I first ran into toum at a Lebanese spot near my sister-in-law’s place, ordered as an afterthought alongside a chicken shawarma plate, and ended up asking for a second cup before the meal was even half over.
It looks like a simple white sauce, almost like a thick mayonnaise, but it is entirely eggless, just garlic, oil, lemon, and salt whipped into something impossibly light and fluffy while still tasting like a punch of pure, raw garlic.
The technique is the whole trick here: garlic gets pureed with lemon juice first, then oil gets added in a slow, patient stream while the food processor runs, the same emulsification logic behind a good aioli, except toum gets there without any egg at all.
Get the timing right and you end up with a cloud-like sauce that holds together for weeks in the fridge. Rush it and you get a broken, oily mess, so patience matters more than any other single ingredient.
I keep a jar of this in the fridge more often than I probably should admit, and it goes on nearly everything savory in my house, grilled chicken, roasted vegetables, even smeared inside a sandwich in place of mayonnaise. If you have made my Muhammara (recipe on the site), toum is the same Levantine pantry logic in a completely different direction, bold, simple, built from almost nothing.
Toum (Lebanese Garlic Sauce) Recipe
Prep time: 15 minutes · Cook time: 0 minutes · Total: 15 minutes · Servings: about 2 cups (16 servings) · Calories: ~90 per serving
Ingredients
- 1 cup peeled garlic cloves (about 4 to 5 heads)
- 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
- 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, divided
- 2 cups neutral oil, such as canola or a light olive oil
- 2 to 3 tablespoons ice water, as needed
Instructions
- Place the garlic cloves and salt in a food processor. Process until finely minced, scraping down the sides as needed.
- Add 1 tablespoon of the lemon juice and process another 30 seconds until the garlic forms a smooth paste.
- With the processor running continuously, begin adding the oil in a very slow, thin, steady stream, just a few drops at a time at first.
- Once the mixture starts to thicken and turn pale (after about a third of the oil is in), you can add the oil slightly faster in a thin stream, alternating occasionally with a teaspoon of the remaining lemon juice or ice water to keep the sauce loosening and emulsifying rather than tightening.
- Continue until all the oil is incorporated and the sauce is thick, white, and fluffy, similar in texture to whipped marshmallow. Taste and adjust salt or lemon juice as needed.
- Transfer to a clean jar and refrigerate. The sauce will firm up further as it chills.
Recipe Notes
- Sourcing tip: look for the mildest, freshest garlic you can find, since it is the entire flavor of the sauce; garlic that has started to sprout will taste bitter and harsh.
- If the emulsion breaks (it will look thin, oily, and separated), do not panic: start a new small paste with a spoonful of the broken mixture, an ice cube, and a splash of lemon juice, then slowly drizzle the rest of the broken sauce back in while processing.
- A light, mild olive oil works, but strong extra virgin olive oil can turn bitter when emulsified this aggressively, so save your good finishing oil for something else.
- Toum keeps in the refrigerator for 3 to 4 weeks in a sealed jar, and it mellows slightly in intensity after the first day or two.
