COOKING TRADITIONS IN SYRIA: RAQAQ AND MLEHY (BULGUR AND JAMEED DISH)

2025-07-25 · YouTube · Foodie Beauty · 18 min

Chantal visits a friend in Syria (introduced as Nora) to learn and observe two traditional Syrian recipes: ragaga (thin layered bread pie with shredded chicken and onions) and malehi/mlehy (a bulgur and jameed/jamid dish served with a yogurt sauce and ghee). The video documents simmering chicken to make a flavorful broth, frying and seasoning large quantities of onions in olive oil, making and resting a simple flour-and-water dough, rolling thin layers and layering them with the chicken filling to make ragaga, baking and serving the pie with laban (yogurt). The next day the hosts prepare malehi using dried jameed reconstituted into a yogurt sauce mixed with chicken broth, mashing bulgur with ghee and yogurt, plating on large communal dishes, and sharing the meal (Chantal and Salah).

Video guide

  1. 0:36 — Intro and recipe overview
  2. 1:39 — Simmering chicken and making broth (spices added)
  3. 2:09 — Chopping and frying onions
  4. 4:11 — Making and resting the dough for ragaga
  5. 7:03 — Shredding chicken and making the filling
  6. 11:17 — Rolling layers, assembling and baking ragaga
  7. 14:26 — Serving ragaga with laban and tasting
  8. 14:43 — Next-day malehi: preparing jameed yogurt sauce
  9. 16:21 — Mashing bulgur with yogurt and ghee and communal plating
  10. 18:17 — Final tasting and impressions

People, places, food, and other named details

  • Person — Nora: Friend who provides her kitchen and teaches the recipes; performs much of the hands-on cooking.
  • Person — Salah: Mentioned as sharing the malehi meal with Chantal; referenced elsewhere in channel metadata (husband).
  • Cuisine — Syrian: Cuisine/context for the recipes (ragaga and malehi) shown in the video.
  • Food — ragaga: Layered thin crispy bread/pie with shredded chicken, onions, spices, and olive oil; prepared and baked in the video.
  • Food — malehi: Traditional Syrian bulgur dish made with jameed/jamid (dried yogurt), bulgur, ghee, and chicken; prepared and served the next day.
  • Food — jameed: Dried yogurt product reconstituted into a yogurt sauce used in malehi and other Arab recipes; shown and described in the video.
  • Food — bulgur: Cooked and mashed bulgur used as the starch base for malehi.
  • Food — chicken: Simmered to make broth, shredded and used as the primary protein in ragaga and malehi in the video.
  • Food — onions: A main ingredient for ragaga; large quantities are chopped and fried in olive oil.
  • Food — olive oil: Generous amounts used to cook onions and to layer into the ragaga; noted as high-quality Syrian olive oil.
  • Food — laban: Served on the side with ragaga and used as the yogurt component of jameed sauce for malehi.
  • Food — ghee: Added to the mashed bulgur and drizzled on top of the final malehi.

Transcript and captions

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