Spicing up our breakfast

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"That was a great breakfast," my 12-year-old son said as he got up from the table today after polishing off two pocket-bread halves stuffed with organic greens, hummus and fava beans. (Photo: Hummus at Maxim Restaurant in Haifa, Israel.)

My breakfast sandwiches also held greens and hummus, but I added a fat Moroccan sardine and a slice or two of plum tomato sprinkled with the thyme-based mixture called za'atar. We both ate some taboule salad, the last from the container I bought at Costco in Hackensack. Everything else but the greens came from Fattal's Bakery (and market) in Paterson.

This breakfast was fragrant with Middle eastern spices -- cumin, coarse Aleppo red pepper, allspice -- and lemon, garlic and extra-virgin olive oil in the hummus with tahini I made from a can (Lebano Verde brand).

As we ate, we discussed how my son's bean, bean and bread sandwich made such a great vegetarian meal and how I would be happy giving up meat as long as I could eat sardines and other seafood. After I finished, I put another half of Fattal's Syrian bread into the toaster to warm and assembled a hummus and fava bean sandwich. Absolutely wonderful.

Fattal's Bakery, 975 Main St.; (973) 742-7125;

Paterson; open seven days.