with flour that is made from seeds of gourds, pumpkins, melons, and squashes.
The egusi is typically seasoned with salt, black pepper, and cayenne pepper. When the soup or sauce develops a smooth consistency, it is then usually served with boiled vegetables, rice, or a variety of grilled fish and meat dishes.
Palm nut soup is a West African soup made with either palm fruit or palm pulp and meat, fish, crayfish, vegetables, and seasonings, but ingredients vary depending on the country or region. The soup can be found in Ghana, Cameroon, Nigeria, and Ivory Coast, and each country has a different name for it.
Some of the side dishes that are served with palm nut soup include fufu, omo tau, kwacoco (puréed and steamed cocoyams), rice, banku, and fonio.
VARIATIONS OF Palm nut soup
Banga or ofe akwu is a flavorful Nigerian soup made with palm fruit, beef or dried fish, vegetables, and seasonings such as salt and chili pepper. The soup is traditionally paired with various fufu dishes. The name of the dish is derived from two words: ofe, meaning soup or stew, and akwu, meaning palm fruit. There are many variations of this soup, and is known under different names.
For example, the Urhobo ethnic group of Delta State in the Niger Delta of Nigeria calls this soup oghwo amiedi, and they typically serve it with a cassava paste usi; the Isoko ethnic group calls it izuwo ibiedi; and in eastern Nigeria, banga soup goes by the name ofe akwu, where it's served with rice and yam.
TasteAtlas food rankings are based on the ratings of the TasteAtlas audience, with a series of mechanisms that recognize real users and that ignore bot, nationalist or local patriotic ratings, and give additional value to the ratings of users that the system recognizes as knowledgeable. For the “Top 42 African Soups” list until February 13, 2025, 1,668 ratings were recorded, of which 376 were recognized by the system as legitimate. TasteAtlas Rankings should not be seen as the final global conclusion about food. Their purpose is to promote excellent local foods, instill pride in traditional dishes, and arouse curiosity about dishes you haven’t tried.