This is a beautiful summer dessert when fresh citrus and berries are in season. For some reason I wanted it to be greener (it turned out yellow-green, which i suppose is because of the eggs), but the taste made up for the color. I think the zest was supposed to be minced finer, but even though I could see strips of zest, it still tasted just fine. In fact, I think i like being able to see that there was zest in it. It is quite tart, so serve each slice with big dollops of whipped cream and sliced strawberries.

This curd recipe was really easy, as it did not require a double boiler. I was apprehensive about pouring the curd mixture directly into a pan, but it turned out just fine!

Recipe here: (more…)

One year ago: Totaa

Think back to your idea of a traditional kitchen, filled with a bunch of women, sharing stories over big bowls of food while they prepare a big meal for their family. Kibbe is that kind of food. There’s a big pot of meat, a big pot of dough, and a bunch of hands rolling and filling and frying while the kitchen echos with laughter and stories.

My friend/mother-in-law, Fatimah, tells me that being able to make kibbe is considered the mark of a great cook in Syria. I’m definitely not there, but it was very fun spending an afternoon learning how to make this classic dish.

Everyone has their own recipe for kibbe (also called kubbe). There are two main ways to prepare it - in bars or in stuffed lemon-shaped dumplings. People from Shaam, especially Syrians, make the dumpling style. These can either be fried and dipped in plain yogurt to eat, or made with a cooked yogurt sauce called shakriya. You can also make them in a patty style and slow-cook them in a barbeque, then serve them with plain yogurt for dipping. I’ll show all three of these styles in this post. The hardest thing to do is stuff and shape the dumplings into the traditional lemon form. I’ll try to show as step-by-step of a process as I can, but really, it just takes a lot and lot and a lot of patience and practice to get it right - but it’s worth it!

Other great Kibbe posts

Kibbi Mihshiyya at Arabic Bites
Kubbe in Broth at Desert Candy

Recipe (and lots more pictures) here: (more…)

One year ago: Mochi

The silver-haired man sitting next to me at dinner said not a word the whole evening. He listened patiently to the judge on my left and nodded along as we all discussed the Legal Ethics scenario for the evening.

He seemed a real southern gentleman. A quiet, pensive man who started life as a hardworking youth and grew into a hardworking adult. His mind had been trained with the words and writings of the law, but his hand stil yearned for the skills of his more fulfilling life.

He was a craftsman. A tinkerer through and through. His joy came from tying strong knots of fishing line onto a hook or carving a block of wood into a toy soldier for his grandson.

It was the same attention to detail that made him an excellent lawyer. His days were spent arguing for his clients. I could imagine him in action during his prime - commanding the attention of the judge and jury in all the terror and power of the courtroom stage. But the night I met him, he spent the evening lost in his own contemplation, with his hands in his lap, not in prayer, but doing what came naturally to their skills. One of the tines of his fork was oddly bent, and over the course of the night, it was reshaped and reformed by his wrinkled but strong hands.

I learned more from his silence that night than from the tableful of respected attorneys giving their opinion on someone else’s life. At the end of the night, when he shook my hand warmly, I could truly say to him, “It was a pleasure to meet you, sir.”

This is a simple, homey soup with just some basic flavors - not a lot of fancy herbs or spices, just the basics. Onion, garlic, salt, pepper, and the vegetables. And with a simple shortcut, its super quick.

Leeks look like an overgrown scallion and have a mild oniony taste, so you don’t have to start by sautéing onions for this soup…unless you just really like onions. Leeks are a little quirky to work with - the bottom part of a leek, the white part, is grown underground, so the dirt gets inside the layers. With leeks, you cut first, then submerge in water and rinse very well to get the dirt all out.

I used leftover mashed potatoes that I had frozen to make this. The mashed potatoes had spinach and mushrooms in a buttermilk alfredo sauce (this one), so if you wanted to make it the full “Potato, spinach, mushroom, and leek soup” (which I highly recommend), just sautee the mushrooms and spinach along with the leeks.

Recipe here (more…)

From my old, brown-paged, batter-stained Joy of Cooking, vol. 2: Appetizers, Desserts, and Baked Goods. It needed a little adjustment, but it was quite good - even though I don’t usually like orange flavors in desserts. I’m sure you can make it with lemon zest instead. It’s very good spread with ricotta cheese and drizzled with honey.

By the way, zest can be frozen. If you’ve got a bag of lemons to make lemonade, or if you’re peeling an orange to eat - zest it, then freeze it in a little ziploc bag, and juice a little bit of the fruit into the bag. You can keep it on hand and be ready to bake or make curd or add it to seafood.

Recipe here (more…)