List of Ethiopian and Eritrean dishes and foods

This is a list of Ethiopian and Eritrean dishes and foods. Ethiopian and Eritrean cuisines characteristically consists of vegetable and often very spicy meat dishes, usually in the form of wat (also w'et, wot or tsebhi), a thick stew, served atop injera, a large sourdough flatbread, which is about 50 cm in diameter and made out of fermented teff flour. Ethiopians and Eritreans eat exclusively with their right hands, using pieces of injera to pick up bites of entrées and side dishes. Utensils are rarely used with Ethiopian and Eritrean cuisine.

Bread and pastry

 * Dabo kolo – small pieces of fried dough, served as a snack
 * Injera – a spongy, slightly sour flatbread regularly served with other dishes.
 * Himbasha – wheel shaped lightly sweet bread, often flavoured with raisins and cardamom
 * Samosa (also sambusa) – fried pastry stuffed with spiced lentils

Breakfast

 * Fir-fir – shredded bread mixed with niter kibbeh and berbere, commonly served for breakfast
 * Ga'at or genfo – a stiff porridge made from barley or wheat flour, sauced with a mixture of niter kibbeh and berbere, commonly served for breakfast

Dishes

 * Ful medames – an Egyptian dish of cooked and mashed fava beans served with vegetable oil, cumin and optionally with chopped parsley, onion, garlic, and lemon juice, it is also a popular meal in Ethiopia, Eritrea and other countries.
 * Gored gored – a raw cubed beef dish
 * Kitfo – minced raw ground beef mixed with mitmita and niter kibbeh
 * Shahan ful – stewed fava beans served with chopped fresh vegetables and spices
 * Shiro – a stew with primary ingredients of powdered chickpeas or broad bean meal
 * Tibs - cubes of beef in wat
 * Tihlo - barley dough balls served with meat stew spiced with berbere, a Tigrayan dish
 * Wat – stew that may be prepared with chicken, beef, lamb, a variety of vegetables, spice mixtures such as berbere, and niter kibbeh. Wat is traditionally eaten with injera.

Crops

 * Enset – a root crop, particularly important to the south of Ethiopia
 * Teff – a grain widely cultivated and used in Eritrea and Ethiopia, where it is used to make injera or tayta. Teff accounts for about a quarter of total cereal production in Ethiopia.
 * Gesho – leaves and stem used to flavour tej (mead) and tella (beer)
 * Niger seed – the seeds of this herb are crushed to make an edible oil.

Sauces and spices

 * Ethiopian cardamom – The spice known as korarima, Ethiopian cardamom, or false cardamom is obtained from the plant's seeds (usually dried), and is extensively used in Ethiopian and Eritrean cuisine. It is an ingredient in berbere, mitmita, awaze, and other spice mixtures, and is also used to flavor coffee.
 * Berbere – usually include chili peppers, garlic, ginger, basil, korarima, rue, ajwain or radhuni, nigella, and fenugreek.
 * Mitmita – a powdered seasoning mix used in Ethiopian and Eritrean cuisine.
 * Niter kibbeh – seasoned clarified butter used in Ethiopian and Eritrean cooking.

Beverages

 * Coffee - A brewed drink made from Ethiopian coffee beans and used in a jebena.
 * Tej – A honey wine or mead that is brewed and consumed in Ethiopia and Eritrea.
 * Tella – A traditional beer from Ethiopia and Eritrea that is brewed from various grains, typically teff and sorghum. It is called siwa in Tigray and Eritrea.