Lebeniye soup
A yoghurt soup thickened with chickpeas and hulled wheat, finished with garlic and mint in butter. The Antep version adds small köfte. In Mardin it goes by çoban çorbası.
Chickpea and wheat starch plus the pulses’ soluble fibre already thicken the base, so added flour is often unnecessary. It is never boiled after the yoghurt goes in.
What it is made of
Yoghurt
pH 4.4 · splits above 85 °C
Dairy: it brings creaminess, protein and calcium.
Temper it with a few spoons of the hot liquid before it goes in; added straight, it splits.
Ck
Chickpea
Protein 19% · skin dissolves in alkaline water
Gives body: the bulk of the plate and its starch.
A pinch of soda in the soaking water: the alkaline bath dissolves the skins and nearly halves the cooking time.
Ga
Garlic
Allicin forms 60 s after cutting
A base: it neutralises acid and shifts colour and lift.
Let it sit for a minute after chopping: that is when allicin forms. Straight into the pan and it never appears.
Bt
Butter
Smoke point 150 °C · milk solids burn
Fat: it carries the aroma and softens the texture.
Add a spoon of neutral oil alongside it: the mix survives a higher temperature before the solids burn.
Mi
Mint
Menthol is volatile · add off the heat
Spice: it adds aroma and edge.
Fresh mint goes in off the heat; dried mint is bloomed in fat. They are not the same job.
Sa2
Salt
0.8–1.5% of the weight of the food
Seasoning: it sets the perception and balances the salt.
0.8–1.5% of the weight of the food. Coarse and fine salt do not weigh the same by the spoon, so weigh it.
What it tastes like
No axis sits clearly above the average: a balanced dish without a sharp character.
This profile is computed rather than measured: the role-weighted average of its ingredients’ taste vectors, shifted by what the cooking does. The thin line is the database average on that axis.
How it is made
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Soak the chickpeas and hulled wheat overnight and boil each until tender.
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Whisk the yoghurt with flour and egg and temper it with the cooking liquid in three stages.
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Thicken it in the pan below the boil, stirring without pause.
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Add the grains and adjust the salt.
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Bloom garlic and dried mint in butter and pour it over the soup.
Why This is the Antakya signature: garlic opened in fat rather than raw.
Where it comes from
The name comes from Arabic *laban*, milk or yoghurt — direct evidence of the culinary continuum between the Levant and Anatolia. It sits in the Ottoman line and is found in both Turkish and Lebanese cooking.