The Definitive Guide to Living in the Capital , Cairo , Egypt

It’s general knowledge to anyone that’s visited Cairo, that foul is by no means rare or a treat. Egyptians alike have grown to love the stuff, so finding a restaurant dedicated enough to name itself after such a signature dish, filled us with a mixture of excitement and anticipation.

Foool Tank is one of those daring establishments that serve solely through delivery. With a long day ahead of us, we decided to give this restaurant a shot and order in to the 360 headquarters.

Unlike various fool establishments in Cairo, Foool Tank stand out by offering a more varied menu than most. Their sandwiches are available with three different breads; the common shamy, ciabatta and for the health conscious, brown ciabatta. Exotic combinations like fool with kiri cheese (4.5LE – 8.5LE), BBQ (4.5LE – 8.5LE), sweet ‘n’ sour (4LE – 6LE) and fajita (4.5LE – 7.5LE). There is also a daring tagine, fool 3amety (10LE) which consists of mashed foul and bechamel sauce. Beans aside, the menu also hosts other choices such as sogo’ with hummus (7LE-12LE) and sambousak with cheese (8LE) or meat (10LE). In the dessert department we found crepes with Nutella (10LE), black honey and tahina (8LE), cream and honey (8LE), and Nutella filled sambousak (10LE).

We opted for a shakshouka tagine (4LE), a Lebanese fool sandwich (4.5LE), Fajita fool sandwich (4.5LE), stuffed taameya box (7LE) along with a beetroot salad (4LE) and tahini dip (4LE) on the side. Life’s too short to skip dessert so we treated ourselves to black honey and tahina crepe (8LE).

Our order arrived in less than an hour; a well dressed, familiar faced delivery boy handed us brown paper bags and was well on his way. As a small local establishment, Foool Tank extend their deliveries only to Mohandiseen, Agouza, Dokki, Downtown, Garden City, Manial and Zamalek.

There’s usually two outcomes when grabbing a fool sandwich in Cairo; either the bread is overstuffed, causing a foul eruption when its bitten into or there’s barely any foul and it feels like you’re eating foul-flavoured bread. Thankfully, we found our shamy bread sandwiches to be satisfyingly stuffed with fresh and well-mashed fava beans, minus the mess.

The Lebanese foul was a mix of hummus and spices whilst the Fajita had an assortment of ingredients including coloured peppers, olives, mushrooms and herbs in a Mexican style. Both were ordered spicy and didn’t disappoint, with the inclusion of fresh jalapeno strips. A complementary side of pickles made for a pleasant addition to our meal.

The shakshouka was a generous portion and included a flavourful combination of cheese, tomatoes and spices but was a slightly over salted. Our beetroot salad was made like coleslaw, where a tub of sweet mayonnaise had been filled with beetroot strips with the unusual, clever addition of pineapple pieces. The taameya box was filled with four large, fried bean delights that went well with the smooth tahini dip. Each taameya had a center of assorted vegetable cuts that were both crunchy and unexpectedly spicy.

Rounding off with dessert, the soft crepe was conveniently rolled and cut into bite-sized pieces, drizzled with a generous, runny mixture of honey and tahini.

Foool tank is slightly more expensive than the average foul provider in Cairo. However, this is reflected in both the quality and the presentation of the items which makes it worth the extra pennies. For everyone who lives or works in Foool Tank’s delivery radius, there’s no excuse not to try it!