Kurrat

Kurrat (Allium ampeloprasum var. kurrat), also called Egyptian leek, salad leek or kurrat baladi, is a leafy Middle Eastern relative of the common leek grown not for a fat white shaft but for its slim, dark-green leaves. Where the European leek is earthed up for its blanched pseudostem, kurrat is cut again and again for its narrow, flat blades, which carry a sweet, gently oniony-garlicky flavour milder than a scallion. Handfuls are chopped raw into salads and mezze, folded into the herb-and-green fillings of Egyptian and Levantine pastries, stirred into omelettes and stews, and simmered into soups; it is a foundational cutting green of Egyptian cooking and is grown across the Nile Valley, the Levant and the wider Middle East as a cheap, repeatedly harvestable kitchen vegetable rather than a market bulb crop.