If there was ever a recipe worthy of “breakfast for dinner” it would be shakshuka. This rich, saucy dish is full of smoky spices, hearty beans, and rich eggs. Make sure to buy or make some homemade crusty bread for dipping, because you’re not gong to want to waste a drop of this delicious tomato sauce!
What is Shakshuka??
Shakshuka is delicious dish cooked all across the Middle East and North Africa. It’s an incredibly simple and hearty dish consisting of eggs poached in a spiced tomato sauce. I decided to take my shakshuka in a slightly different direction by adding cannellini beans to bulk it up a bit, plus a hefty dose of smoked paprika to give it a deep, fire-roasted flavor.
How to Serve Shakshuka
Most people in the U.S. eat eggs mostly for breakfast, but this delicious dish is great for breakfast, brunch, OR dinner. You’ll want to serve the shakshuka with some crusty bread, pita, or naan to sop of the delicious sauce. No bread? No problem. Spoon the saucy mix over a bowl of grits or rice (like we do here in the south). Just don’t let one drop of that sauce go to waste, promise? K.
Smoky White Bean Shakshuka
Servings 4Ingredients
- 2 Tbsp olive oil ($0.32)
- 4 cloves garlic ($0.32)
- 1 yellow onion ($0.16)
- 1 28oz. can whole peeled tomatoes ($1.69)
- 1/2 Tbsp smoked paprika ($0.15)
- 1 tsp ground cumin ($0.10)
- 1/2 tsp dried oregano ($0.05)
- 1/8 tsp crushed red pepper ($0.02)
- Freshly cracked black pepper ($0.05)
- 1/4 tsp salt, or to taste ($0.02)
- 1 15oz. can cannellini beans ($1.19)
- 4 large eggs ($1.10)
- 1 handful fresh parsley, chopped ($0.20)
- 2 oz. feta, crumbled ($1.12)
Instructions
- Mince the garlic and finely dice the onion. Cook both in a large deep skillet with olive oil over medium heat until the onions are soft and transparent (about 5 minutes).
- Add the canned tomatoes and their juices, crushing the tomatoes with your hands as you add them to the skillet. Add the smoked paprika, cumin, oregano, red pepper flakes, and some freshly cracked pepper as well. Stir to combine.
- Allow the sauce to come to a simmer. Let the sauce simmer, stirring occasionally, for 5-7 minutes, or until it has thickened slightly. Add 1/4 tsp salt, then taste the sauce and adjust the salt or other spices to your liking.
- Drain the white beans, add them to the skillet, then stir to combine. Allow the skillet to return to a simmer. Simmer for 2-3 minutes more.
- Crack four eggs into the skillet, then place a lid on top and let them simmer for 5 minutes, or until the whites are set but the yolks are still soft. Top the skillet with the crumbled feta and chopped parsley.
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How to Make Shakshuka – Step by Step Photos
Start by mincing 4 cloves garlic and finely dicing one yellow onion. If you want to, you can also dice a jalapeño and toss it in there as well. Add the garlic and onion to a large skillet along with 2 Tbsp olive oil and cook over medium heat until the onions are soft and transparent (about 5 minutes).
Add a 28oz. can of whole tomatoes (with the juices) to the skillet. Use your hands to crush the tomatoes as you add them to the skillet. Word on the street is that the best tomatoes are reserved for the “whole” canned variety, while lesser tomatoes are used for “diced” or “crushed”. I’m not sure if that’s true, I just liked the organic shapes of the hand crushed tomatoes rather than perfectly diced bits. You can use diced or crushed if that’s easier for you.
Along with the crushed tomatoes, add 1/2 Tbsp smoked paprika, 1 tsp cumin, 1/2 tsp oregano, 1/8 tsp red pepper flakes, and some freshly cracked pepper (about 10 cranks of a pepper mill). Stir to combine.
Let the sauce come to a simmer over medium heat. Let it simmer for 5-7 minutes, or until it’s slightly thicker and saucy. It starts out more watery, but you want it closer to the thickness of V8 juice (if you’re familiar with that!).
Now that the sauce has thickened, it’s time to add the salt. Stir in 1/4 tsp salt, then taste and adjust to your liking. You can also add more smoked paprika or red pepper flakes, if you like an extra punch.
Drain a 15oz. can of cannellini beans and add them to the sauce. Cannellini is the best white bean to use for this recipe because they are larger, tend to be more firm, and don’t break down as easily as navy or great northern beans. Garbanzo beans also work well in this.
Stir in the beans and let it come back up to a simmer. Let it simmer just a few more minutes…
Finally, crack four eggs into the sauce and place a lid on the skillet. Let the eggs simmer in the sauce for about 5 minutes, or until the whites are set and the yolks are still soft. The yolks will be cloaked in a white veil when they begin to cook, so you’ll have to watch the vibrations in the simmering sauce. When they’re still liquidy, they’ll shake from the popping bubbles of the simmering sauce. :)
As it simmers, the sauce will settle some, so I always take a spoon and stir the sauce around the eggs to remix the beans and tomato pieces.
Finally, top the eggs and sauce with 2oz. crumbled feta and a handful of chopped parsley. NOM.
And seriously, every beautifully golden runny yolk deserves some bread for dipping, don’t you think?
Smoky White Bean Shakshuka, it’s what’s for break… dinn… BRINNER!
This is the best Shakshuka! Who knew that white beans and smokey paprika would make something usually a bit pedestrian into something we want to have weekly now. Oh, and the feta is important as it adds a lot of salty goodness. Thank you Beth for another extremely budget friendly and delicious dinner. And, it’s almost a pantry staple kind of thing, because generally, if you cook, you usually have these ingredients around.
Beth, you have saved us so much time and money and given us so many great recipes. Thanks so much.
How have I never had this before! Amazing! I messed up and over cooked the eggs a little, but the creaminess of the beans and everything else together was still perfect!
So Delicious and surprisingly simple! I do not think I would have found this recipe if it wasn’t for your website definitely my favorite food blog! It would be great to see more ‘ethnic’ dishes like this
Thank you for this recipe! We loved it with toasted ciabatta rolls and a few dashes of hot sauce! Delicious meatless meal option! Adding it to our make again list!
Finally had a chance to make this. Amazing! I had to sub a few things: I used 14 oz diced tomatoes and 3 oz of tomato paste with 1/2 cup water and used kidney beans instead of white.
Other than that, followed exactly and LOVED the results!
Really want to try this for dinner tonight! How is the spice level? Love good flavor, just can’t handle too much heat!
Hey Tandra, if it helps, I made this tonight using the spice amounts stated in the recipe and it wasn’t spicy at all, just nicely flavoured :)
Another Budget Bytes winner for me! The feta really takes this to another level. It was like fancy brunch at dinner time:D
Let me start by saying I’ve been following your blog for almost a year, and I now ONLY make recipes from you site. Your recipes always turn out so well, always taste good, and are so easy and affordable. I feel like a chef!
That being said, I’ve never heard of shakshuka in my life. But I thought, “If it’s good enough for Beth, it’s good enough for me!” So I went for it and OMG…. my stomach is still in heaven. My husband just described it as “breakfast soup”, it’s like the best of dinner and breakfast met and had this beautiful meal. I wish I had as much skill at spacing out eggs as you do though, mine definitely didn’t look as pretty, but the taste made up for my ugly eggs!
Thank you for sharing this. It is amazing and I can’t wait to make it for guests.
This is so simple but I can see how it will taste amazing! I gotta find a way to use that tomato-bean sauce.
Maybe I’ll make some tofu scramble and pour the sauce over it. ;)
Hey Teresa – there’s few recipes out there for marinated tofu “feta”. I haven’t tried any yet, but they sound pretty good. Here’s one: http://greenevi.com/vegan-tofu-feta-cheese-new-and-improved/. Tofu scrambles sound good too, though!
WOW. This is so easy, and it looks exactly like your picture. We’re just now mopping up the last bites with your home-made naan recipe. Everybody’s smiling. Thank you, more than you know! Your blog went from “thoroughly enjoyable” to “utterly essential” last week when we had to (overnight) launch a heart-healthy household diet. Your recipes are perfect and everything is easy to sub for meatless/dairy-free. I purchased your cookbook moments ago! Thanks for being a genius!
Beth, Your photos make me want to go get a spoon and dip out some of that lusciousness for myself! I like everything in this dish.
I make Shakshuka or Eggs in Purgatory every couple of months and I look forward to preparing your recipe which sounds delicious. I love these well-seasoned, one pot dinners–standing over a bubbling pot with a wooden spoon helps me unwind. Thanks Beth!
This is what I love about your blog, things I would have never thought of fixing together, you create it and now I want to fix it! :) This looks amazing!!
Also, just wanted to send kudos your way! My fiance and I have been going to a nutritionist in Garner, North Carolina. She was educating us on healthier ways to eat and actually SUGGESTED YOUR BLOG for recipes!!! She was so excited when we told her we have been making meals from it! :)
Sending much thanks and big kudos for helping us transition into a healthier lifestyle and giving us such amazing delicious recipes that we can cook at home!
~Heather & Chris~
I am a registered dietitian, and use this web site all the time as well!
That is awesome! I always knew it was a good site but this is yet another confirmation on how great it really is! :)
Looks great! I’ve always wanted to try making Shakshuka but it seems like it’s the kind of dish you’d need to eat right away. Do you know if it reheats well at all?
I’d remove half of the sauce from the pan and only add 2 eggs at the beginning, saving that other half to eat later in the week, since this recipe isn’t going to halve as well as some–well, you can use a smaller can of tomatoes, but half a can of beans is likely to go to waste. My personal issue is an extreme dislike for runny egg yolks–yeah, weird, I know. So my take on this was to poach 2 eggs in the sauce for my husband, and scramble 1 more on the side for me, pouring the sauce over the egg in my bowl. It was a hit at my house, and we gobbled up every bit of the tomato and bean sauce! Tons of flavor make this recipe is a perfect thing for nights when you need to go to the pantry for a meal!
I reheated my leftovers today and they were quite tasty. :) (just used the microwave)
I make leftovers from it all the time. I pretty much do what Janmaus suggested, except I leave all the sauce in the pan when I add the eggs, I just scoop out around them when moving the food from the pan into my bowl. Then, when I go to make it the next day, I just get out a slightly smaller pan than I used the night before, put the leftover sauce in it with a little added water, heat until warm, add the eggs, and eat it all again.
You could probably use the microwave too, but I’m more comfortable with cooking the eggs in a pan.
Do you have any suggestions for doing one serving versions of this? It looks so tasty but I am generally cooking for one.
Hmm, I don’t know that you could really do it one at a time, but I found the leftovers to be quite good. ;)
Perhaps one could make a whole batch and split it between four containers; in a smaller pot put in one portion and poach one egg. Freeze the other portions and reheat as required for quick meals.
Honestly, I have a terrible time poaching eggs in sauce, so whenever I make this or similar recipes, I just do my eggs separately, over-easy, and add on top. That way I can control the yolkiness, and there’s no over-cooked eggs in the sauce for the next day.
You know, that doesn’t sound like such a bad idea. And I’m sure it’s much prettier! :P
Can I use tomato sauce instead of the whole tomatoes? I know it’s crazy but I hate the texture of tomato bits!
Yep!