The Carrot Tree

The Carrot Tree
a cookbook for people

who can read
by
Gina Raye
This is for
Amani
who used to hate to cook (I hate to cook),
then was unable to cook (I cant cook),
and now doesnt know how to cook (I dont know how to cook)!
We call this progress.
Pretty soon shell invite you over for dinner...
in spite of herself!
Introducing a traditional yet nonetheless unique perspective on homecooking
with an Apologia to Those On Restricted Diets... Y e p!
i
I started cooking when I was 9 years old, regular cooking. Thats when my mom and dad divorced and my mother told us she
needed help to get everything done around the house. When I look back and think on it now, it doesnt make any sense at
all. My dad never helped with the cooking except when we barbequed. My sister, Paula, and I would fnd a note from Mom
when we came home from school.
Dear Monsters-
Take the roast out of the fridge when you get home. Turn the oven on to 350 and put the roast in at 3:30. Add
potatoes and carrots at 5:00. Call me when you get home. Love, M.P.
Mom remarried. She married a Danish guy named Frithiof (pronounced Frichoff). He took us deer hunting, quail, and dove
hunting. He taught us to shoot rattlesnakes and how to make bread. We used to spend our Saturday afternoons (after
mowing the back yard, fnishing the laundry and making the weekly trip to the market) at the kitchen table kneading bread
dough and inventing startling new things to do with dough scraps. He also taught us how to build a proper fre in the grill and
to eat our steaks medium, or you dont get any. We learned what happens when you open a pressure cooker before its
cool Instantaneous Mess, and when opening a champagne bottle, to aim it away from light fxtures,and we learned all the
words to Oh Danny Boy.
We visited our dad every other weekend. He made us scrambled eggs for breakfast. He made great scrambled eggs. I
didnt used to like eggs much. He added a couple of drops of Worcestershire sauce, some Tabasco, and onion and green
pepper. They didnt taste so egg-y that way. My dad prohibited ketchup on the table unless we were having hamburgers
and hotdogs and French fries. He also didnt let us order spaghetti in a restaurant until we had mastered the art of twirling it
on our fork. This was a pain because we used to go out to eat at Montis La Casa Vieja and the only good kid food there was
spaghetti and meatballs, and since Mom didnt make meatballs, they were a Real Treat, so we learned to twirl our spaghetti
early.
We had to eat everything on our plates. Paula got herself tied to her chair with the kitchen towel for almost three hours one
time when she wouldnt eat something. Dad fnally let her go to bed at nine, but she ate whatever it was for breakfast. I had
to eat cold oatmeal for dinner once when I didnt fnish it for breakfast. I just ate everything on my plate after that. The sister
after us, Mary Liz, vomited up French style green beans all over our table at Miners Camp restaurant when Dad made her eat
them even though she said shed throw up. He didnt know that we had been suborning his wishes by distracting his attention
whenever Mary wanted to get rid of some green beans. She just scraped them off the edge of her plate on the side away
from Dads view and then pressed them up in under the edge of the plate. Ingenious solution, we cleared the table.
ii
In summers, Paula and I would go to stay with the grandparents in Texas. Both my grandmothers had truck gardens (thats a
vegetable garden big enough you have to haul the produce away in a truck). I remember afternoons sitting in the shade on
the back porch of my Nenaw Wilsfords house with a bushel basket of fresh black-eyed peas between us, me, Paula, Mom,
Nenaw, our Aunt Martha, and Morri, our cousin, snapping peas, and us listening to stories that always started, Wayel, back
then, gals, we dint have
On my dads parents farm, we had all kinds of fresh vegetables and fruit, and we had fresh chickens and catfsh and wide-
mouth bass and bony perch, and sometimes some squirrel meat or frog legs, if Uncle Butch had brought any home. My
grandfather smoked hams every year and then there was beef, beef and more beef. Beef and cotton were Papas cash
crops. After her kids all got married, my grandmother started helping her friend Alene who owned the Dairy Mart next to the
gas station out on State Highway 77. Nenaw later bought the place. I foated through my childhood summers on the creamy
foam of Dr. Pepper Frosteds and strawberry malts, root beer foats, hot fudge sundaes, banana splits, just-fried fresh peach
pies with ice cream! Our grandmother let us eat as much ice cream as we wanted. Im not kidding. It was great. I love ice
cream.
Miz Speer (Thats my grandma!) became famous for 100 miles around for her chicken-fried steak. The engineers on the MKT
railroad stopped the train there at the Italy water tower and had their lunch at Miz Speers every day. People came down
from Fort Worth and up from Waco for her chicken-fried steak and steak fngers in-a-basket. She also served up good burgers,
properly moist and messy. And fried chicken (served with mashed potatoes and cream gravy). A succession of colored
women helped her in the kitchen, peeling the potatoes and cutting up the fryers, starting with Mary, the oldest, and going on
down through her sisters, daughters, and grand-daughters.
Mary and her family lived in a big corrugated tin house. We went there once when it rained and you had to sit on the porch it
was so loud inside. Course its nicest to sit on the porch when it rains. Nenaw fnally had to close the Dairy Mart after Interstate
35E came through and they built a real Dairy Queen at the Italy exit. The train had eventually stopped coming through every
day, too.
Couple-a-three times a summer wed go out to my great-aunt Jesses farm on Waxahachie Lake for a pre-family reunion
supper. Thered be maybe 30 of us all together, all cousins or kissin' cousins. Paula didnt much like to go because Aunt Jesse
always had dirt dobbers (a kind of wasp) fying around in her house, then after sundown the boy cousins would chase us girls
and put June bugs down our backs. At least they didnt squash them. When it was near time to eat, Uncle Henry (That ol
Henry, hell argue with a fence post, wontcha Henry? Hell, I will!) would have a wash pot of water boiling on a fre in the
yard. Hed send us kids into the corn feld to pick a couple of bushels. Then wed shuck the corn, clean all the silks off real
iii
well and throw it in the water. Seven minutes. Barbecued chicken and ribs, fresh corn on the cob dripping with butter,
potato salad. And watermelon and all the aunts special recipe pies and cakes and different kinds of home-made ice
creams for dessert. We took turns turning the crank on the ice cream makers.
So I began to learn to cook from the women in my family. I didnt expand my repertoire until I moved to Egypt in 1983. I still
had a hankering for the same kinds of food, but the ingredients, methods and style of cooking are different, so I improvised
and began to learn new dishes, frst, from my mother-in-laws cook, Mohamed Aly.
Mohamed Aly has been in kitchen service since he was 8 years old and started out in a Big Houses Osmanli kitchen. He
can do some pretty sophisticated stuff, along with your run-of-the-mill saneya batatas. I kept out of Mohameds kitchen
until I was pregnant with Noora, when my loathing for warm milk with bits of skin in it overcame my fear of stepping on his
toes. I spoke a little Arabic when I came to Egypt, but acquired much more, some of it questionable, thanks to numberless
incursions into Mohameds domain.
Noora was born in 1984, and started eating food at the beginning of 85: Rice Galactina with pured peaches and a pinch
of cinnamon. I started experimenting with the things I remembered from my childhood about then. We had moved down
to Hurghada and there was NO FOOD, at least nothing like in Cairos beautifully stocked markets. There was lovely sun-raised
coarse shamsy bread and there was fsh. Rice or pasta. Tahina. Olives. Boxed white cheese. The vegetable truck came
once a week and the vegetables were cooked by the time it reached Hurghada. Only summer fruits. Noora drew the carrot
tree in Hurghada, and I was thoroughly staggered by that glimpse of how environment shapes perception. Dont you have
a red crayon, Noora? Yes, Mommy. Then why did you make the apples orange? Those arent apples, Mommy! Those
are carrots! I drew a picture for her of how carrots grow. She wasnt quite convinced. She carefully drew a little rabbit sitting
on its back legs on the ground beneath the tree. Then why do bunnies jump so high?
iv
I met Nihad Sursock awhile after Nooras dad found better things to do than drive me crazy. Nicha and I took the management
contract on a formerly popular restaurant in Zamalek and brought it back to life. A lot of our luck was just plain timing: outside
the hotels, there wasnt much of anywhere nice, semi-cultured, semi-hip, and NOT TOO LOUD! to go out for an evening in
Cairo.
Nicha likes airplane food. Dont get me wrong. He was a good cook before we met, but a diffdent eater. At Il Capo, we
began to explore the World of Cuisine. The owner, Emad Osman, Allah yarhamu, had a fantastic library of cookbooks. I read
them all. Over and over. And bought all the cooking magazines I could fnd. One time at a CAC garage sale, I found 10 years
worth of Gourmet magazines. We cooked some really good food at Il Capo. Many thanks to Chef Said, Chef Michel, and
Amu Dahi who remained cheerful and willing though the cumin was locked up and alien edibles overfowed the counters.
After the success of Il Capo, we took over restaurant after restaurant after restaurant. Yep, like that. Nichas still taking over
restaurants. After luck, comes know-how and talent... and demagh.
Holidays with Nicha were centered on food. We ate lots of nice stuff. Belgian and Dutch stuff, Italian and French stuff, Turkish
and Greek stuff and we didnt get fat.
Summers in Split on the Dalmatian coast with Cici, Nichas mum, are still the highspot of my food-consuming life.
Food! Glorious S u m m e r Food! F R E S H L A N G O U S T I N E S !! (Still twitching their whiskers!) Rougets, mackerel, grouper,
eel, squid, REALLY BIG OCTOPII! Salted sardines.
Did you ever eat REAL salted sardines? Fished out from the bottom of a barrel by a mustachio-ed fshwife? With a slice of raw
onion on a heel of coarse bread drizzled with strong olive oil? Washed down with a slug of summery white wine, crisp and
dry?
Figs, grapes, peaches, plums, lettuce-ES, rosemary and basil, all different kinds of squashes and eggplants and radishes and
carrots. The farmers like to experiment. YES! Lavender honey. Austrian-style pastries. Great coffee. Dalmatia is a lovely place
to eat.
And your house can be, too.
Preparing your Kitchen
2
Non-perishables
all-purpose four
sugar
rice
dried beans, peas or lentils
spaghetti
other pasta
vegetable shortening or ghee (samna nabati or samna
beladi)
hot pepper sauce, such as Tabasco
Worcestershire sauce
honey
molasses (asl iswid)
raisins
walnuts or pecans
oil, saffower or sunfower
olive oil, the best you can afford
vinegars, white and wine*
tomato paste
canned tomatoes
canned tuna
tahina
vanilla extract or vanilla sugar
allspice, ground or berries
bay leaves (wara' lowra)
caraway seeds (bizoor karawya)
cardamom pods (habahan)
cayenne pepper (shatta)
nutmeg, whole (goz e-teeb)
oregano (zaatar)
paprika, mild or hot (flfl ahmar amrikani)
sage (salvia)
tarragon, if you like it
thyme (zaatar lubnani)
turmeric (korkum)
celery seeds (bizoor karafs)
cinnamon, ground and stick ('erfa)
cloves, whole ('arunfel)
coriander seeds (kosbara hassa)
cumin seeds (bizoor kamoun)
dill seeds (bizoor shabat)
ginger, ground, or fresh (ganzabeel)
mustard seeds, any color (kherdl)
chili powder or dried chiles
a rosemary plant, or 2 or 3 depends on how much you like
rosemary (zanzabeel)

.
Food Stufs Sometimes you have to cook something with what you have on hand, either for yourself or for un/
expectedly hungry guests. Its nice to have particular things on hand so youre not stuck ordering take-away every time.
* Buy a bottle of cheap red wine and leave it open for a few days in a warm place, if it doesn't go to vinegar, add a
tablespoon of regular vinegar to it, re-cork and begin using 2-3 days later.
3
Grinding Spices
Buy small quantities of spices as they lose favor over
time. I buy mine from Hassan, a wholesaler in Suk al
Zeit in Khan al Khalili. He has everything or can get
it immediately, like mustard seeds are diffcult to fnd
anywhere else. He also has dried horny toads and
other even more obscure aphrodisiacs.
To grind cumin and coriander seeds and allspice
berries and cloves, dry fry them in a small pan until
they give off a great smell, then grind them hot in
the grinder attachment of your blender (or pound
them in the mortar). These spices are much better
prepared yourself. The already ground ones from the
supermarket arent usually toasted. They dont have
the pungency they should. You can buy a special
grater for the nutmeg, but the smallest option on a
good grater works just fne.
Perishables
These are things that are pretty important to have
around, but if you dont intend to eat them within 3 or
4 days, freeze the dairy products. The cheeses will be a
little grainy, but they taste fne. Fresh vegetables can
be washed then soaked for 20 minutes in a tub of water
with a pinch of potassium permanganate. You can buy
the crystals or solution at any good pharmacy. Dry them
thoroughly and theyll keep a long time in the fridge.
Garlic
Onions
Potatoes
Tomatoes
Key limes or lemons
Cured black or calamata olives
Parmesan or romano cheese
Mozzarella or other mild cheese
Roquefort or goat cheese
Gruyre or emmental cheese
Edam, gouda or cheddar
Eggs
Milk
Yoghurt
Butter
Cream
Sour cream
Breads
*Limoon adalia (Italia?) are the big yellow lemons. When the recipe calls
for lemons or lemon juice, I mean key limes. It will be specifed if the recipe
requires limoon adalia.
Breakfast (or Supper!)
7
Tea and Cofee
Tea
We hope you can boil water. Boil some water (you
might want to measure it, use the same cup you will
drink from). Meanwhile put the teapot in the sink and
run it full of hot water. Let it stand until the water boils.
Dump the water out of the tea pot and put in one spoon
of tea (or one teabag) for every cup, and another one
for the pot. Pour boiling water over tea and put the
cover on the pot. Let sit (we call it steeping) 3 minutes
or so.
Coffee
If you like coffee, you probably know how to make
it, so these directions are for people who dont
drink coffee, but have to make it for someone else
sometimes, perhaps an overnight guest. I recommend
either Turkish coffee (very quick and easy) or lespresso
(smells great, is easy, and impresses your overnight
guest). Both require special purchases: a kanaka for
Turkish coffee, buy the one cup size; an espresso maker
for lespresso; and both coffees are served in those little
cups that we call demitasses.
Turkish Coffee: Put one heaping spoonful of Turkish grind
coffee into the kanaka. Add sugar according to your
wishes: spoon, ala riha, 1 spoon, mazboot, 2 spoons,
ziyada. Add cold water up to the ridge near the rim of
the kanaka. Leave the spoon in and put the kanaka
onto a low fre. Stir it around until the coffee and sugar
are all mixed in, by that time the water will be warming
up quickly. STOP STIRRING. Leave the kanaka on the fre
and watch it. As the coffee heats, the level will begin to
rise slowly. When it reaches near to overfowing, take
the kanaka off the fre and tap the bottom of it against
the stovetop. Let the surface settle. Then put it back
on the fre and do it again. Then again. It should come
to a boil 3 times. Swirl the coffee around carefully in the
kanaka then pour into a demitasse. Serve with a glass
of cold water.
Lespresso: Fill the bottom of the maker with cold
water. Fill the flter cup with espresso grind coffee. Put
the flter cup in the bottom half and screw the top half
on, making sure the rubber seal ring is seated and no
coffee grounds are on it so that it seals properly. Put it
on a medium fre. If you like, heat some milk, careful
it doesnt make a skin. The espresso pot will make
some noise when it is espressing the coffee. When it
stops making noise, open the lid carefully, has it flled?
Should have. Serve black in demitasse cups or in mugs
with hot milk and sugar Cuban style.
USE REALLY GOOD WATER TO MAKE COFFEE AND TEA
8
Smoothies
A smoothie is a fruit-based blender drink. Its a cool,
quick summer breakfast or a pick-me-up any time of
day. You can use any kind of fruit. This recipe is from
Sunshine, a snack stand at 9th Street Beach in South
Laguna Beach, California.
1 cup chopped fruit
1 tablespoon FULL of honey
1/2 banana
1 cup fruit juice (apple or orange; apple with
delicately favored fruit, orange with other)
1 cup crushed ice
Just blend together in the blender. You can add a
spoonful of protein powder, or some soy bean based
baby milk powder, or a raw egg to beef it up a bit. Or
use yoghurt or milk instead of juice in the recipe.
9
French Toast
Beat two eggs with a little milk in a dish big enough that bread slices will ft into. Salt lightly. You can add a pinch
of vanilla sugar. Take some slices (3 or 4) of your favorite bread, slightly stale is better. Put them one at a time in
the egg mixture. First one side, then the other; let them soak it up a bit. Heat a little butter in a frying pan. When
it is sizzling, carefully lay each egg-soaked slice of bread into the pan. Cook until edges show golden brown, turn
and cook other side. Serve with butter and warm syrup or powdered sugar.
To warm syrup: when you start to make your french toast or pancakes, put the syrup bottle in a deep container
of some kind. Run hot water in over it and let it sit until youre ready for it.
Easy Fruit Syrups
Put a couple of big spoonfuls of your favorite jam in a small saucepan. Stir in enough water to thin it to syrup
consistency. Heat it gently with a little glob of butter. Its nice chunky, but you can strain it for a classier effect.
Store leftovers in fridge. Use it for blintzes, which are crpes flled with sweetened farm or ricotta cheese (just
whip in a little sugar) and then gently heated in a little butter and served with warm fruit syrup (cherry) and
maybe some sour cream (Got your attention, huh?).
10
Buttermilk Pancakes
This batter you can make at night, refrigerate it
covered, then use it in the morning. Otherwise youd
probably never make pancakes. I always make
buttermilk pancakes, rather than regular milk ones,
theyre tastier.
1 1/4 cups four
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg, beaten
1 1/3 cups buttermilk (laban rayeb) or sour milk (1 1/3
cups milk soured with 1 tablespoon vinegar or lemon
juice)
1 tablespoon cooking oil
Stir together dry ingredients. Stir together wet ingredients.
Dump the wet on the dry. Stir until blended. If you make
the batter in a pitcher its easier to pour out into the
pan.
To cook, grease a frying pan lightly: put some oil or
shortening on a paper towel and wipe the inside of the
pan. Put it on a medium fre. Its hot enough to cook
pancakes when a drop of water skitters across the pan
surface. Just wet your fngers and fick a couple of drops
of water into the hot pan. The water drops should do
a little dance, not just sit there bubbling or immediately
vaporize. Pour or spoon the pancake batter into the
hot pan. If it doesnt spread out by itself, thin the batter
with a little buttermilk, milk or water. A big frying pan
should hold three pancakes. It takes about 1/4 cup
of batter for each normal sized pancake. Cook until
edges are dry and little bubbles appear in the top
surface. Turn and fnish cooking, another minute. Serve
with butter and warm syrup.
Variation: to the dry ingredients add 1/2 cup fresh
berries (straw, blue, black, rasp, mul-) or 1/2 cup broken
pecan or walnut pieces sauted in a little butter.
You can also make dollar pancakes-- kids love them.
Theyre just small, the size of a silver dollar. Or huge
ones that fll the whole pan. For huge ones, thin the
batter down a bit with more buttermilk. Be careful
turning the big ones. Its not hard, but it takes some
agility. Practice with smaller ones frst-- then increase
the size gradually. Youll get good at it.
11
Popovers (Yorkshire puddings)
Popovers are really easy. Its eggs for breakfast without
egg taste. Noora loves them. Serve them fresh out of
the oven with butter and honey.
Preheat oven to 190 C/gas mark 4 plus/375 F
Grease a muffn tin WELL. Down in the corners and on
the face and everything but the bottom. Put it in the
hot oven. In your blender pitcher put:
4 eggs
1 cup milk
1 cup four
1/2 teaspoon salt
Press the ON button. Blend until smooth. Remove
muffn tin from oven and quickly fll muffn cups 2/3
full. Return to oven and bake for 35 minutes. DO NOT
OPEN THE OVEN WHILE BAKING or they wont puff up
like they should and they wont be hollow. Remove
from oven and quickly prick each popover with a
toothpick to let the steam escape. Theyll hold their
shape better. Dump them into a napkin-lined basket.
Serve immediately with butter and honey. Put the
butter and honey down inside the hollow. Put plenty
of napkins on the table. Sometimes the popovers look
better than other times, higher and puffer and crispier
...but even if theyre lop-sided, they still taste good.
The traditional Yorkshire pudding is baked in a pan
placed on the oven rack underneath a somewhat
fatty roast on a rotisserie. Put the empty baking dish
under the roast and let the fat drip into it as the raost
cooks. 45 minutes from fnishing time, remove the hot
dish and quickly pour the egg mixture into it. Put it
back in the oven and continue cooking until done.
12
Oeuves la coque
Get your toast soldiers ready while the eggs cook:
toast some bread and butter it, then cut it into fnger
lengths.
Put medium eggs in cold water, bring to a boil, put
lid on pan AND TURN FIRE OFF. Leave eggs 3 minutes
exactly. It is best to serve them immediately, or you
can quickly cool them in cold running water to stop
them from cooking more.
Omelettes
The secret to a successful omelette is cooking it over a
low fre. Put some butter in an omelette pan and set
it over a low fre. Use butter or margarine when frying
eggs any style. The eggsll stick if you use a little oil,
and if you use a lot of oil they'll get crispy. Beat your
eggs up (2 or 3 for one person, make 1 omelette at
a time) with a fork in a bowl with salt, pepper, and a
little milk (if the eggs are really thick and yellow, add
a teaspoon of water so the omelette wont be tough).
Pour them into the pan. Get your flling ready.
Fillings
1) grated cheese
2) previously sauted mushrooms or onions cut in rings
3) ham, onion, green pepper, all chopped (thats a
Denver omelette)
4) tomato, onion and green pepper, all chopped
(Spanish omelette)
When the edges are cooked and theres only a thin
flm of uncooked egg over the rest, sprinkle the flling
over the whole thing. Carefully insert a spatula at one
side and fold the omelette in half. Its done if you like
them a bit runny. If you like your omelette well-cooked,
do this: as the egg is cooking and before you add the
flling, when the edge is cooked, slide a fork down under
it and tilt the pan so the liquid egg runs down under
the already cooked egg. Do it until youve got rid of
all the really runny egg. Then add your flling, fold the
omelette, and cook another minute or so. Serve with
hash browns or home fries (see page ?) and tomato
wedges, fried in the same pan until lightly browned.
13
Huevos rancheros
Serve these the morning after youve cooked Mexican,
that way youve got everything pretty much ready.
You need soft corn tortillas and refried beans for a real
huevos rancheros breakfast. The salsa ranchera you
can make quickly (see index for recipes).
Make the salsa ranchera. Heat the refried beans.
Heat a little oil in a small pan and heat the tortillas in it,
dont fry them crisp, just heat them up. Put two tortillas
on each plate. Fry your eggs in butter. Traditionally,
sunny-side-up, but any way you like them. Put one egg
on each tortilla and cover with salsa ranchera. Heap
some beans on the side. Really nice with a cold beer
and a basket of hot four tortillas to mop up the sauce
and beans.
Tortilla
Not to be confused with tortillas. This one is a Spanish
egg thing, the others are Mexican bread things.
Beat some eggs (1 or 2 per person) up with salt and
pepper and milk and herbs if you want.
Heat some butter in a frying pan. Saut some onion,
maybe some zucchini, and/or mushrooms, tomatoes,
ham, bacon, sausage. Throw in some chunks of pre-
cooked potato, maybe some other leftover veg.
Anything will do. Saut until all the veg is cooked or
warmed up properly. Add a little oil or a tablespoon of
butter and let it melt. Lower fre and pour egg mixture
over vegetables. Add some cheese cubes now if you
want. Cover and cook over very low fre until done.
Cut and serve with nice bread, some olives, a small
salad or some salsa fresca.
14
Breads
17
Corn Bread
Preheat oven to 230 C/gas mark6/450 F
Makes 1, serves up to 8
This is our family recipe. It came off the back of an
Aunt Jemima corn meal package back in the 1950s.
Normally, we melt the drippings in an iron skillet in the
oven, but since you probably dont have an iron skillet
(or any bacon grease), just put the oil or shortening in
a heavy layer cake tin or square cake pan and heat it
in the oven. Leave it in the hot oven until youve mixed
the batter.
1 1/2 cups corn meal, yellow or white (not to be
confused with corn four or corn starch!)
3 tablespoons four
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups buttermilk (laban rayeb) or 2 cups milk soured
with a tablespoon of vinegar or lemon juice
1 egg
2 tablespoons drippings (thats bacon grease) or oil/
shortening heated in the pan
Mix the dry ingredients together in a bowl. Make a well
in the center and break the egg into it and pour in the
buttermilk. Stir well with a fork. Dont beat the batter.
It can be a little bit lumpy. Pour into the hot pan and
bake 20 to 25 minutes. Serve with butter (and honey
for breakfast). Fantastic to crumble in soups, stews,
beans.
You can bake the batter in a muffn tin, too. Just put
a teaspoon of oil in each muffn cup and heat the tin
before you fll the muffn cups to 2/3 full. Bake only 15
minutes.
Variation(s)
Toss into the dry ingredients: some cheddar cheese
cubes and some chopped jalapeo peppers, some
canned sweet corn, drained, or some sliced green on-
ions and some crumbled fried bacon, or some chopped
sun-dried tomatoes and some basil with maybe some
mozzarella cubes. Then proceed as directed above.
18
Flour Tortillas
Makes 12
2 cups all purpose four
1/4 cup cold vegetable shortening, cut into pieces
(traditionally, lard is used)
1 teaspoon salt in 2/3 cup warm water
Squoosh the four and shortening together in a bowl with
a fork until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Add
the salted water spoon by spoon to the four mixture,
and toss with a fork until water is incorporated. Form
into a ball with your hands and knead it on a lightly
foured surface for 2 to 3 minutes or until it is smooth.
Divide dough into 12 equal pieces. Form into balls and
let stand covered with plastic wrap or a damp kitchen
towel for at least 30 minutes and up to 1 hour.
Heat a griddle, sturdy baking sheet or, failing those, a
large frying pan, until a drop of water skittles across it.
Sprinkle some four on the counter and roll out each
dough ball to a circle just bigger than your spread
hand. Slap onto hot griddle. Cook until it begins to
puff up in places and the edges are dry. Turn, press
down and cook another minute or so. As the tortillas
come off the griddle, wrap them in a kitchen towel.
19
Baking Powder Biscuits
Some tips: If your fat is not cold, the biscuits wont rise
as high. Too much stirring will make the biscuits tough.
When cutting the biscuits, plunge the cutter into the
dough and pull it back out without twisting; if you twist
the cutter the biscuits wont rise as high. If you really
like biscuits, you can buy a biscuit cutter. It looks like a
small tuna can with both top and bottom removed.
Preheat oven to 230 C/gas mark 6/450 F
Makes 10 to 12 biscuits
2 cups four
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup vegetable shortening or butter
2/3 cup milk
Stir together dry ingredients. Cut the shortening or
butter into the dry ingredients with a fork until it looks
like crumbs. Make a well in the center and pour the
milk in it. Stir with a wooden spoon until the dough
comes together.
Flour your hands and sprinkle some four on the coun-
ter. Take the dough out and form it into a ball. Knead
it 10 times. Pat or roll dough out to 1.5 cm thickness.
Cut into biscuits: either round, with a cutter or glass, or
whatever shape, with a knife.
Put the biscuits on a baking sheet or in a cake pan,
they shouldnt be too crowded so they have room to
rise. Bake them for 10 to 12 minutes, or until golden.
Serve hot with butter and jam or honey-- or be really
southern and fry up some sausage patties and make
pan gravy to serve with the hot biscuits.
20
Annettes Mufns
Annette Baldree frst made these muffns for me when I
visited her in Lausanne for New Years 1987. She added
chopped canned peaches. They were memorable.
I faintly recall New Years Eve, also.
Makes 12
Butter a muffn tin well.
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/4 cup butter, melted
up to 1 cup chopped goodies of your choice (optional)
2 cups four
1 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
Beat eggs in a small bowl and add milk and melted
butter. Add up to 1 cup chopped fruit, nuts, raisins or
whatever combination thereof. Sift dry ingredients
together into a larger bowl. Pour in the egg mixture and
mix with a fork until just wet (dont beat the batter). Fill
cups of muffn tin 2/3 full and bake 10-15 minutes, until
golden brown. Serve hot with butter and honey.
More nutritious variation
Substitute up to 1 cup of the four with whole wheat
four, or up to cup with oats or wheat germ.
Appetizers
Well start out with things you can make in advance for company or can keep in
the fridge for yourself when you get the munchies. Do your shopping for the week
and come home and put your groceries away and MAKE something with your just-
bought, fresh stuff.
23
Marinated Mozzarella
about 1 cup virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons dried rosemary, crumbled (or 2 nice
fresh sprigs)
2 large garlic cloves, sliced thinly
1/2 kilo mozzarella, cut into cubes (cut it with clean
hands and knife on a clean board)
4 large fresh rosemary sprigs
Combine the oil, dried rosemary, and half the garlic
in a saucepan and warm over a low fre for 2 minutes.
(Dont fry the garlic and dont let it smoke.) Remove
from heat and strain. Add fresh rosemary sprigs. Cool
to room temperature.
Pick out rosemary sprigs and put them in the bottom
of a clean jar or other covered dish. Add remaining
garlic and the mozzarella and pour the favored oil
over them, add more oil if necessary to completely
cover the cheese pieces. Screw the lid on the jar or
cover the dish. Let it sit outside the fridge for awhile.
If your kitchen is fairly cool and youve been careful
about everything being practically sterile, it will keep
a couple of days outside the fridge. If not, put it in the
fridge after a couple of hours. Let marinate at least
1 hour and up to 2 days. Serve with fresh tomatoes,
some olives and good bread. Or put some on a mixed
salad and serve that with some good bread.
Nihals Marinade for Olives
Always do this with your olives. Youll be as famous as
Nihal at least for your olives.
1 bay leaf
2 cloves garlic, peeled and cut in half
olive oil
1/2 kilo cured black or calamata olives
Put the olives in a colander and drain the brine (thats
the salted water theyre packed in) off, the olives
should be almost dry. In a clean jar (Nihal uses large
Nescafe jars), put the bay leaf and garlic, then add
the olives. Cover with olive oil and store in a cupboard
for at least a week. When youve eaten all the olives
you can re-use the oil. If youre on a budget, you can
mix half good sun/saffower oil with excellent olive oil.
24
Peppercorns and Thyme
a 300-350 gram log of mild goat cheese, cut into four
pieces
1 1/2 tablespoons mixed peppercorns, crushed, or just
black ones
6 to 8 fresh thyme sprigs
virgin olive oil
Rosemary, Anise and Cayenne
a 300-350 gram log of mild goat cheese cut into four
pieces
1 tablespoon anise seeds, crushed
1 teaspoon cayenne fakes
6 to 8 fresh rosemary sprigs
the zest of one lemon (the colored part of the peel,
grated)
virgin olive oil
In a clean jar with a lid, pour a little oil then put in the herbs and spices, then a piece of cheese. You put the
fresh herb in the bottom otherwise it will foat up out of the oil and get moldy. Pour oil in as you go to cover the
cheese pieces completely. Knock the bottom of the jar against the counter to get the bubbles out from under
the cheese. (Also a cause of mold.) Marinate chilled for 1 to 3 weeks. Let come to room temperature before
serving with a fresh, crusty bread.
Goat Cheese Marinated with...
25
Tahina
Makes about 1 1/2 cups
some tahina (2 big spoonfuls)
some lemon juice (1 or 2 lemons)
1 clove garlic, well crushed in your mortar with salt (it
will make a paste)
1 pinch ground cumin
1 pinch cayenne pepper (more to taste)
some water
Stir up the tahina in its jar then put two big spoonfuls in a
medium mixing bowl. Add the garlic paste and spices.
Squeeze in one lemon and stir with a fork. Take the bowl
over to the kitchen sink and turn on the cold water at just
a dribble. As youre stirring the tahina (vigorously), keep
dipping it under the water. It will get really thick and dark
at frst, like peanut butter, but as you add water it will thin
down and whiten. Add water to the point where it is just
a little thinner than you want it. Taste it. Do you want
more lemon or salt? Add it. Unless it turns out completely
bland, dont add more spices. As the tahina sits, these
favors will come out. Scrape the tahina into a covered
dish or jar with a lid, and refrigerate at least 1 hour. It
will keep for several days in the fridge if you are careful
about using clean utensils to serve it. Serve it on saucers,
garnished with some cayenne or cumin, with warm
pocket bread cut into triangles.
Baba Ghanouj
Makes about 3 cups
1 large eggplant
the tahina recipe
black pepper
Wash then cut the eggplant in half lengthwise. Oil each
half and place cut-side down on a baking sheet. Bake
in a medium hot oven (190 C/gas mark 4 plus/375 F)
until completely soft, about 30 or 40 minutes. Remove
from oven and let cool a bit. Spoon out the fesh onto
a cutting board and chop it fnely, then scrape it into a
big bowl and mash well with a fork or potato masher.
Add up to an equal part of prepared tahina and some
black pepper. Mix well. Taste. It will probably need a
bit of salt and maybe some more pepper. Store and
serve like tahina.
26
Three easy semi-Egyptian party dips
Foul (fava beans) with Garlic Dip
Open a can of foul medames and put it to simmer.
Add a pinch or two of cayenne and of cumin. Cook
until beans are soft and water is mostly evaporated.
Mash 5 to 6 cloves of garlic with a little salt until it forms
a paste. Mix the garlic paste into the foul and remove
from heat.
Mash thoroughly and taste, salt if necessary, black
pepper if you like. Its easiest to mash with the empty
foul can itself.
Serve hot or cold with oven-dried pita.
White Cheese and Mint
Empty a box of white cheese (with its water) into a dish.
Add some dried mint fakes and some cayenne fakes
to taste. Beat until smooth.
If you use fresh white cheese youll have to add a little
milk or water and beat it a lot longer.
Mound into a dish and serve with bread sticks.
White Cheese and Tomatoes
Drain the water from a box of white cheese and dump
the cheese into a bowl.
Finely dice a frm tomato or two and, if you like, a
green pepper (a hot one?) or some black olives. Blend
thoroughly into the white cheese.
Serve with dipsters.
27
Prepare your vegetables. Caulifower, broccoli, green
beans, baby artichokes, artichoke hearts, and carrots
should all be steamed or boiled in a little water (with
half a lemon) until half cooked, then cooled in running
cold water. Mushrooms, red onions, greens, tomatoes
and cucumbers should just be cleaned and cut into
bite-sized pieces. Peppers can be marinated raw, but
they are much better roasted and peeled. Eggplant
has to be cooked (see below).
Marinade enough for 1 kilo vegetables
Shake together in a jar with a lid:
1 cup olive oil
3/4 cup wine vinegar
1/2 teaspoon salt
freshly ground black pepper
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon fresh or 1 teaspoon dried herb; choice
of rosemary, oregano, thyme, basil, marjoram
Arrange your selected veg in a glass rectangular dish, or
toss together same textures in a glass bowl. Cover with the
marinade and chill several hours. Theyll keep a week or
more covered with the marinade refrigerated. Good for
hors doeuvres, on sandwiches or salads, or make a meal
with some good bread and a piece of feta cheese.
To roast peppers: wipe nice, frm peppers with a damp
cloth. Place them on a baking sheet in an orderly
manner. Turn on the broiler (thats the fre in the ceiling
of the oven) and put the baking sheet on the oven
rack. The peppers should be about a hands width
from the fames. If they roast too slowly theyll cook to
mush. Pay attention. The skin of the peppers will begin
to blacken and blister. When one side is done, take
the baking sheet out and turn the peppers and roast
the other sides. It wont take as long as the frst side.
Get a plastic bag big enough to hold them all. When
they are almost completely black all over, remove
them from the oven and put them in the plastic bag
and close it. Let it sit about ten minutes. Their sweating
loosens the now-burned skin from the fesh. Remove
the peppers one by one, closing the bag each time,
and hold under cool running water, peeling the skin
off with the water. Slice, remove seed core, then do
whatever the recipe you need them for says. If you
only need one, stick a fork in the stem end and roast
the pepper over the open fame on the stove top.
Eggplant: Slice, brush with oil. Place on a baking sheet
and broil, frst one side, then the other, 5 minutes each.
Cool and marinate.
Marinated Vegetables (also for veggie kebabs)
28
Garlic Dip
Makes about 2 cups
1 250 gram carton creamed cottage cheese,
drained, (gibna arish)
1 small carton yoghurt
4 or more large cloves garlic
salt
white pepper
1 tablespoon fresh dill, snipped (optional)
Dump the cottage cheese and yoghurt in a bowl. Put
the garlic and a good sprinkle of salt in a mortar and
grind with the pestle until its creamy. Scrape into the
cheese and yoghurt and add some white pepper and
the dill if you want. Beat until smooth. Taste and adjust
seasonings. The garlic will get stronger on its own. Serve
with chips, crackers or oven-dried pocket bread.
Onion Dip
This is like the Liptons Onion Soup Mix Onion Dip, except
better.
Makes about 2 cups
1 250 gram carton creamed cottage cheese, drained
(gibna arish)
1 small carton yoghurt or sour cream
1 large onion, minced as small as you can possibly
mince it
butter
salt
several drops Worcestershire sauce
Dump the cottage cheese and yoghurt or sour cream
in a bowl. Fry the onion in just enough butter on a low
fre, stirring often, until it is completely brown BUT NOT
BURNED. Cool before adding to the cheese mixture.
Add salt and pepper to taste, it should be a bit
peppery, then add the Worcestershire and beat until
smooth. Serve the same way as the garlic dip.
To oven-dry pocket bread (Also for melba toast): Take the racks out of the oven. Turn the oven on low. Cut open the pocket
so you have two fat rounds. Cut each into wedges or squares or hearts or Christmas trees. (Take some slices of thinly sliced
fne white bread.) Arrange them fat on the oven rack. You can brush them with oil favored with garlic and sprinkle them
with salt and/or dried herbs. Put in the oven and Pay Attention. When theyre golden theyre done, though some people like
them darker. Let cool then store any old air-tight way.
29
Guacamole
Makes about 2 cups
A bit of interesting trivia: the Aztecs called the avocado
tree ahuaca cuahuitl: tree of testicles. Seems the
fruits grow like that. In pairs, I mean.
2 very ripe avocados, peeled and cut in small chunks
(set one pit aside and poke three toothpicks in the
other and suspend it with its big end in a small cup of
water, in a month youll have a baby avocado tree, in
seven years youll have avocados. In Mexico they use
the leaves, toasted and ground, as a spice, they taste
a bit like anise, very good in beans.)
1 medium tomato, diced fnely
1 small onion, diced fnely
1 hot pepper, fresh or pickled, diced fnely
juice of 1 lemon, at least
salt
If you have a lot of people and only a few avocados
you can stretch the recipe by adding sour cream,
labneh or yoghurt, even a little mayonnaise, but its no
longer authentic.
Stir all the ingredients together then bury the pit in the
bowl to keep the guacamole from turning black.
Serve with corn tortilla chips, fresh four tortillas, or
lettuce leaves. Or on hamburgers. According to my
very good friend, Lauri Neff, you can freeze avocado
pure successfully with the pit buried in it in a tightly
covered dish. Lucky woman! I never have any left
over to freeze.
Ceviche (seafood cooked in lime juice)
The frst time I ate this I was sailing in the Sea of Cortez.
The captain, Rod, made the ceviche with scallops hed
pulled up off the bottom. It was excellent. Since then
Ive had it with shrimp and with fsh. The fsh should be
of the un-bony, frm, white-feshed variety.
Serves 4 to 6
2 cups FRESH, cleaned, raw seafood
fresh lemon juice to cover
1 recipe salsa fresca without the lemon juice (page ?)
Cut seafood up into little chunks about 1 cm each
side. Put it in a non-reactive bowl. Cover with lemon
juice and refrigerate. Give it a stir every now and then.
Its done when the fesh has turned white all the way
through. It shouldnt take much more than an hour.
Toss with salsa fresca. Serve with crackers or chips.
30
Cheddar Cheese Balls
1/2 kilo cheddar cheese (the sharper, the better),
grated fnely
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
several drops hot pepper sauce
several drops Worcestershire sauce
2 cups walnuts, fnely chopped
Put everything except the walnuts into a very large
bowl. Mush it all together with your hands. You have
to work it quite a bit to get a homogeneous mixture.
Scrape the stuff off your hands back into the bowl.
Put the bowl in the fridge for awhile, until the cheese
mixture doesnt stick to your hands anymore, maybe
an hour. Put some chopped walnuts on a dinner plate.
Roll the cheese mixture into balls the size of a walnut,
and then each ball in the chopped walnuts. Arrange
on a bed of leafy greens, maybe some red lettuce, or
fresh nasturtium (abu khangar) or grape vine leaves.
Goat Cheese Balls
fresh goat cheese
some milk
lots of freshly ground black pepper
Mash the goat cheese up with a fork. Beat in just
enough milk to moisten, so that the mixture will make
balls. Put the black pepper on a dinner plate. Roll the
cheese mixture into balls the size of a large olive. Roll
the cheese balls around in the black pepper. Serve on
a bed of leafy greens.
31
Really Good Yoghurt
(almost as good as the Greeks make)
Put 1 cup powdered whole milk in a big plastic bowl.
Whisk in 1 liter full cream milk at room temperature or
warmer, but not warmer than 43 C/110 F, or it will kill
the little yoghurt makers. Whisk in 1 small carton your
favorite plain live yoghurt. Cover with a clean towel or
pour into individual serving size bowls and place on a
tray and cover with a clean towel. Let it sit undisturbed
in a warm place. The cooler it is the longer it will take
to yog, but about 6 hours in a warm kitchen or in a
sunny place. It's best to warm the milk slightly during
the winter. Refrigerate. For lesser fat yoghurt: use non-
fat milk powder and skim milk. Your result will be richer
tasting but with less fat than store-bought yoghurt.
32
Labneh and Labneh Balls
Makes about 2 cups labneh or a jam jar full of labneh balls
Dump 10 cartons of yoghurt into a cloth bag made from an
old sheet or pillowcase, or gather them into a large square
of cotton cloth and tie with string. Hang the bag or cloth
from something over the kitchen sink. Let it hang all day.
Lots of water will drip out. Scrape the bag out into a dish
and beat the stuff up with a fork. This is labneh.
You can use it instead of sour cream as a garnish for baked
potatoes or whatever. Mostly its served drizzled with olive oil
and sprinkled with fresh mint leaves, with soft warm pocket
bread, for breakfast or snacks, or an appetizer, along with
tahina and baba ghanouj. A typical Lebanese snack:
spread a round of shami bread with labneh, sprinkle with
chopped black olives, diced tomatoes, fresh mint leaves
and drizzle with olive oil, roll it up.
For labneh balls, leave the bag hanging 24 hours. Give
it a little squeeze. No water should come out. ALL the
water should have drained out. Open the bag (cloth).
Does it look like soft cheese? Glump a bit together in
your hand. Will it roll into a ball? It will if ALL the water
is drained out. Put a little olive oil in the bottom of a
boiling water rinsed jar with a lid. If you want to, put
in a sprig of fresh rosemary and a split clove of garlic.
Make a couple of balls the size of a walnut. Drop them
carefully into the jar. Cover with more olive oil. Make
more balls. Cover with more olive oil. And so on. Ive
kept a jar of these 6 months in the cupboard. Theyll
keep if ALL the water has been drained out and they
are completely covered with olive oil. No air bubbles
down underneath. Of course you can refrigerate them
if you want.
Use labneh balls as an appetizer, or squash them into
a pocket bread with some olive oil and chopped
tomatoes and black olives and fresh mint. You can
also use them to enrich plain labneh or yoghurt. Mash
a couple or three in a bowl and beat in some labneh
or yoghurt-- GREAT on baked potatoes.
33
Now it gets more complicated. Take heart. Proceed
with confdence. You can do it.
Hold the perception.
Samosas
Supposed to make 28
Samosas are Indian fried savory pastries. You can fll
them with any leftovers. Just drain off any liquid and
chop fnely, then dry fry with some extra spicing if
necessary. If it is leftover curry you wont need to add
anything, but if it is, say, leftover eggplant parmesan,
youll want to spice it up with some cayenne powder or
chopped chili peppers. You can make sweet samosas,
too, flled with chopped nuts and raisins, bound with a
little fresh, unsalted cheese and some sugar.
Dough
1 1/2 cups four
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 pinch baking powder
1 small carton plain yoghurt
Mix dry ingredients together then stir in yoghurt with
a wooden spoon. The dough should form a shaggy
mass and come away from the sides of the bowl. Flour
your hands and put a little four out on the counter.
Turn the dough out onto it and knead with the heels of
your hands until smooth and pliable, about 8 minutes.
Cover and let rest 1/2 to 1 hour. Can be sealed in
plastic wrap and refrigerated for up to 2 days.
Basic Potato Filling
1 1/2 teaspoons black mustard seeds
2 tablespoons butter seasoned with chopped mint
and a drop of lemon juice
2 or 3 hot green chiles, seeded and minced
1 cm piece of fresh ginger, shredded
6 medium potatoes, boiled, peeled and diced small
(or other cooked veg or mixture thereof)
1 1/4 teaspoons Bengali garam masala or other
Indian dry spice blend (page ?)
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon raw sugar (1/2 teaspoon molasses)
2 tablespoons chopped fresh coriander or basil
Put mustard seeds in small frying pan over medium
heat. When they begin to pop, add seasoned butter,
chiles, and ginger. Fry until mustard seeds all pop and
turn gray. Add potatoes, garam masala, salt and
sugar. Stir fry 2-3 minutes. Remove from heat. Stir in
fresh herb. Let cool.
So far so good. On to the next page...
34
Now, to assemble:
Knead dough briefy. Roll into a rope 35 cm long, thats
about the length of your forearm not counting your
hand. Cut into 14 equal pieces. Cover with a damp
kitchen towel, taking care pieces do not touch. Get a
bowl of water, a sharp knife, four and a rolling pin.
Work one piece at a time. Roll it into a ball then fatten
and roll out on a lightly foured surface to a 15 cm
round. Move to clean part of the counter. Cut in half.
Lightly wet half of the straight edge with your fnger
dipped in water. Fold over and pinch the wettened
edge together, forming a cone. Pick up the cone
open-end up and fll 2/3 to 3/4 full. Moisten the inside
edge with a little water and pinch it closed, allowing
1/2 cm seam. Set seam-side down on a tray in a cool
place, the counter next to you is fne, just dont set the
tray on the stove. Finish construction of samosas. They
may be kept in a cool place covered for 3-4 hours,
or refrigerated for up to 8 hours. They must be room
temperature before frying.
Heat 8 cm of ghee over moderate heat. Fry each
samosa for 4-5 minutes, until golden brown. Better hot
dipped in some kind of raita (see page ?), but can
be eaten cold and are great in lunchboxes and for
picnics. I often make them bigger, from the whole
round of 15 cm just folded in half over the flling and
sealed. Handle them a little more carefully so they
dont break open.
35
A few words about mushrooms
The most ubiquitous of mushrooms goes by the name
of champignon de Paris. Its the white one that looks
kind of like a button. (The one, God forbid, you buy
in cans.) Choose mushrooms that are dry, frm, and
unblemished. The underside of the cap should still be
completely closed against the stem if you arent going
to use them immediately. Wipe the dirt off of each one
carefully with a barely damp kitchen towel. Store in
the fridge in a brown paper bag. The mushroom favor
is increased if you let them dry out a bit. To do that you
have to have a frost-free refrigerator. After cleaning
the mushrooms, put them in a colander and put them
in the fridge. Dont cover them and be careful nothing
drips on them. After 3 or 4 days they start to shrivel up.
The half-dried ones are excellent to use to favor things
. . . mushroom sauce, cream of mushroom soup (!!!!),
as an addition to anything that just needs a little extra
mushroom favor. Its really MUCH stronger.
There are other mushrooms.
Chanterelles are a light golden color and look like the
caps have been turned inside out. Just saut in a little
butter over a low fre; if you cook them too quickly they
become tough. Serve over meat or an omelette.
Cpes are the ones that have stems that look like a
tree trunk. The cap is slightly darker than the stem.
This is the mushroom for mushroom freaks. Very nice
ones can be eaten raw, but they are usually cooked.
You can put them inside omelettes, make sauce,
or serve as a garnish, especially recommended to
accompany fresh-water fsh. These are the ones you
grill. Go buy a good French cookbook for cpes
la bordelaise, cpes au gratin, cpes grills, cpes
la mode barnaise et cpes la provenale.
36
Mushrooms Trifolati
This is an old recipe. I dont know where it came from,
but Nicha has always used it in his restaurants.
Serves 2
a double handful of fresh mushrooms, cleaned and
sliced
5-6 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons fresh parsley, minced
butter
2 or 4 slices French bread
Heat a knob of butter in a frying pan over medium heat.
Put the bread in and fry it lightly on both sides. Remove
the bread slices and put them on your plates. Add a
little more butter to the pan, and toss in the mushrooms
and garlic. Salt and pepper lightly. Saut, stirring gently,
until done, just over 5 minutes. Toss in the parsley and
mix it all together. Spoon the mushrooms over the toast.
Once the mushrooms have started cooking nicely, you
can add a splash of red or white wine. The liquid will
mostly evaporate but the favor stays.
37
Stufed Mushroom Caps
There are lots of things to stuff mushrooms with. The best
I ever ate was at B.B. Singers in Scottsdale, Arizona. The
chef was a big black guy named George. Im pretty
sure hes responsible for the Chocolate Climax in the
dessert section, too. Huge mushrooms are sometimes
diffcult to fnd, ask your vegetable seller to ask for them
specially when he orders.
4 giant-sized mushrooms per person, caps should
measure at least 6 cm across
some oil
some crab meat, either fresh or canned (drain well)
some 1000 Island dressing (page 85)
some bread crumbs
Clean the mushrooms and pull out the stems. Oil the
caps lightly and save the stems for another use. Moisten
the crab meat with the 1000 Island dressing. Taste, salt
and pepper if necessary, you may want to add a couple
of drops of lemon juice (depends on how fshy the crab
tastes). Heap the crab mixture into the mushroom caps
and place them, stuffed side UP, on a cookie sheet or
shallow baking dish. Stuff them high. Sprinkle with bread
crumbs and place in the oven under the broiler for 10
minutes. Serve on a bed of greens. These little suckers
are rich so take care that your main course is mild, just
grilled meat with green veg is perfect.
38
Artichokes
Wash artichokes and trim stem ends close to choke.
If the thorns are developed, as they are on very large
artichokes, trim them off with scissors.
Select a pot with cover that will hold all the artichokes
all crowded into it, stem ends down. They must be
crowded into the pot so that they dont turn over while
theyre cooking... so that the hearts stay down in the
water so theyll cook properly. Understand? Fill the
pot 2/3 full with water and sprinkle in a little salt and
squeeze in a lemon, throw in the peel of it, too.
Crowd the artichokes into the pot stem ends down.
Bring to a boil then lower heat and cover. Simmer 10-
20 minutes, (depending on the size) until when you pull
a leaf from low down on one it comes out easily.
Serve warm with melted butter favored with garlic and
lemon, or cold with vinaigrette (page ?).
Salads and Dressings
41
Salads are good. They are easy to make and easy
to eat. Especially in the summer. Since you can buy
so many different greens and fresh herbs nowadays,
theres no excuse for boring salads.
Sprouted seeds and pulses (bean/pea-type things) are
nutritious and delicious. Lentils are my favorite. Soak 2
handfuls of brown lentils overnight in water. Dump into
a sieve or small-holed colander and wet 3 times a day,
setting the colander in a shallow dish and covering the
lentils with a wet towel. The roots should show in two
or three days, followed closely by the frst leaves. You
can start using them then. Store in the colander in the
fridge. Theyll grow very slowly there. Use them before
the roots become entangled. Theyre very good just
sprinkled with salt and lemon juice.
Wash your greens well and clean away any brown or
wilted parts. Greens and fresh herbs will keep for days
in the fridge wrapped in a wet kitchen towel. Make a
bag by folding a new kitchen towel in half and sew-
ing along 2 sides. Wet it and wring it out, place the
freshly washed and still somewhat wet greens inside,
and store in the crisper of your fridge.
Use chilled produce to make salads or make them
ahead of time and refrigerate undressed. A limp salad
is so disappointing.
42
Tossed Green Salad
OK, you take some greens and wash them well if you
didnt already. By greens I mean anything green (or
red or purple) and leafy. Lettuces, cabbages (green,
red, chinese), cresses (gargeer), sprouts, and things like
spinach and swiss chard (sel'). Try not to get too bitter
of a mix, like escarole, chard and belgian endive,
use one bitter green at most. Pinch the stems off of
anything that has stems (like spinach) and tear the
ribs out of anything that has large ribs (like swiss chard
or kale or cabbage). Tear the greens into pieces. If
you cut greens, the cut edge turns brown after awhile,
even if you put lemon juice on them. Slice cabbages
in ribbons. Put them in a salad bowl and toss them
together. Squeeze a little lemon juice over it and
dribble on some olive oil. You can serve it like this. . .
Sprinkled with croutons, see page ?, and oregano or
celery seeds. Or make one of the dressings from the
end of this section.
or you can build a Mixed Salad
On your base of mixed greens, sprinkle some fresh herbs.
Use any and all. Its very nice when you use everything
you can get; its also nice to use special combinations.
Use basil, rosemary, celery leaves, parsley, coriander,
dill, mint or whatever. Then cut some gorgeous
tomatoes into chunks and clean and slice some fresh
mushrooms or cucumbers. Scatter over the salad. Slice
an onion and separate it into rings. Put them in a pile
on the salad. Salt the onion fairly heavily, and squeeze
a lemon or two over it. Leave it 5 minutes or so then
toss it all together gently, trying to keep the tomatoes
and mushrooms (or cukes) from all ending up on the
bottom of the dish. It should look great. Itll taste great
anyway. For special combinations, instead of regular
tomatoes and mushrooms with rosemary and/or basil,
use cherry tomatoes and broccoli forets with parsley,
or thinly sliced carrots and celery with dill or coriander,
or cucumbers and mint leaves.
43
Greek Salad
Serves 4
There are probably as many Greek salads as there
are people who make them. The biggest controversy
seems to be over whether or not it should have lettuce.
I like it with lettuce. If you dont use lettuce, use more
cucumbers. Another point: one of the best Greek
salads I ever ate had boiled beets on it. The old Greek
lady at Ariston (now closed) in downtown Cairo made
it that way. Another good place (still open I imagine)
is the marina restaurant at Piraeus.
1 head romaine lettuce (optional), torn into pieces
1 or more large cucumbers, sliced thinly or cut in
chunks, peel if you must
2 large tomatoes, cut in chunks
1 large green bell pepper, cut in strips or rings
1 medium onion, cut in rings
250 grams feta cheese or other frm, salty white
cheese, sliced thickly or crumbled coarsely
1/2 cup Greek style olives (open the can from the
bottom)
olive oil
salt
oregano
Put all the veg together in a salad bowl and toss with
a little olive oil and salt. Top with sliced or crumbled
cheese and scatter with olives. Drizzle with olive oil
and sprinkle with plenty of oregano (especially the
cheese). Serve with warm crusty bread. Scare up an
ice-cold bottle of retsina.
44
Tuna Salad
Serves 4
This salad you can serve in a salad bowl, but it is much
nicer served in a country loaf. Buy a large, round
loaf from any good bakery. Cut it in two like a huge
hamburger bun, the bottom piece slightly deeper.
Scrape out some of the mie (thats the French word for
the white stuff inside breads that doesnt have a proper
word in English, crumb just doesnt do it, in Arabic it's
libaba), let it dry out and use it to make bread crumbs
or croutons, or put it in the dogs dish.
Heat about a 1/4 cup olive oil with a crushed clove of
garlic. Brush the cut faces of the bread with the favored
olive oil and place cut side up under the broiler for a
few minutes, until a bit toasty. Use the bottom piece of
the loaf for a salad bowl. Cut the top half into wedges
and serve on the side.
1 bowl mixed green salad (with fresh rosemary)
2 large frm tomatoes, cut in chunks
1 medium onion, cut in rings
1 green or red bell pepper, cut in strips
1/2 cup cured black or calamata olives
2 cans fancy chunk or solid pack tuna, chilled and
drained
2 hard-boiled eggs, cut in wedges (optional, page ?)
olive oil, the stronger the better
juice of 1 lemon plus lemon wedges for garnish
Squeeze lemon juice over drained tuna in cans and
break it up gently with a fork. Toss the tomatoes, onion
and bell pepper lightly with the greens. Put them in
the bread bowl now if youre using one. Top with tuna,
dont break it up much. Arrange the wedges of egg
around the edge of the bowl. Scatter with olives. Driz-
zle with plenty of olive oil. Garnish with lemon wedges.
If you didnt make the bread bowl, serve it with warm
pocket bread or a fresh baguette and more olive oil.
Sop up the olive oil with the bread.
45
Cheese Salad
Serves 4
Toss together gently in a bowl:
1 cup each of 3 kinds of cheese, julienned (cut in
matchsticks), a swiss, a cheddar and a dutch
1 red bell pepper, julienned
2 green onions, sliced thinly
1 large frm tomato, diced
maybe you want to put in some olives
Stir together:
juice of 1 lemon
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup yoghurt
1 teaspoon dijon mustard
1 teaspoon prepared horseradish or a healthy shot of
Tabasco
Pour dressing over salad and toss gently. Chill. Serve on
a bed of greens or stuff in sandwiches.
Spinach Salad
Serves 4
1 bunch fresh young spinach, washed carefully
(spinach is often sandy), and drained
1 red onion, cut into rings
1 handful fresh mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
2 pieces bacon (for traditional dressing), cut into very
small bits
OR 4 cloves garlic, minced
Put the spinach in a salad bowl and scatter the
mushrooms and onion rings over it. When you are ready
to serve, heat a frying pan and toss in the bacon. Fry
until crisp then pour it, with its grease, over the salad.
Serve immediately with freshly ground black pepper.
Or heat some oil in a pan and fry the minced garlic
until golden, then pour over the assembled salad.
46
Waldorf Salad
This is another one of those salads that everyone does
differently. The traditional Waldorf contains equal
parts of red apples (cubes sprinkled with lemon juice),
celery (sliced), cheese (usually semi-sharp cheddar
cubes), and some walnuts. Mix in enough mayonnaise
to coat. Its good.
Whats better is to use roquefort instead of cheddar,
serve it on a bed of greens, and dress it with roquefort
dressing. Pass around the pepper mill.
Insalata Caprese
Slice some beautiful tomatoes. Slice some fresh
mozzarella. Pick the leaves off some clean, fresh basil.
Assemble on a plate in a circle or in rows, overlapping
tomato slice, mozzarella slice, basil leaf, tomato slice,
mozzarella slice, basil leaf, tomato slice, mozzarella
slice, basil leaf... you get the picture. Drizzle with olive
oil. Serve with good bread.
47
Egg Salad with Caviar
Serves 4 to 6
Linda Lambert made this for us a couple of times, and
Nicha was able to use the recipe at Il Capo, too. Its
different and very good. Dont use real caviar. Use the
German or Dutch black lumpfsch eggs. I mean, use
real caviar if you want, but its kind of a waste, seeing
as how its mixed with other stuff.
4 eggs
1 small onion
1 small pickle
1 small spoon mustard
salt
pepper
mayonnaise
4 green onions
1 small carton sour cream
1 jar (or two) black caviar
Make egg salad.
Hard boil the eggs. Put the eggs in a pan of cold
water and put it on a medium fre. Bring it to a boil
then lower the heat to a simmer. When it starts
boiling, start timing. Small eggs 10 minutes, large
or extra large 15 minutes. Remove the pan from
the heat and pour the water down the sink. Set the
pan in the sink and let the cold water run over the
eggs a couple of minutes. Leave the pan full of cold
water and leave the eggs to cool in it. Theyll peel
much easier if theyre properly cooled. Meanwhile
fnely dice a small onion and a small pickle. Put
them in a bowl. Peel the eggs and chop them
fnely. Put them in the bowl, too. Add some salt and
pepper and a small spoon of mustard. Stir in enough
mayonnaise to bind the mixture together. Set aside.
Finely slice the green part of 4 green onions. Open a
carton of sour cream and whip it up with a fork. Open
the caviar.
Assemble the dish. In the bottom of a serving bowl, put
the egg salad. Spread the surface out evenly. Now
spread the caviar over the egg salad. Then carefully
spread a layer of sour cream about 1 cm thick over the
caviar. Sprinkle with green onions. Serve with melba
toast (see page ?) or rye crisps, a little dish of lemon
wedges on the side.
48
Potato Salad with Variations
Potato salad is like Greek salad in that there are as many
of them as there are cooks. Use 1 medium potato per
person. This is the version my mother makes. I like it the
best.
some potatoes, boiled, peeled and cut into chunks
1/3 as much celery, sliced
1/4 as much onion, diced
ditto amount pickles, diced (dill or sweet)
mayonnaise, enough to bind
mustard to taste
salt
white pepper
Mix the ingredients all together in a big bowl. Chill. Eat
it with barbecued chicken.
The Potato Salad Doris Made One Time
some potatoes, boiled, not peeled, cut into chunks,
WARM
1/3 as much broccoli forets, raw
same amount onion, diced
lemon juice
mayonnaise, enough to bind
salt
Stir it up all together in a bowl and serve warm. I dont
remember what we ate with it. Maybe octopus.
Nichas Dalmatian Variation
some potatoes, boiled, peeled and cut into chunks
1/4 as much onion, cut into thin slivers
celery leaves, minced
cornichons (baby dill pickles), diced
lemon juice
oil to coat potatoes
dijon style mustard, he likes to use a lot
salt
white pepper
capers to sprinkle on the top
Stir it all up together in a bowl and chill. Eat it with
grilled fsh.
49

In a small, deep bowl mix together 2 tablespoons
dijon mustard and 2 tablespoons vinegar (red wine
preferred). Whisking constantly with a fork, slowly
add 1/2 cup olive oil, until the vinaigrette is thick and
creamy. Lots of people add a pinch of sugar.
Variations
1) Add 1 teaspoon minced fresh herb, such as basil,
rosemary, thyme, dill, parsley
2) Add a clove of garlic, well crushed, a pinch of
oregano and 1 teaspoon grated parmesan

Crumble a piece of roquefort or DanaBlu and put
half in a bowl. Set it aside. Put the rest in your blender
pitcher. Cover with light cream and pure. If its too
thick, add a little milk. Pour the blended cheese over
the crumbled cheese and mix well. Grind some black
pepper into it. Serve over green or mixed salad or the
Waldorf.
Basic Vinaigrette with Variations
Roquefort (Blue Cheese) Dressing
1000 Island Dressing (page 85)
Stocks, Soups and Stews
53
Stocks
A good soup has a good base. You can use plain
water or water with a bouillon cube, but homemade
stock is best. Your soups will be more satisfying, and
more nutritious, too.
Use vegetable trimmings and/or bones or chicken/
turkey carcasses (thats the bird after you eat the
meat off of her). As you acquire them, bag up and
freeze potato peels, apple peels and cores, lettuce
leaves, tomato cores, just about anything; be sure you
wash them properly. Careful about using too much
cabbage family unless you want real cabbage favor,
same goes for celery, and dont use carrot peels or
eggplant, theyll make the stock bitter. Red onion skins
will darken it.
Just boil the stuff up, skimming off any scum that forms,
season and strain. If you have a lot or if the favor is a
little weak, reduce it by half or more (boil it for awhile),
let it cool (if youve used bones or apple cores and
peel youll have a jelly when it cools) and freeze it in
ice cube trays. Then use the cubes to favor whatever.
Its really not a big deal to do and it feels good to use
all that nutritious stuff instead of throwing it out.
These two stock recipes are from Anna Thomas' The
Vegetarian Epicure.
Potato Peel Stock
Yields about 6 cups
peels from 6-7 large, healthy brown-skinned potatoes
1 large onion, quartered
2 carrots, sliced
1 medium sized celery, sliced
2 liters water
1 small bunch parsley
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 bay leaf
1/4 teaspoon thyme
pinch of sage
salt and pepper to taste
1 clove garlic, crushed
dash of Tabasco
juice of 1/2 lemon
Combine all ingredients except Tabasco and lemon
juice in a large pot and simmer for up to 2 hours, or
until all the vegetables are very soft. Keep the water
level high enough to cover all the vegetables. Strain
and add Tabasco and lemon juice.
Garlic Stock
Proceed exactly as for Potato Peel Stock, only add a
full, large head of garlic, slightly crushed, rather than
just one clove. Simmer gently for almost 2 hours, then
strain.
54
Nichas Chicken Stock
Makes about 6 cups
1 whole chicken, washed well (skin it and cut the fat
off, if you want)
1 whole onion, peeled and stuck with 6 cloves
1 whole carrot, peeled
1 leek, well cleaned, cut in 3 pieces (korrot)
some fresh celery leaves
a bay leaf
a whole head of garlic
salt
Put everything in a big soup pot and cover with cold
water. Bring to a boil. Skim off any scum that forms.
Lower heat and simmer 1/2 hour, then turn the chicken
over and simmer another 1/2 hour (for a big chicken).
Strain. Taste and adjust seasoning/strength (maybe
boil it down a bit). Use the chicken for something (look
in the index).
55
White Bean Soup
Serves 6 with leftovers
This is the easiest soup to make of all. Thing is, you really
need corn bread with it. But thats pretty easy, too.
1/2 kilo white beans, soaked overnight in water with
a pinch of baking soda (it takes the gas out), then
drained
1 bay leaf
1 large onion, chopped
Put everything in a big soup pot and fll it almost to
the top with water. Put it on the fre and bring it to a
boil. Lower heat, partially cover, and let simmer until
kingdom come. At the very least 2 1/2 hours.
If the water gets low before the beans begin to fall
apart, add BOILING water. If you add cold water
the beans will never get soft, also if you salt them. So
DONT SALT THE BEANS UNTIL THEY ARE COMPLETELY
SOFT. When the beans are soft, salt them, and grind in
some black pepper. As soon as the beans are soft, you
should have a nice soup. If you keep cooking it, it will
become much thicker. Its as you like. This is something
thats just as good or better the following days.
Serve with hot corn bread, buttered. Tabasco.
Chopped pickled peppers. OR when beans have
fnished cooking, strip a few sprigs of fresh rosemary,
and some basil and celery leaves in on top of the
beans. Drizzle with olive oil. Ladle out onto cornbread
slices and garnish with tomato-basil relish (page ?) and
yoghurt or labneh.
Lentils
1/2 kilo brown lentils (ads abu giba), well-washed
1 bay leaf (optional)
1 medium onion, minced (optional)
Put it all in a soup pot and add enough water to cover
the lentils by half the length of your index fnger. Bring
to boil, lower heat to simmer and cover. Cook about
30 minutes and taste. They should be done. Salt to
taste. If you want them to cook down to a mush, add
water or broth if necessary and cook until they reach
the consistency you like. To turn them into dhal see
page ?.
56
Shorba Tersa (Star Soup)
Whoops! I was wrong. This is the easiest (and fastest)
soup to make! Mohamed taught it to me: he called it
shorba terso (Third-class soup). It was one of his favorite
things to do: teach me stupid wrong words for things.
I still cant get some of them out of my vocabulary.
Serves 4
2 tablespoons butter
1/2 medium onion fnely minced
about 1/3 cup of little pasta stars (or ABCs or orzo,
lissan asfoor, or even vermicelli, sha'reya)
1 liter water
1 bouillon cube, chicken, veg or beef (optional)
1 tablespoon parsley, dry or fresh, snipped
Melt the butter in the soup pot and saut the onion and
pasta until they begin to take color. Add the water, stir
it around and crumble in the cube if you want. Bring to
a boil, lower heat and simmer 5 minutes, sprinkle with
parsley and serve. And it tastes GOOD, even without
a bouillon cube.
Variations: Use green onions instead of regular. Or
add 1/2 cup of frozen mixed veg. Or some pre-cooked
chicken, diced very small. Or top with shredded lettuce
and squeeze half a lemon into your bowl.
57
French Onion Soup
Believe it or not, this is how you make French Onion
Soup. You need:
some somewhat dried out french bread slices
(sourdough is great), or you can toast it
enough butter melted in a soup pot to almost cover:
1 large or 2 medium yellow onions per serving, cut up
how you want (think about it*)
2 cups water or broth per serving
salt and pepper
port or madeira (optional)
gruyre (emmental will do, even roquefort)
Simmer onions in butter for a long time. A long time is
at least 1/2 hour, more like 40 minutes, or even an hour
for a really big pot of onion soup. It has to be a very
low fre. The onions should not take any color at all
and the butter mustnt burn. The onions will yield up
some water, so dont worry about it burning too much,
just make sure the fre is low and that the onions are
well covered with their own cooking liquid. Stir them
around with a wooden spoon every now and then.
When theyre beautifully soft and translucent, pour on
2 cups water or light broth per serving. Salt and black
pepper. Bring to a simmer and, for authenticity, add 1
spoon of port or madeira per serving. (Shake in a little
Worcestershire if you dont have either of the wines.)
Simmer another 20 minutes.
While the soup is simmering, get out a slice of old (slightly
dried out) french bread for each bowl and grate some
gruyre cheese. In fre proof bowls, ladle the soup, top
with a slice of bread, cover with grated cheese, and
cook under the broiler until bubbly and golden brown.
Put the bowls on a baking tray to put them in the oven
so theyre easier to handle.
*Its important aesthetically. And practically. If youre
gonna feed the soup to kids, sick people, or drunks,
dice the onions. If youre feeding coherent adults,
slice the onions in rings.
58
Vegetable Seasoning
8 or so artichoke hearts, sliced boil with 1/2 lemon, season with 1/2 teaspoon thyme
2 cups asparagus, chopped 1/2 chopped onion sauted, lemon juice, nutmeg
2 cups broccoli, sliced bay leaf, 1/2 teaspoon thyme
1 cup carrot, sliced 1 tablespoon parsley, 1/2 teaspoon basil
2 cups caulifower, sliced 1/2 chopped onion sauted, 1/2 teaspoon curry powder
1 1/2 cups celery, chopped 1/2 chopped onion sauted, 2 tablespoons parsley, 1/2 teaspoon basil
2 cups corn kernels 1/2 chopped onion, 2 minced cloves garlic sauted, Worcestershire sauce
1 1/2 cups fresh peas 1/2 chopped onion sauted, 1/4 cup shredded lettuce, pinch of sage
1 large potato, sliced 1/2 chopped onion sauted, nutmeg
2 cups spinach, chopped 1/2 chopped onion sauted, pinch thyme, nutmeg
2 cups mixed summer veg 1/2 chopped onion, thyme, cardamom pod, 1 tablespoon fresh
coriander, snipped
4 medium tomatoes, chopped saut with 1/2 chopped onion, 2 cloves minced garlic, generous pinch
each of oregano, basil, cayenne
1 1/2 cups winter squash, sliced 1/2 chopped onion, nutmeg, cinnamon
1 1/2 cups zucchini, sliced 1/2 chopped onion, 1 clove minced garlic, thyme
Cream of Vegetable Soups
Serves 4
Boil your veg in veg or chicken broth, seasoned as
shown in the table, except for tomatoes, saut them
with the onion and garlic then add the broth and
seasonings. Use about 1 1/2 cups broth. If the recipe
calls for onion or garlic, saut in a little butter before
adding the broth and veg. Cook the veg until its
totally tender, remove lemon/bay leaf/cardamom
pod, then pure in the blender. Some soups you will
want to have bits of the vegetable, like corn and
mushroom. So . . . only pure half or three-quarters of
it with its liquid and save some chunky bits on the side.
On to the next page...
59
Bechamel for Cream Soups
2 tablespoons four
1 cup milk
salt
white pepper
In the same pan youre going to make a bechamel:
heat the butter over a medium fre then add the four.
Stir it around with a whisk, cooking it 1 or 2 minutes
maybe, so the four doesnt have a raw taste. For
darker soups, like mushroom, you can brown it a bit.
(This is called a roux, the frst one blond, the second
brun.) Whisking all the time, pour the milk on it all at
once, bring to a low boil, lower heat and cook until it
thickens, stirring all the time, say 3 minutes or so.
Remove from heat and strain in the veg pure, add
salt and white pepper, and the veg bits if you wanted
them. Return to fre and simmer awhile, 10 minutes.
Taste and adjust seasonings.
You can add some real cream just before serving. Only
heat it through, dont boil the soup again if you have
added cream because it will separate. Or use cream
to garnish the soup, a small spoonful right in the middle,
top it with a sprinkle of whatever herb or spice called
for, or a sprig of parsley, or dill, or some croutons. Or try
some grated cheddar or salsa fresca on corn or potato
soup, parmesan on tomato or zucchini. Asparagus tips
on asparagus. Serve with fresh bread or crackers or
rusks.
60
Crme de volaille (cream of chicken)
Make the base of the cream of vegetable soup
(bechamel) and add strong chicken broth (like Nichas
in the Stocks section or like for Chicken/Turkey Carcass
Soup) to desired thickness. You can add diced pre-
cooked chicken, too.
Croutons (plain and favored)
Take some day-old bread, either toast, a baguette or
even kaiser rolls. Cut it up in small cubes and let it dry
out a bit. A couple of hours just sitting or 5 minutes in
a warm oven. Melt some butter in a frying pan; for a
cup of bread cubes, use a good tablespoon of butter.
Or olive oil. When its hot but not smoking, throw all
the bread cubes in it and stir them around real good.
Make sure they all get moistened. Now fry them, stirring
them around, over medium heat until theyre golden
brown. Drain on paper toweling.
To favor them, add 1 or 2 cloves garlic, minced, to the
butter (or olive oil). After adding the bread, sprinkle
with dried herb, like parsley, sage, rosemary or thyme.
Continue frying. After you take them off the fre, you
can sprinkle them with grated parmesan or romano
cheese. Dont taste them or you wont have any left
for garnishing. When they cool, you can store them in
a container that closes tightly or in a plastic bag out of
the fridge.
61
Vegetarian Vegetable
Red and Green (winter and summer)
Red
Serves 6
a little olive oil
1 large onion, diced
2 tablespoons tomato paste
generous pinch cumin
generous pinch cayenne
In a large soup pot, heat a little olive oil. Saut the
onion and garlic until soft. Add the tomato paste and
stir it around with the onions and garlic. Add the cumin
and the cayenne pepper. Fry it on a high fre, stirring
with a wooden spoon or spatula until it turns orangey
and the oil separates out a bit. Fill the pot about 2/3
full with water or veg stock. Throw in:
1 small handful brown lentils (ads abu giba), washed
2 medium potatoes, diced
2 carrots, peeled and diced
1 cup peas, fresh or frozen
1 teaspoon oregano
salt
black pepper
Simmer for an hour or so, half-covered. Taste and adjust
salt and pepper. I like to eat this soup with hot, fresh
corn bread. You can as easily serve it sprinkled with
grated parmesan with a nice green salad and some
good crusty bread. This soup is better the second day.
Tip: you can use mixed frozen vegetables for soup
instead of the fresh.
Green
Serves 6
This is Mohamed Alys recipe. He would normally use a
chicken bouillon cube, but since I was a vegetarian at
the time, he compromised.
Saut an onion, diced, in some vegetable oil. Fill soup
pot 2/3 full with water or veg stock. Add:
3 zucchini, diced
1 cup green beans, cut small
2 medium potatoes, peeled and diced
2 cardamom pods, broken open
salt
pepper
Simmer for about 30 minutes. Then add 1 tablespoon
fresh coriander, minced fnely. Adjust salt and pepper.
This one is better to eat the same day.
62
Mexican Peasant Soup
Serves 6
Saut together in a large soup pot until onion is limp:
some olive oil
1 bell pepper, red or green, cut in rings
fresh hot chiles to taste, minced
teaspoon cumin
Add and bring to a boil:
2 liters broth or water
3 medium potatoes, scrubbed and cut into eighths
a double handful of fresh green beans cut into 5 cm
lengths
1 teaspoon oregano
salt
Simmer 15 minutes then add:
4 zucchinis, cut in bite-sized chunks
Simmer together until all veg is cooked, another 15-20
minutes.
Then add:
3-4 medium tomatoes, cut in wedges
1 can of corn, drained, reserve liquid
Bring back to a simmer and taste. Add salt and
cayenne if necessary, and some or all of the reserved
corn liquid, again to taste. Simmer until tomatoes are
soft.
Dice some mild cheddar into small cubes and put in
soup plates. Ladle soup over cheese and top with
snipped fresh coriander.
63
Chicken or Turkey Carcass
with Veg and Noodles/Rice
Serves 6
Take your chicken or turkey carcass, break it up and
strip it of all meat, dice the meat and set it aside. Put
the carcass in a pot with an onion (cut in half), a carrot
(peeled), and a bay leaf. Cover it with water (the
carcass, not the pot), and put it on the fre. Bring to
a boil, lower fre and simmer for an hour. Strain, and
discard the carcass and veg or give them to the dog.
While the stock is making, dice up 2 medium potatoes
and 1 carrot. Set them aside. Dice up 1 onion and
mince 1 clove of garlic. In the now empty soup pot,
melt a little butter and saut the onion and garlic until
tender. If you want a thick soup, put in a tablespoon
of four and cook and stir for a minute or two. Whisk
in the stock that you made and add the potato and
carrot. Add some salt and some white pepper, and
some parsley (about a tablespoon). Simmer about 20
minutes, then throw in the diced meat. Let it simmer
another 10 minutes and taste it. Adjust the seasoning.
It can be a little salty.
Bring it up to a boil and add some uncooked egg
noodles, fettucine or tagliatelle. Break them so they
are politely edible. Or toss in a half cup of rice, WELL-
WASHED in hot water. Simmer until rice (20 minutes) or
noodles (8 -10 minutes) is/are done. This is great soup
for sick people, or if youre feeling low. Makes the
house smell cozy.
64
Pane e Pomodoro
Serves 4
3 cups veg or chicken stock
4 cups water
1/4 cup olive oil
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 teaspoon fresh basil, chopped
1/4 loaf coarse white bread, sliced
2 cups fresh tomatoes, peeled and chopped with
juice
1/2 teaspoon salt
black pepper
fresh basil, to garnish
Bring the stock and water to a boil in a soup pot. Heat
the olive oil in a large frying pan. Saut the onion and
garlic until golden. Scrape into soup pot.
Fry bread slices 2 or 3 at a time in the oil left in the
frying pan. Press slices down with a spatula to favor
and brown lightly on each side. Remove bread.
Put the tomatoes in the frying pan and cook over high
heat for 3 minutes. Scrape them into the stock, cover
the pot, and let the soup simmer over low heat for 30
minutes.
To serve, place the bread slices in fat soup plates and
pour the soup over them. Sprinkle with parmesan and
garnish with fresh basil leaves.
65
Lentil Soup
Serves 6 to 8
Here it is fnally, that most famous of Egyptian soups.
This is Mohamed Alys recipe.
1/2 kilo of split lentils, sometimes called red lentils
(theyre orange), or Egyptian lentils
1 medium potato, cut in pieces (to make the soup
smooth)
1 medium carrot, peeled and cut in pieces (for color
and favor)
1 medium tomato, cut in half (for color)
1 medium onion, cut in wedges
water or stock (Mohamed uses chicken stock* and
serves the chicken at the same meal)
Put the lentils in a large wire strainer and wash most
of the starch out of them. Dump them in a big soup
pot. Add enough water (throw in a chicken bouillon
cube, if you have to) or stock, to cover them by
about the length of your index fnger. Put on the
fre and bring to a boil, then lower heat to simmer.
When it is boiling, some scum might form on the surface
and collect around the edges and in the middle,
depending on how well you washed the lentils and
how your stove burners heat and the size of the pot.
Skim it off and throw it away or put in in the dogs dish.
Add the veg and return to a boil. Lower the heat and
simmer until everything is soft and falling apart. You may
have to add more water, but probably not. Turn off the
heat and let the soup cool down a bit. When its cool
enough not to break your blender pitcher, pure the
soup in batches and return it to the pot. Place over a low
fre. Taste it now and add salt and pepper to your taste.
You can eat it now, but its much better with the
taleya...
*Boil a whole chicken in some lightly salted water till cooked. Skim regularly. Remove chicken and place it in a baking dish in
a hot oven until its browned. Strain and use the stock for the soup. Serve the chicken on a platter surrounded by rice, soup
and other accompaniments.
66
Taleya method
Now, in a small frying pan, heat about 2 tablespoons
of oil. Into the oil, throw 1 or more, depends on you,
cloves of garlic fnely minced. When the garlic begins
to brown, add a pinch or two of cumin, and continue
frying and stirring until garlic is browned nicely. Dump
it into the soup, still sizzling. Wash the frying pan out into
the soup with a ladle of soup. Lovely sizzling, that! Give
the soup a quick stir. Cover the pot and turn the heat
off. Its done now.
The classic accompaniments to lentil soup are lemon
wedges, oven-dried pocket bread or croutons, diced
onions in vinegar, and whole green onions, with maybe
some gummy (just cook it with a little extra water) white
rice and chicken (you shred it into the soup). Each
person adds what they like. I like to eat it with regular,
plain croutons and sliced green onions in vinegar.
67
Gazpacho
Serves 4 to 6
These are the ingredients for gazpacho. You can either
mix them all together in a bowl, or you can pure all of
it or half of it in the blender. I like it the third way. Put
the tomato juice and half of the cut up fresh veg in the
blender pitcher along with the seasonings, oil, vinegar,
lemon juice and bread crumbs. Pure. Pour into a
bowl and add the rest of the veg. Chill well. Serve in
chilled bowls garnished with croutons.
4 large, red, ripe, juicy tomatoes, diced (use their juice)
4 cups good tomato juice (if canned rather than
bottled, add 1 teaspoon honey)
1 medium onion, chopped fnely
1 large green bell pepper, chopped fnely
2 medium cucumbers, peeled and diced fnely
1 small, hot, green chile, minced (or more, optional)
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons fne white bread crumbs
1 pinch each cumin and cayenne
1 tablespoon wine vinegar (preferred)
juice of 1 lemon
salt
Chilled Cucumber Soup
Serves 4 to 6
1/2 mild white onion, diced
3 tablespoons oil
3 1/2 cups cucumber, peeled, seeded and cut in
chunks or slices
6 cups veg or chicken stock
2 teaspoons wine vinegar (preferred)
1 teaspoon dill
salt
white pepper
1/2 cup sour cream (ishta fellahi)
more sour cream to garnish
mint leaves to garnish
Saut onion in oil until golden and soft. Add cucumber,
stock, vinegar and dill. Simmer covered for about 20
minutes, until cucumber is soft. Cool slightly and pure
in blender. Add salt and white pepper to taste. Whisk
sour cream into warm soup. Season with salt and
pepper. Refrigerate for at least three hours.
Serve in chilled bowls, garnished with a dollop of sour
cream and a sprig of mint.
68
Vichyssoise
Serves 4 to 6
1 leek (korrot), cleaned and sliced thinly, or 1 large
mild onion, diced
oil
4 medium potatoes, peeled and sliced thinly
4 cups veg stock
2 cups milk
1/2 cup light cream (crema labani)
salt
white pepper
chives or green onions, chopped, to garnish
Saut the leek or onion in oil in a soup pot until tender.
Lots of recipes call for butter instead of oil, but when you
chill the soup the butter makes hard lumps, so I prefer
to use oil. Add the potatoes and stock. Cook until the
potatoes begin to break up. Cool a bit then pure in
the blender and strain back into the soup pot. Add milk,
salt and pepper. Heat gently over low fre. Remove
from heat, cool to room temp and whisk in 1/4 cup light
cream. Taste and adjust seasonings. Chill well.
Before serving, whisk in remaining 1/4 cup cream.
Serve in chilled bowls garnished with chopped chives
or green onions, or freshly snipped parsley or dill.
Chilled Watercress Soup
Serves 4
2 1/2 cups watercress leaves
3 cups veggie or chicken stock, degreased (chill it
and the grease gets hard and comes off easily)
1/3 cup sour cream
salt
Pure 2 cups of stock with the watercress. Add the
contents of the blender to the remaining stock. Whisk
in the sour cream and salt to taste. Chill thoroughly.
Serve in chilled bowls topped with a dollop of sour
cream and a sprig of cress.
69
Chili
The debate is on. What exactly constitutes chili? Chili
purists cry fake! if theres as much as one bean in it.
And no self-respecting Mexican would eat chili made
with tomatoes and ground beef. Basically, there are
three kinds of chili, Mexican chile con carne, Texas chili
with beans, and the bastard versions born far from the
border to mothers of invention.
Mexican Chile con Carne
Serves 6
1/2 kilo beef, cut in bite-sized cubes
four, salted and peppered
the fat from the meat, or lard or oil
3 or 4 dried chiles anchos, plus 1 or 2 dried chiles guajillos
water
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1/2 onion, chopped
a pinch of oregano
Toast the chiles lightly in a dry frying pan. When they
are cool enough to handle, break them open and
discard the seeds and stems. Place them in a bowl
and cover with hot water from the tap. Let them soak
about 20 minutes.
Meanwhile chop your onion and garlic. Put the onion,
garlic, spices and the drained chile pieces in your
blender pitcher. Cover with enough water and pure.
The mixture should be thick, but pourable. Set aside.
Now, dredge the meat in the four. That means put the
four (with a large pinch of salt and pepper) on a plate
or the counter and dump the meat on it and mop it all
around until the meat is encrusted with four. Put the
fat in a large soup pot and melt it, or heat some lard or
oil. Fry the meat pieces on medium high heat, stirring a
lot, until well-browned. Strain the chile mixture into the
meat pot. It will sizzle. Fry together, scraping the bottom
of the pan and stirring constantly, over high heat until it
begins to smell like cooked chiles. Add some water, stir
thoroughly, and let simmer uncovered until the meat is
tender. You may have to add water or beer from time
to time.
Serve in bowls, with chopped onion, jalapeos, a mild
grated cheese and hot four tortillas on the side. Or use
it to stuff burritos.
70
Texas Chili
Serves 8 to 10
1/2 kilo dried beans, pinto, red or kidney, soaked
overnight with a pinch of baking soda, drained
water
1/2 kilo beef, cut into cubes (ground beef if you must)
four, salted and peppered
fat from meat, lard or oil
1 kilo tomatoes, peeled (if you want) and diced or
roughly pured
at least 2 tablespoons chili powder* or use chile pure
from chile con carne recipe
1 teaspoon oregano
cayenne
In a big soup pot, saut the onion and garlic in a little
oil until soft. Add the beans and plenty of water. Cook
until beans are soft, but not breaking up, and very little
liquid is left in them. This could be as little as an hour
and as much as 5 hours, depending on the age of the
dried beans. Remember always to add boiling water
to cooking beans if you need to add more water.
Dredge the meat in the four. In a big frying pan, melt
the fat, or heat the lard or oil, and fry the meat until
brown, adding the other onion and garlic about half
way through the cooking. (If you use ground beef, just
forget the four and oil.) When the meat is browned,
dump it into the bean pot. In the same frying pan,
fry the tomatoes with a little oil and the chili powder,
oregano, and cayenne to taste, until they are a darker
red-- chili colored. Dump the whole bit into the soup pot
with the beans and meat. Wash the frying pan out with
a little water, scraping the bottom and add that to the
chili pot. Stir it up really well, taste and adjust seasoning.
Simmer over a low fre forever. Add water or beer as
necessary. Its done when the meat pieces can be
broken up with a fork. Serve as for Mexican style.
Bastardized Chili (Vegetarian)
This is done exactly the same way as the Texas version,
except instead of meat, use eggplant. Dice it small,
dredge in four and proceed as above. You can hardly
tell theres no meat in it.
*Chili powder is a prepared spice blend containing ground
chiles, oregano, cumin, and garlic. McCormick Spices makes
a nice chili powder.
71
Albondigas
Mexican style meatball soup
Serves 4 to 6
Soup:
8 cups water
1 large soup bone, or bouillon cube
cabbage wedges
2 onions, quartered
1 tomato, cubed
1 small bunch of fresh coriander
3 cloves garlic, crushed
salt
Put everything in a big soup pot and bring it a boil.
Lower heat and simmer for at least 1/2 hour. If you use
a soup bone, youll have to skim the gray stuff off the
surface. Make the meatballs.
Meatballs:
1/2 kilo ground beef
6 sprigs fresh mint or 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1/4 cup rice, uncooked
1 egg
1 teaspoon salt
Mix everything together and shape meat into balls the
size of a walnut. Drop into boiling soup 1/2 hour before
serving. Cook covered. Serve with warm four tortillas,
lemon wedges and chile sauce.
72
Beef Barley Stew
Serves 6
This is a really good basic meat stew recipe. This one is
with beef and mixed veg and barley. The same recipe
could be used with veal and carrots and mushrooms,
technique is the same. Even chicken and green
peppers. In which case, omit the tomatoes and use
white wine so you get a blond stew. The grain can be
any kind: barley, cracked wheat, millet, rice; or dont
put grain, serve it over egg noodles. Or cook some
dumplings in it.
1/2 kilo beef (rump, shoulder, fank, flet...), cut in bite-
sized pieces
some four, salted and peppered
oil
1/2 kilo tomatoes, coarsely chopped
1/2 cup pearl barley, washed (bleela)
1 tablespoon salt
basil, 1 teaspoon dry or 1 tablespoon fresh
1/2 kilo vegetables of your choice (potatoes, carrots,
mushrooms, turnips . . . ), cut up imaginatively
water
1/2 glass red wine
Dredge meat in four. In a big pot with a lid, heat the
oil over a medium fre and toss in the meat and garlic.
Cook them over medium heat, stirring a lot with a
wooden spoon or spatula until the meat is brown. Add
remaining ingredients, except wine, water enough to
cover everything well, and bring to a boil. Add wine.
Let the wine smell come out, maybe 3 minutes boiling
gently, then cover and simmer for an hour or until meat
and barley are tender. Tougher cuts of meat take
longer. If the liquid gets low, add boiling water. This is
even better the next day.
For vegetarians: Make the stew exactly the same way
except dredge chunks of EGGPLANT in four.
73
Baked Caribbean Fish Stew
Serves 4
1/2 kilo white fsh flet, or fsh steaks
4 green onions, sliced
2 tomatoes, cut into eighths
1/2 cup yellow (or green) bell pepper, diced
1 or more fresh hot chiles, sliced open lengthwise,
leave stems on, seeds removed (optional)
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
1/4 teaspoon salt
black pepper
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
2 cups fsh stock, made from head, tail and fns, boiled
with some onion, garlic, bay leaf (strained), HOT
1 cup water
1/2 cup dry white vermouth (or wine)
Spread olive oil in a large, deep oven-proof pot with a
lid. Place fsh on oil and sprinkle green onions around
it. Lay hot chiles on green onions. Then the tomatoes.
Sprinkle the bell pepper, cayenne, salt and black
pepper over the fsh. Add the lemon juice, water, hot
stock and vermouth. Cover and bake for 30 minutes.
To serve, place a portion of fsh in each bowl and ladle
broth and vegetables over it. Garnish with lemon
wedges.
74
Sauces and Condiments
77
Bechamel and Variations
Bechamel is white sauce. Its the base for a lot of other
sauces. Its the base for cream soups. Base-ically,
you use equal parts of butter and four, then add milk
according to how thick you want your sauce. Then
salt and white pepper. For 1 cup of thick sauce, use 2
tablespoons each of butter and four. Melt the butter
over medium heat, whisk in the four and cook about
1 minute. Pour 1 cup milk in all at once, whisking until
it begins to bubble and thicken. Salt and pepper,
give it a little grate of nutmeg. Lower heat and cook
another one or two minutes. Add other ingredients for
variations.
Variations
1) Sauce aurore for egg dishes and chicken, also
good on stuffed pastas: to the bechamel, add 2 1/2
cups strained fresh tomato pure, heat, then add a
tablespoon of butter. Whisk well.
2) Sauce Mornay to nap different kinds of things that
will be au gratin-- eggs, seafood, vegetables, stuffed
crpes: after seasoning the bechamel, stir in about 1/4
cup grated gruyre cheese, stir until it melts and the
mixture is smooth. Remove from heat. You can use it
now or for a richer sauce, beat 1 egg yolk in a cup,
while beating it add some of the warm sauce, spoon
by spoon, until the egg yolk is warm, too. Then beat
the egg yolk mixture into the sauce. Return the pan
to a low fre and heat just to boiling point. Do not boil.
Remove from heat. Stir in a couple of spoons of fresh
cream. For garnishing seafood, use a little seafood
stock when making the bechamel.
3) Lemon-y bechamel to nap artichoke hearts, salmon
ravioli, tagliatelle al salmone, etc. To the bechamel
add lemon juice and the grated zest (the colored part
of the peel) to taste.
78
Other important white sauce variations
Tuna on toast, chipped beef on toast, cheese sauce
for pastas, white sauce with choice of veg, etc., are
all made from this basic recipe. Proceed exactly the
same way, only use a little less four (or a little more
milk). The sauce should be a little thinner since youre
going to add stuff to it that will make it appear thicker.
Prepare tuna and chipped beef (any canned meat)
in a frying pan. Butter, four, milk, simmer, add drained
broken up tuna or chipped beef. Simmer some more.
Just salt and pepper it and serve over toast with french
fries (quick meal).
When you make a cheese sauce, like quattro
formaggio, do like for the Mornay, adding the extra
cheeses (4 kinds) little by little, stirring with a wooden
spoon. If youre careful, you can make it as cheesey
as you want: the more cheese you want to add, the
lower your fre needs to be and the steadier you have
to stir. If you boil it hard the cheese could go rubbery
and separate out.
To make veg in white sauce (like peasncarrots, green
beansnmushrooms, etc.), just cook the veg, drain
it, butter it and add as much bechamel as you want
into it. Mohamed piles artichoke hearts with peas and
carrots and puts them in an ovenproof dish covered
lightly with bechamel, sprinkled with bread crumbs
and grated cheese. Bake at 200 C/gas mark 4/400 F
until bubbling and golden.
Macaroni and Cheese
Cook pasta half the time it says on the package. Drain
it and put it in a baking dish. Mix in plenty of not-very-
thick cheese sauce. 1/4 cup each butter and four
to 1 liter milk, 250 grams cheese, grated. (American
style: made with cheddar cheese, a few drops of
Worcestershire sauce, Tabasco, and a small spoon of
strong mustard.) Top with more grated cheese. Cover
with foil and bake at 180 C/gas mark 3/350 F for 20
minutes. Uncover and fnish baking. Its done when its
bubbling and the top is golden brown.
79
Salsa Pomodoro and Variations
I always use 4 kilos of tomatoes to make this. It makes
enough for 4 people to eat it for dinner that night and
3 or 4 ice cube trays to freeze. (Use 4 cubes per serving
when you melt them down again.)
olive oil
at least 3 cloves garlic, chopped
4 kilos tomatoes, buy 5 and save the best ones for salad
2 teaspoons oregano
a generous pinch ground cumin
a couple of sprinkles of cayenne
salt
pepper
Saut the onion and garlic in the olive oil. (Use a non-
reactive soup pot. Never cook tomatoes in aluminum.
Theyll clean the pan up beautifully and youll be
eating aluminum oxide.) Remove from heat.
Cut the tomatoes up into large chunks and pure them
in the blender. To the frst batch, add some water to
get it going. Then just dont empty the pitcher all the
way after that, so you have some liquid to process with.
You have to choose now whether you want a slightly
chunky sauce or a smooth sauce.
If you want it chunky, just dump the contents of the blender
in the pot with the onion and garlic and set it to simmering.
But if you want a smooth sauce, pure the onion and garlic
with the frst batch and strain the pure back into the pot.
Youll have to work it through the strainer with a wooden
spoon.
When youve processed all the tomatoes, add the spices
and leave the sauce to simmer until it reaches the desired
consistency. Over an hour but probably not two.
Variations
1) Mushroom-bell pepper: Make chunky version. To
onion and garlic, add 2 green bell peppers, cut in
chunks, and 1/4 kilo fresh mushrooms, sliced.
2) Eggplant-bell pepper: Make chunky version. Cut up
a peeled eggplant or 2-3 unpeeled zucchinis, a green
bell pepper, a large tomato, and saut them with the
onion and garlic.
3) Italian sausage: Fry up some Italian sausage (roll it into
meatballs if you want) with an onion, diced, and a red
or green bell pepper, also diced. Add some prepared
sauce and simmer together half an hour or so.
4) Tuna: Dice an onion (and maybe a bell pepper)
and saut it in some olive oil. Add prepared sauce.
Cut up some black olives (or substitute 2 tablespoons
capers) and throw them in along with a can of tuna,
drained. Heat gently.
Serve over pasta. Pass around the parmesan.
80
Pesto
Serves 4 to 6
Real pesto should be beaten in a big wooden mortar.
Nowadays people short-cut and do it in the blender.
Its not the same. Serve pesto over pasta, tagliatelle
or fettucine is best. You can also put a dollop of it on
grilled meat, garnish tomato soup with it, and use it as
a sandwich spread.
1/2 teaspoon salt
6 large garlic cloves, peeled
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 cup pine nuts (snayber)
1 cup packed fresh basil leaves
1/4 cup or more grated parmesan
Start with the salt and garlic. Mash them to a paste
in your mortar. Add some basil and a few pine nuts.
Mash some more. Drizzle with olive oil. Mash some
more. Dump most of the pesto into a bowl as the
mortar reaches half full and it becomes diffcult to
mash. More basil, more pine nuts, more olive oil, more
mashing, until youve fnished all the basil. Now beat in
the parmesan. Toss with hot pasta.
Blender version: Add garlic-salt paste to olive oil in blender
pitcher. Switch on low and feed in the rest of the stuff bit
by bit. Pulse it on high a few times at the end.
Mushrooms Paprika
Serves 4
1 medium onion, fnely chopped
1/2 kilo fresh mushrooms, sliced or coarsely chopped
2 teaspoons mild paprika
1 dash cayenne pepper
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2/3 cup sour cream
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons snipped fresh dill
Heat butter in a large frying pan. Saut onion until
barely golden. Add mushrooms and saut until lightly
browned. Stir in paprika and cayenne and cook a bit
longer. Stir in tomato paste, sour cream and salt. Bring
to a simmer and cook over low heat for a few minutes,
until the canned smell of the tomatoes is gone. Stir in
dill. Serve hot over toast, noodles, rice, or use as garnish
for baked potatoes.
81
Salsa Ranchera
Makes about 2 cups
3 tablespoons oil
3/4 cup fnely chopped onion
3/4 cup fnely chopped green bell pepper
pinch oregano
2 to 3 ripe tomatoes, diced
1/2 cup tomato pure/juice/stock/water
hot green chiles, chopped, to taste
salt and pepper to taste
Saut the onion, green pepper and garlic in the oil. Add
oregano and tomatoes and cook about 10 minutes.
Add remaining ingredients and simmer an additional
10 minutes. Serve hot over eggs and tortillas (huevos
rancheros) or as sauce for cheese omelette, sauce for
baked polenta, an addition to plain beans.
Conchitas Salsa Fresca
Conchita is the mother of my old sweetie, Skip Fraijo.
Their house always smelled great. There was always
something to eat in the fridge. And there was always
this salsa fresca. Connie made a killer menudo, too,
but we wont go into that.
Makes 2 cups
4 green onions, sliced
1 large tomato, cubed
3 or 4 green chiles, chopped (seed them if theyre
very hot)
2 tablespoons chopped coriander
juice of 1 lemon
salt
Combine all ingredients and chill. If you cut everything
up real small, its like a sauce or relish; if you cut them
bigger it gets to be like a salad. Its good next to anything
dry or bland or cheesey, like polenta, omelettes,
beans. You can spoon it into your gazpacho, or mix
it with avocado for instant guacamole, or marinated
seafood for ceviche.
82
Puerto Rican Sofrito
Makes about 2 1/2 cups
2 large green or red bell peppers, coarsely
chopped
1 medium onion, ditto
1 small fresh hot chile pepper, seeded and
chopped
2 large cloves garlic
1 bunch of fresh coriander, trimmed
1 tablespoon wine vinegar
1/4 teaspoon salt
Blend ingredients together in a blender or food
processor. Do not process too much; mixture
should be slightly chunky.
Use a seasoning sauce for soups and stews or on
grilled meat.
Tomato Basil Relish
Make as much as you want
Dice some nice frm tomatoes and some onion. Salt
them lightly and dribble with vinegar (wine preferred)
and a little olive oil. Mix and chill.
When ready to serve, stir in fresh basil leaves to taste.
I say to taste because some basil is very strong and
some isnt, so taste it!
83
Tamater Raita
This is my favorite raita.
Makes 2 cups
2 cups yoghurt
salt
white pepper
3 medium, firm tomatoes, diced small
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tablespoon black mustard seeds or coriander seeds
1 hot green chile, seeded and minced
2 sprigs fresh coriander, basil or dill for garnish
Whisk together yoghurt, salt and pepper. Dump into a serving
bowl. Drop tomatoes onto yoghurt. Do not stir. Fry mustard
seeds and chile in oil. When seeds crackle and pop and begin
to turn gray, pour over tomatoes. Serve immediately next to
anything Indian (dip samosas in it).
Variations
1) Salt yoghurt lightly. Pile with sliced bananas or mango chunks
and sprinkle with toasted coconut.
2) Grate a cucumber and salt it lightly. Let it sit 15 minutes then
squeeze all the water out. Stir into yoghurt along with a teaspoon
of dried or freshly chopped mint.
Dhaniya Chatni (coriander)
Makes 1 cup
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
3 tablespoons sesame seeds
1/4 cup grated unsweetened coconut
1 cup trimmed fresh coriander, slightly packed
1/3 cup hot green chiles, seeded and chopped
1 cm piece fresh ginger, chopped
2 tablespoons water
1/2 small pot of yoghurt
1 teaspoon salt
Dry roast seeds. Combine with all other ingredients in a blender
and blend well. Mixture should be consistency of baby food.
Transfer to bowl and serve or cover well and refrigerate for up to
2 days. Serve as for tamater raita. Nice to have them both.
84
Johnnys Grainy Spicy Mustard
This is real mustard to put on sandwiches or serve next to beef.
2/3 cup dry white wine
1/3 cup cider vinegar (available at good supermarkets)
1 tablespoon honey
1 teaspoon salt (or to taste)
1/4 cup brown mustard seeds
1/4 cup yellow mustard seeds (theyre really whitish)
Tie in a cheesecloth bag or put in a tea ball:
2 tablespoons mixed dry whole spices (what favor do you like
your mustard?) Use pickling spice* or your own combination,
i.e., peppercorns, star anise, regular anise, caraway or dill seed,
cinnamon, lemon grass, tarragon, cumin, bay leaves.
Simmer everything except mustard seeds with 1/2 cup water
in a covered saucepan for 5 minutes. Remove spice bag and
add mustard seeds to liquid. Cover and let steep one hour.
Transfer to blender and grind until thick. Add a bit more water
gradually, blending until reasonably smooth but still thick. Thin, if
necessary, with additional wine or water after mustard is cool.
*1 teaspoon coriander seeds, 1/2 teaspoon black peppercorns, small
dried hot red chile, small piece of cinnamon bark
Barbecue Sauce
This is an easy sauce. Use as a table sauce or as a marinade
for chicken or ribs: get some guidance from page ?.
1/2 onion, grated
oil
1/2 bottle of ketchup, about 1 cup
several good shots of Tabasco
1 tablespoon honey
1/4 cup vinegar or lemon juice or a mixture of the two
1/2 teaspoon salt
Saut the onion and garlic in a little oil until tender. Add the
other ingredients and simmer gently 5 minutes. Cool.
85
Tartar Sauce
1 cup good mayonnaise
1/4 medium onion grated fnely
2 tablespoons sweet pickles diced fnely (you can use
dills if you want)
1 tablespoon of lemon juice
salt
fnely grated hard-boiled egg (optional)
chopped capers (abu khangar) (optional)
1/4 anchovy, well mushed (optional)
You mix all this stuff up together in a bowl. The optionals
just make it more interesting. To make Secret Sauce for
Hamburgers, mix in 1 tablespoon catsup, and to make
1000 Island Dressing, add a little more lemon juice or
juice from the pickles to that, then thin it to desired
consistency with water.
86
Side Dishes
89
Perfect Rice
Medhat Abassi taught me how to make rice. Before
he told me his secret, I always measured the rice and
the water, but it never turned out perfect. Now, I make
perfect rice every time. Just like Uncle Ben.
Dump some regular rice in a saucepan that has a lid. Fill
the pan half full or less, the rice will double in bulk. So,
thats between 1/2 and 1 cup per person, depending
on how much everyone likes rice.
Set the pan in the sink and turn the hot water on. Let
the hot water run into the rice pan and overfow for
about 5 minutes, stirring it around every now and then.
Work on something else while the rice is being rinsed.
Turn off the water and empty most of the water out
of the rice. Run some cold water over it and swish it
around, then strain all the water out. The rice should be
kinda translucent. Bang the strainer against the sink to
get all the water out.
Put a tablespoon of oil/butter into the pan and, as
soon as it heats, add the rice and stir with a wooden
spatula/spoon. Fry lightly, stirring vigorously.
Now add water, covering the rice up to where, when
you touch the tip of your index fnger to the surface of
the rice, the water level is half way up to the frst joint
of your fnger, about 1 cm. Salt, less than teaspoon
per cup of rice. You can crumble half a bouillon cube
in, too, if you want.
Bring to a boil and give a quick stir. Move the pan
to your smallest fre on its lowest setting, with a heat
diffusing pad under the pan. Cover as tightly as
possible and cook 20-30 minutes. Check for doneness
after 20 minutes. When done, leave covered for 5 more
minutes off the fre then fuff with a fork.
Green Rice
Serves 4 to 6
1 1/2 cups rice
a large bunch of fat leaf parsley (ba'dounis)
1 clove garlic
1/2 onion, diced
water or stock
oil
Put the parsley, garlic and onion in a blender with a
little water or stock and pure it. Wash and fry rice
like for perfect rice, frying the rice until golden. Add
the parsley pure and cook, stirring, a minute or two
longer. Add water or stock like for perfect rice. Cook
like for perfect rice.
90
Yellow Rice
Serves 4 to 6
1 1/2 cups rice
1/2 onion, minced
oil
1 large pinch saffron, soaked in a teeny bit of warm
milk OR 1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric
water or stock
salt
pepper
Wash the rice like for perfect rice. Fry it with the onion
in oil until golden. If youre using turmeric, fry it with the
onion and rice. Add your water or stock and salt and
pepper. If youre using saffron, stir it in with the water or
stock. Cook like for perfect rice.
Arroz Mexicano
(Mexican Rice, its red)
Serves 4 to 6
1 1/2 cups rice
1/2 cup fnely chopped onion
1/2 cup fnely chopped green pepper
1 cup cooked tomatoes (dice a large tomato and
saut in a little oil)
2 tablespoons chile paste or 2 teaspoons chili powder
salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1 1/2 cups broth, plus water if necessary
Cook rice, onion and green pepper in butter until rice
is golden and onion wilts. Add remaining ingredients,
give it a stir, and cover. Cook like perfect rice. Lots of
people put a handful of green peas in it when they
add the tomato and broth.
91
Now this section is about Potatoes.
The lowly potato is another of the Americas gifts to the
Old World, along with the tomato, the chile pepper,
corn, and turkey. It was discovered by Pizzaro in Peru
and frst appeared in Europe in 1534. Fifty years later
Walter Raleigh discovered it again in Virginia. There
are about 40 million different kinds of potatoes. (I'm
exaggerating, but not much.) We have two basic kinds
in the market: what my gran always called aish taters
(Irish potatoes), and white potatoes. Use Irish potatoes
(longish potatoes with a thick brown skin) for baked
potatoes and mashed potatoes to obtain the fuffest
results. Use white potatoes (long or round with pale, thin
skin) for everything else, especially potato salad. New
potatoes, the little round ones that appear in the spring
and early summer, are nice to boil whole and treat like
pommes de terre lyonnaise. The Irish potato is mealy,
and crumbles and fuffs well. The other is waxy, and
holds together well after cooking. But, after all, a potato
is a potato, so use whats available in the market.
Your average 100 grams of potato, which is 77% water,
furnishes you with 86 calories, 19 grams of starch and 2
grams of protein, plus potassium, iron and iodine, and
vitamins B and C, with C being especially high in new
potatoes. Theyre good for you and NOT fattening.
Its all in how you make them that adds the calories.
One shouldnt peel potatoes unless its absolutely
necessary. Most of the nutrients are in and just under
the skin. And one shouldnt boil them in so much water
that the water has to be drained off, because all of
the water-soluble vitamins and minerals get drained
off, too, and youre left with just the starch, then a
potato is practically worthless as a source of nutrients.
Same goes for most vegetables. Always use as little
water as possible when boiling veg, and steaming is
best for preserving their nutritional value. Something
else, potatoes belong to the Solanaceae family, the
same as Deadly Nightshade. The berries and fowers
are poisonous and green potatoes (they get green if
theyre exposed to the sun while growing) can make
you ill. Cut green bits completely off and throw in the
trash.
92
Baked Potatoes
This is the absolute best way to cook potatoes.
Scrub some potatoes well. They should all be about
the same size so that they cook in the same amount
of time. Wrap them in aluminum foil. Put them on the
middle rack of the oven and bake them for between
35 minutes and 1 hour, depending on their size. Its
useful to turn them around or rearrange them a bit half
way through cooking if your oven doesnt heat evenly.
To tell if theyre done, squeeze them with your hand,
protected by an oven mitt or hot pad. They should
squish pretty easily. Take them out of the oven and,
with your same oven mitt or hot pad, roll each potato
on the counter, pressing lightly. This breaks up the fesh
and the potato will be fuffy inside.
Serve in the foil: cut lengthwise about halfway through
the potato, then squish the ends so that it opens up.
Serve with butter, salt and pepper, sour cream (with or
without chives), bacon bits (pork or beef); check out
the labneh balls recipe for a nifty topping. Eat the
skin!
You can of course top your baked potato with broccoli
and cheese sauce, or chili and onions and grated
cheese, or anything else your little heart desires.
Twice-Baked Potatoes
Scrub the potatoes well. Dry them. Oil your hands
lightly and caress each potato lovingly. Pop them
in the oven (unwrapped). Bake according to size,
between 35 minutes and 1 hour. When done, the skin
will be hard and darker brown and a little shriveled.
Dont let them burn. Remove from oven (leave the
oven on) and cut carefully in half lengthwise. With a
big spoon, spoon out the fesh of each half into a bowl.
Line the empty shells up in a baking pan. Mash the
potato up with a fork and salt and pepper to taste,
add some butter and some milk (or cream or sour
cream or labneh) and whip it all up together real nice.
Mound the potato mixture back into the shells. Sprinkle
with parmesan cheese and put them back in the oven
until the tops take on a nice golden color.
Eat them. Eat the skins, too. For lower fat, use yoghurt or
labneh instead of butter and sour cream. You can also
jazz them up with bacon bits or fresh parsley. Instead
of topping with parmesan you can top them with a
slice of smoked turkey or beef, or ham or Canadian
bacon, then nap them with any white sauce of your
choosing, Mornay probably nicest.
93
Hash Browns
Here is how to actually make those lovely crispy crunchy
golden things that you thought came in boxes from the
frozen food section of the supermarket.
Wash potatoes well and peel them if you must. Get a
clean kitchen towel and grate the potatoes onto the
center of it. Salt and pepper. One potato each person.
Fold the towel over on the grated potato lengthwise
and grasp the ends closed right near the potato.
Wring as much water out of them as you can (over the
sink). Heat a little oil in a frying pan over a medium fre.
Put about 4 nice sized spoonfuls of potato in the pan.
Smash them down fat with a spatula. Cover and fry
until golden and crispy on the down-side (the edges
will show brown), about 5 minutes. Uncover and turn
them over carefully. Fry the other side uncovered until
golden and crispy, too. Serve with ketchup. I always
have them with my eggs for breakfast, but you could
have them for lunch or dinner, instead of french fries.
French Fries
Scrub some large potatoes well. Peel them if you must.
As you cut them into your favorite french fry shape, drop
them into a bowl of very cold water, with ice even. This
ensures crispy fries. Heat at least 1 cm of oil or samna nebati
or meat grease in a heavy pan, until when you put a DRY
potato piece in it, it sinks and little bubbles form around it.
Shake the fries dry in a large wire strainer or plastic
colander and place by the small handful CAREFULLY
into the hot oil. Don't put too many for your pan or
the amount of oil you have unless you don't mind them
mushy. Even them up with a spatula (not a rubber or
plastic one, a wooden or metal one). The tops can be
out of the oil. Leave them to fry until the edges look
golden then scatter them around gently, turning them
at the same time with the spatula. Get them all turned
over and frying evenly again in the pan. I like to salt
and pepper them now. Continue frying until golden
then remove to a plate lined with paper towels. Then
salt them.
Deep-frying potatoes: If you have a lot of people or
really prefer to deep-fry, buy a frying basket that fts
one of your soup pots. Fill the pot NO MORE THAN
HALF WAY with oil (use sun- or saffower oil, it's less sticky
when it's reused). Place the shaken-dry potatoes
into the basket then lower the basket into the proper
temperature oil: you put a DRY potato piece in it, it
sinks and little bubbles form around it and it starts to
dance. Give the fryer basket a little shake every now
and then. Do not be deceived and remove the fries
when they are a lovely golden brown. They'll be over-
fried. Take them out while they are still light gold and
not yet brownish. When you're fnished, let the oil cool
then strain it into an old samna can with a cover to use
for fries again.
94
Potato Latkes
Serves 4 to 6
6 large potatoes, peeled
1 large onion
3 eggs, lightly beaten
3 tablespoons four
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons salt
black pepper
oil
sour cream and/or applesauce to garnish
Soak the peeled potatoes in cold water to cover for 1
hour. Drain and dry well.
Grate the potatoes and onion together. Stir the eggs
into the grated mixture. Mix the dry stuff together, then
stir them in, too.
In a large heavy frying pan heat enough oil to barely
cover the bottom of the pan over medium high heat.
Drop large tablespoonfuls of the potato mixture into the
oil, fatten slightly with a spatula, and fry until golden.
Turn and cook the other side. Do not crowd the pan.
Serve hot with sour cream or applesauce. A different
kind of breakfast treat, equally nice for a late supper.
Scalloped Potatoes
Serves 4 to 6
1/4 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup four
1/2 liter milk
6 potatoes, sliced thinly
Butter a baking dish. Saut onion in butter until limp.
Stir in four and cook a 1/2 minute or so. Whisk in milk
and bring up to boiling, stirring constantly. Add salt and
pepper and remove from heat. Put half the potatoes
in the baking dish and cover with half the sauce. Put
in the other half of potatoes and cover with the rest
of the sauce. Bake, covered with foil, for 40 minutes.
Uncover and complete cooking, another 30 minutes.
Variations:
1) To the simmering sauce, stir in gradually 1/2 cup
grated cheese of your choice. Top the potatoes with
more grated cheese. Sprinkle lightly with paprika (it
gives a nice brown color to the top).
2) Sprinkle some fried and crumbled bacon or smoked
turkey in between the two layers of potatoes.
95
Sanneya Batatas
(Oven-baked Potatoes and Tomatoes)
Serves 6
This is also Mohamed Alys recipe. He often serves it as
a main course or next to grilled chicken or meat. The
sauce is the same he makes for koshary*.
1/2 kilo each of potatoes and tomatoes, washed and
thickly sliced
1 or 2 bell peppers, washed and sliced (optional)
1 large onion, sliced
1 small onion, diced
oil
1/4 cup tomato paste
pinch of cumin
water, about 3 cups
salt and pepper, cayenne
Saut the diced onion and the garlic in a little oil until golden.
Add the cumin and the tomato paste and fry, stirring with a
wooden spatula until it darkens. Add the water, salt, pepper
and cayenne to taste. Bring to a boil, turn down heat and
let simmer until you assemble the sanneya.
In a (supposed to be round) baking dish, layer the potatoes
with the onion and tomato slices, starting with potatoes
and ending with tomatoes. Put the optional bell peppers
in wherever you want. Pour the sauce over them and
cover with foil. Bake 40 minutes covered, then a further 30
minutes uncovered. The tomatoes on top should blacken
around the edges. They're good served with garlic yoghurt
on the side.
*Koshary: Make some perfect rice, cook some small
macaroni, like ditali, boil 2 handfuls of brown lentils (ads
abu giba) with some salt until soft and drain them, chop
an onion roughly and fry until brown and crispy in oil, toss
in the lentils and heat. In your bowl: rice, pasta, lentils with
onions, sauce.
Pommes de terre la dauphinoise
Special request from Amani. These are the original scalloped
potatoes. Boil some nice, foury potatoes in their skins, one
per person. Peel them and slice them. Melt some butter
in a pan with some minced garlic. Rub the garlic-butter
around in a baking dish and fll with the potatoes. Pour fresh
cream over them to barely cover and put under the broiler
until top is browned and cream is bubbly.
96
All these potatoes are made with already boiled
potatoes. Scrub your potatoes well under running water
and put them in a big pot. Cover with water, put in a
bit of salt, and boil until done. That, of course, depends
on the size of the potato. When a potato is done, you
should be able to stick a sharp knife into the center of
it and withdraw it without picking the potato up. Use
a knife. If you use a fork you could break the potato
open and it will get water-logged. Drain water off. Or
save it for soup stock. Peel them now if you must.
For Home Fries, cut the potatoes into cubes. Get an
onion and a bell pepper if you feel like it (thatll make
them Potatoes OBrien). Dice them.
Heat some oil in a frying pan over medium high heat,
add a knob of butter for better favor. Toss in the
potatoes, top with the onion and bell pepper, if you
felt like it. Salt and black pepper generously.
Cook without stirring until the potatoes start to brown, if you
stir in the onion and pepper at the frst, the onion tends to
over-brown. Then stir everything up together and continue
cooking until they are golden brown. These potatoes
are what you get with your eggs in some delis and diners
instead of hash browns. Lots easier to prepare.
For Parsley Potatoes, also known as pommes de
terre la lyonnaise, peel the boiled potatoes and
slice them thickly. If they are very large potatoes,
cut in half lengthwise frst. Mince a medium onion.
Melt plenty of butter, at least 1/4 cup, in a big pan over
medium heat. Saut the onion until soft, then toss in
the potatoes, some salt and white pepper and stir it
all around. Throw in some fnely chopped parsley and
stir it around some more. Theyre done.
You can use other fresh herbs, like rosemary or basil
or thyme, if you want. I like them very much with
rosemary and olive oil instead of butter, even a little
garlic! They're perfect next to grilled fsh that way.
Home Fries
Parsley Potatoes (Pommes de terre la lyonnaise)
Mashed Potatoes
Gnocchi di patatas
97
At last we get to Mashed Potatoes, the
ultimate comfort food. Im of the same opinion
as Nora Ephron: most people dont have enough
mashed potatoes in their lives.
Mashed potatoes are quite good with the skins left
in. So either peel the boiled potatoes and put them
through a potato ricer into a saucepan. Or cut
them up so the skin is in small pieces, put them in a
saucepan and mash them with a masher. To either,
add salt and pepper (white for no peel, black OK
for with peel), plenty of butter and some milk. Heat,
stirring with a wooden spoon. Add more milk if they
are too thick.
You can use electric beaters instead of a potato
ricer or masher, beat the potatoes, just so much and
no more. If you overbeat, it brings out the starch and
you get glue instead of mashed potatoes.
Mound them into a serving bowl and put a dollop of
butter on the peak to melt down over them. Have
your frst orgasm now. Sprinkle lightly with paprika.
Dont forget to make gravy. Youll fnd the recipe on
page ?.
A quicker way to make mashed potatoes is to slice
raw, washed potatoes very thinly and barely cover
them with water in a saucepan. Add some salt. Boil
until soft and breaking up, drain off excess water
(there shouldnt be very much). Mash with a masher
then whisk well with butter, milk, salt and pepper.
98
Here we go: Gnocchi di patatas
Put your boiled, peeled potatoes through a potato
ricer or mash them thoroughly. One large potato for
every two servings. Salt them. If your potatoes are very
waxy, add a pinch or two of baking powder.
See how much youve got. Add about half as much
four and work it in well with your hands. Is it very sticky?
Add four, bit by bit, working it in well, until you get a
dough that hardly sticks to your hands. You cant really
measure the four because the potato can be dry or
moist, depending on what variety it is and how you
boiled it.
Dust your countertop with a little four. Now, from the
dough, make a ball that just fts in the palm of your
hand. Lengthen it, so its shaped like a potato. Put it
down in the four and roll it with both hands into a rope
as big around as a small, yet mature, boa constrictor.
You know what I mean. Cut, with a sharp knife, into
bite-sized pieces. Repeat with the rest of the dough.
Cover with a damp kitchen towel.
Get whatever sauce youre using ready. Bring a big
pot of salted water to a boil. Drop the gnocchi one
by one into the boiling, salted water. Dont overcrowd
the pot. They will sink to the bottom. Boil them gently.
When they are done cooking they will foat to the
surface; it doesnt take long. Skim them out and place
them to drain on paper toweling or in a colander.
To serve, either place in a dish and top with sauce of
your choice; or toss with the sauce; or, best of all, make
gnocchi au gratin (with sauce, then cheese or bread
crumbs under the broiler). Sauces for gnocchi: salsa
pomodoro (top with parmesan), quattro formaggi,
or sauce roquefort (plenty of freshly ground black
pepper), pesto (serve next to grilled meat), just butter
and parmesan (under the broiler). You can eat them
with bolognese or other meat sauce, too, but its a bit
heavy.
99
Polenta
Serves 4 to 6
Im going to give a recipe for polenta, even though its
sometimes diffcult to fnd the real thing. Youll fnd long-
cooking polenta and instant polenta on the market, if
you fnd it. In a pinch, you can use hominy grits or corn
meal, though your results wont be quite as authentic.
For packaged polenta or grits, follow the cooking
directions on the package, adding extra butter.
Instead of plain water, you can use stock or milk, partly
or entirely.
For corn meal, bring 2 and 3/4 cups water (or stock or
milk with water) to a boil in a saucepan. In a separate
dish, combine 1 cup corn meal with 1 cup water and
1 teaspoon salt. When the water is boiling, stir the corn
meal mixture into it. Add a nice glump of butter. Cook
and stir until boiling again, then reduce the heat to very
low and cover the pan. Cook, stirring occasionally, for
10 to 15 minutes.
Now its ready if you want it for breakfast in a bowl
with butter and honey or molasses or maple syrple. If
you want it for lunch or dinner, turn the polenta into a
baking dish, spread it out fat, and let it sit awhile, at
least 30 minutes, even until tomorrow in the fridge. It
will set up.
To serve, reheat in a medium hot oven. Slice and serve
garnished with salsa pomodoro and parmesan, or
peperonata or ratatouille.
But the best way, in My Most Humble Opinion, is to
serve it smothered with cheddar cheese sauce (sauce
Mornay with cheddar, no eggs), garnished with plenty
of diced tomatoes, diced onions, and minced HOT
green chiles. Arrange on the plates red, white and
green, like the fag of Mexico. It's great when you
crave Mexican and don't have any corn tortillas.
Vegetarian Main Dishes
103
Grits and Cheese Casserole
This is a high protein American South version of polenta.
Serves 6
6 cups water
1 and 1/2 cups grits, polenta or corn meal (yellow is
nicest)
3 eggs
2 teaspoons salt
2 cloves garlic, crush
1 teaspoon paprika
dash Tabasco
1/2 kilo sharp cheddar, grated
1/2 cup butter
Butter a 2 liter casserole. Prepare grits, polenta or
cornmeal according to the Polenta recipe on page ?.
Beat eggs slightly in a small bowl and add to them
spoon by spoon some hot grits, stirring all the time to
prevent the eggs from cooking. When warmed, stir
egg mixture into grits. Add seasonings, cheese and
butter, mixing well. Pour into prepared casserole. Bake
uncovered for 45 minutes.
Slice and serve topped with salsa pomodoro or
peperonata or hot ratatouille. Serve with a green salad.
104
A word of warning about cheese fondues: drink white wine
or tea with them or theyll turn to rubber in your stomach.
There are two kinds of fondue pots: one for hot oil and broth
fondues, and one for cheese. The cheese fondue pot is a
heavy enameled pan, the other is usually stainless and is
narrower at the top to keep the hot oil from spattering. I
don't know why the Italian fondue calls for four and the
savoyarde for corn starch. They both serve to prevent the
cheese proteins from separating from the fats so that the
fondue is homogeneous. I've done the savoyarde with four
instead of corn starch and it works fne.
Italian fondue
Serves 6
2 to 3 cloves garlic, lightly crushed
1/4 kilo fontina cheese, grated
1/4 kilo provolone cheese, grated
3 tablespoons four
1 1/2 cups dry (Italian preferred) white wine
pepper to taste
large loaf of French or Italian bread, cubed
Let the garlic sit in the olive oil for 2 or 3 hours. We call this
macerating. Toss the grated cheeses gently with the four
until it is evenly distributed.
Heat the wine to a simmer in a fondue pot. Add the foured
cheeses a handful at a time, slowly stirring with a wooden
spoon (in a fgure 8 going the same way all the time, dont
ask why) until it melts.
When all the cheese is melted, stir in the olive oil and garlic
and grind in black pepper to taste. Continue stirring over
low heat for about 15 minutes or until the fondue is perfectly
smooth.
Transfer pot to rechaud (thats your fondue pot stand with
heat source). Use bread cubes to dip. Serve with fresh green
salad or antipasti (marinated vegetables).
Fondue Savoyarde
Serves 6
1/4 kilo gruyre, grated
1/4 kilo emmental, grated
1 heaping teaspoon cornstarch (Cook's Corn Flour),
mixed in 1/4 cup cold water
1/3 bottle of dry white wine
French bread cut in cubes
Bring the wine to a simmer in your fondue pot. Add cheese
a handful at a time, stirring constantly like for the Italian fon-
due. When youve got all the cheese in and its melted, stir
in the cornstarch mixture and continue stirring over low
heat until the mixture is completely homogeneous.
Transfer pot to rechaud. Use bread cubes to dip. Serve
with a green salad.
105
Cannelloni or Manicotti
Cannelloni is fat pasta that you stuff and roll up.
Manicotti is large tubular pasta that you stuff. Manicotti
is easier to use since you dont have to boil it frst and
worry about tearing it while youre assembling them.
You can also use those frozen lasagne pasta squares
(try the green ones), just thaw them and use them
without boiling them frst. Be careful not to tear them.
180 C/gas mark 3/350 F
Serves 4
1 package cannelloni or manicotti, cook cannelloni
according to package directions
1/2 kilo ricotta or cottage cheese (gibna arish)
1 egg
nutmeg
salt and pepper
about 1/2 liter of well-seasoned tomato sauce,
warmed (see page ?)
about 1 cup bechamel (see page ?)
parmesan cheese
Beat the cheese with the egg and some freshly grated
nutmeg and salt and pepper. Pour a little tomato sauce
in the bottom of a baking dish. Stuff the manicotti with
the cheese mixture. Its easy if you use a table knife.
If youre using pasta squares, put a couple of spoonfuls
of cheese mixture along one side and roll them up. Line
them up in a single layer in the baking dish. When the
dish is full (you should be able to get 12 or 14 in it), pour
tomato sauce over them, making sure the pasta itself is
well-coated. The sauce should come about half way
up the stuffed pasta. Pour the bechamel right down the
center (lengthwise) and sprinkle with parmesan. Bake
35 to 45 minutes, or until bubbly and the bechamel is
golden brown. Serve with a nice green salad.
Variations to the cheese mixture:
1) Blend in 1/4 cup minced fresh herbs (basil, thyme,
rosemary)
2) Blend in 1/2 kilo fresh spinach, chopped and wilted
(put freshly washed spinach in a covered pan over low
fre)
3) Blend in a handful of chopped mushrooms, sauted
in butter or olive oil (half-dried is nice, see mushroom
section)
106
Lasagne
Serves 6
1 package lasagne pasta, uncooked, dried or frozen
(half-thawed)
the cheese mixture (with or without variation) from
previous page
1 liter of well-seasoned tomato sauce (see page ?)
2 cups bechamel (see page ?)
parmesan cheese
Lightly oil a baking dish. Pour a little tomato sauce in
the bottom and spread it around. Lay down a layer of
pasta and cover with a little more sauce. Put spoonfuls
of the cheese mixture around evenly (use half of
it) and cover with another layer of pasta, pressing it
down slightly to spread the cheese. Now more sauce,
the rest of the cheese, the rest of the sauce (pour it
down around the sides), and fnish with a layer of pasta
covered with bechamel and sprinkled with parmesan.
Bake 45 minutes, or until bubbly and colored nicely on
the top.
Variations
1) Layer with sliced mozzarella, instead of or in addition
to ricotta, top with grated or sliced mozzarella instead
of bechamel.
2) Layer with grilled vegetables (carrots, mushrooms,
zucchini) and ricotta.
3) Layer with grilled eggplant and mozzarella instead
of ricotta, top with grated or sliced mozzarella.
107
Eggplant Parmesan
Serves 6
2 large eggplants
salt
1 egg
1 cup milk
four
oil
1 liter well-seasoned tomato sauce (see page ?)
breadcrumbs
parmesan cheese
mozzarella cheese (optional)
Slice the eggplants fairly thickly and place the slices in
a colander, salting each layer lightly. Put the colander
on the drainboard or in a shallow dish. Put a plate on
top of the eggplant slices and put something heavy on
the plate. Leave to sit at least an hour. Press down on
the plate. The bitter juice will drain out of the eggplant
and when you come to fry them they wont soak up
the oil so much. Remove the plate and, with your fst,
press the eggplant slices down even more, squeezing
out as much liquid as you can. Rinse and pat dry.
Beat the egg with the milk in a shallow dish. Pour some
four on a dinner plate and some breadcrumbs on
another dinner plate. Heat some oil, olive preferred, in
a frying pan. Dip each slice of eggplant frst in the milk,
then the four (shake off excess), then in milk again,
then the breadcrumbs (shake off excess). Fry in the
oil, turning once, until golden brown on both sides. Set
aside. (You can eat them like this, just napped with
tomato sauce and sprinkled with parmesan instead of
baked together.)
In a baking dish, pour a little tomato sauce, then
place the breaded and fried eggplant slices in a layer.
Cover with a little more tomato sauce. Sprinkle on
plenty of parmesan. Put a layer of mozzarella if you
want. Repeat: eggplant, sauce, cheese, ending with
parmesan or mozzarella.
108
Serves 6
1 large cabbage or 2 per person large, beautiful bell
peppers (color of your choice), or tomatoes, 3 each
2 cups uncooked rice (or 4 cooked)
1 cup chopped tomato
1 bell pepper, diced (not necessary for stuffed peppers)
1 teaspoon oregano or marjoram
1 medium onion, diced
salt and pepper
oil
1/4 kilo ground beef, veal or pork, or Italian style
sausage (optional)
1 liter well-seasoned tomato sauce (see page ?)
For peppers and tomatoes, wash well and cut the tops
cleanly off. Remove the seeds and ribs, scoop fesh out
of tomatoes and use in stuffng. Set in a baking dish.
For cabbage, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.
Separate carefully the largest cabbage leaves (3 or 4
per person) and place them in a pile, one by one, like
sheets of paper. Lower the stack into the boiling water
with the help of some tongs or serving spoons. Boil gently
until tender, about 10 minutes, depending on how thick
the cabbage leaves are. Drain in a colander and cool
under cold running water.
Wash the rice well and shake it as dry as you can. Put
some oil in your rice pot and saut the onion, garlic and
bell pepper until soft. Add the tomatoes and oregano,
salt and pepper. Cook a bit, to render out the water.
Add the meat, if you want, and brown it lightly. Add
the rice and stir it around a bit. Now add water if your
rice is uncooked, and cover and cook until rice is just
underdone, taste it after 15 minutes. It should still have
a slightly hard kernel to it. If youre using leftover rice, just
mix it all up together well and heat it.
Now stuff the peppers and/or tomatoes with the rice
mixture, topping each one with a big spoonful of tomato
sauce. Pour the rest of the tomato sauce in the dish with
them and bake until bubbly and veg begins to brown,
30-35 minutes.
For cabbage, take a single leaf, lay it fat on the counter
and place a large spoonful or two of rice mixture in the
center. Shape the rice into a rough rectangle. Fold one
long edge over the flling, then fold over the sides. Roll
up the parcel. Put a little tomato sauce in the baking
dish, then line up the cabbage rolls in it. Cover with more
sauce and bake until bubbly.
Stufed Cabbage, Peppers, Tomatoes
109
Veg au gratin
This is a quick, good thing that you can make with
any vegetable. The most popular ones are broccoli,
caulifower, summer squash (zucchini, crook-neck, or
pattypan), artichoke hearts, but you can use carrots,
potatoes, mushrooms, onions, any thing that will slice,
or any combination that sounds good to you.
First of all, slice your veg thickly and cook it. Steam it
(best), or boil it in as little water as possible. Mound or
lay the veg out in a buttered baking dish. Put some
little dabs of butter on it. Nap with warm bechamel or
sauce Mornay (see pg ?) and sprinkle with parmesan or
bread crumbs or both. Or some other cheese, grated.
Put the dish under the broiler for 3 to 5 minutes, until the
top is golden. Serve immediately.
Some great combinations:
1) Broccoli with cheddar cheese (in the sauce), topped
with more grated cheddar
2) Caulifower with bechamel, topped with bread
crumbs
3) Zucchini with bechamel and parmesan
4) Artichoke hearts with lemony bechamel, topped
with bread crumbs
5) Carrots or potatoes, topped with bechamel, after
cooking sprinkle with snipped fresh herbs
6) Green peas and sauted mushrooms, bechamel
and bread crumbs
See how easy? Just think, Hmmm, what tastes good
together?
110
Crpes
Ive put the crpe recipe here because all the veg au
gratin can be rolled up in a crpe. Either with the sauce
inside, or over the crpe, or a little of both. Serve like
that or stick them under the broiler for au gratin. You
can make dessert crpes, too. Fill the crpe with ice
cream or sweetened ricotta cheese. Cook a little fresh
fruit with some honey and butter and top the crpe
with that, or with hot fudge (see page ?). Or fold them
in quarters and saut them lightly in butter with a splash
of your favorite liqueur (Cointreau for Suzette) or fruit
syrup (see pg ?). Store unused crpes wrapped tightly
in the fridge, or layer them with waxed paper (butcher
paper) and wrap tightly to freeze. They keep well. If
you love crpes, its really worth your while to buy a
good crpe pan.
For 16 to 18 crpes
Blend in your blender pitcher:
1 cup four
1 1/2 cups milk
2 eggs
1 tablespoon melted butter or oil
a big pinch of salt
Now its best to let the batter sit for an hour or two.
When youre ready to cook, heat a teeny bit of but-
ter in a crpe pan, an omelette pan will do. Thin the
crpe batter with a little water. Put about 2 table-
spoons (thats 2/3 of a 1/4 cup measure, you can use
your 1/4 cup measure to dip the batter and pour it
into the pan) into the pan and tip it round and round
until the batter covers the bottom of the pan. Put it
over the fre. Give it a little shake every now and then.
When it shakes loose, fip it (not that diffcult) or turn it
with a spatula. Cook another minute. Use more butter
for each crpe.
111
Tourli
Serves 6
This could be an Egyptian dish, though its origins are
probably Turkish, they eat it there, too, perhaps the
Egyptians just adapted it to their kitchens. Maybe
its a bastardization of Ratatouille (see farther on).
Somehow everyones Tourli tastes the same, no matter
what vegetables they use.
4 or 5 kinds of vegetable, double handful each, cut in
bite-sized pieces (carrots, potatoes, green beans, bell
peppers, peas, whatever)
a pot of tomato sauce, seasoned with onion, garlic,
cayenne, cumin, coriander
Put the vegetables in a deep baking dish, like a clay
bowl or souffe dish. Put them separately. The potatoes
here, the carrots next to them, then the beans, etc.
Each veg takes up a wedge of your dish. Cover them
completely with the sauce and bake until done, an
hour or more, depending on how big you cut the
pieces and what kind of veg you use. Generally, poke
a fork in where you guess the potatoes are; if theyre
cooked, the rest will be. It sounds simple and stupid,
but tourli is really good. Serve some rice next to it, and
maybe some yoghurt with garlic.
Yoghurt and garlic: stir one or two cloves of garlic,
well-crushed with a little salt in your mortar, into a pot
of yoghurt.
112
Green Beans and Sauce
(or Okra or Green Fava Beans)
This is a typical Egyptian dish. Its what is done with
green beans, okra and foul akhdar, zucchini, potatoes...
almost all vegetables, except maybe eggplant. Serve
it with white rice and yoghurt with garlic.
1 kilo fresh, young green beans, or okra, or fava beans
in their pods, cleaned and washed
4 tomatoes, sliced thinly, then chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 cup tomato paste
salt and pepper
cumin and coriander
cayenne
oil or ghee
more garlic, minced
more oil
Heat some oil or ghee in a soup pot. Saut the onion
and garlic until soft and add the tomatoes. Cook 2 or 3
minutes, then add the tomato paste, cumin, coriander
and cayenne. Cook, stirring all the time, until the mixture
is almost dry. Dont let it burn. Dump in a bunch of
water and the vegetables. Salt and pepper. Simmer
uncovered until veg is cooked, at least 30 minutes.
Add water or cover if necessary. If the sauce seems
too thin to you, put a tablespoon of four with some
water in a jar and shake it up and strain into the veg.
This will thicken it. Stir and simmer some more.
Make a talaya: in a small frying pan heat some oil
and saut as much minced garlic as you dare. When
it is brown, dump it into the veg pot. Turn off heat and
cover. Its done. Dont forget the yoghurt and garlic.
113
The frst way works with long-cooking vegetables,
like potatoes and other root veg, and meat. You fry
up a wet masala and add the stuff to it then cook
it all together. Mash some chopped hot green or
red peppers up with some salt, some garlic if you
want, and a couple of kinda big spoons of garam
masala in your mortar, or grind them up together in
your blender.
Heat some ghee on on medium high fre in the
pot youll use for the stew. Scrape in the contents
of the mortar and some fnely chopped tomatoes
or tomato paste if you want. (Do you want it red?)
Some chopped onions if you want. Fry it all around
until it releases a wonderful smell and the veg has
pretty much disintegrated and the oil is beginning
to separate out. Then throw in your veg or meat cut
in large chunks and stir them around. (Pound meat
well with four spiced with a little garam masala.)
Lower fre and fry it all around some more until it takes
some color, then add water or broth, a little beer or
juice (tomato? apple? orange? mango?) and bring
back up to a simmer. Cover and fnish cooking
The second way you put the spice in at the end. It
works with tender vegetables and beans and peas
and lentils. Follow the recipe on the previous page for
green beans with sauce or for lentils/beans (dhal) on
page ?. Omit onion and garlic and use ghee. 10-15
minutes before the veg is done cooking, add garam
masala to taste. Only a teeny bit to beans and lentils,
as much as you like otherwise. Careful! The favor
develops. Add some more cayenne pepper, give it a
big stir and fnish cooking.
Masalananda! Curried Whatever
Indian curries can be made in two ways. Neither way uses that yellow curry powder. Use that in marinades for
chicken or for making Yellow Rice (page ?). Its full of poor quality turmeric. You CAN buy a good Indian spice
blend or make the one on the next page. Always serve raitas (page ?) with curries.
114
Garam Masala Bengali
This is a northern Indian spice mixture. The
recipe is from Lord Krishnas Cuisine, the best
Indian cookbook Ive ever seen. It was written
by Yamuna Devi, who got the recipes from her
travels in India with the founder of the modern
Krishna movement, Sri Prabhupada. Its a big fat
book, and mouth-watering reading. Buy it if you
love Indian food.
3-4 dry red chiles
3 tablespoons sesame seeds
2 tablespoons green peppercorns
2 tablespoons black peppercorns
2 tablespoons white peppercorns
1 tablespoon cloves
3 cinnamon sticks, 8 cm each
20 green cardamom pods
1/4 cup cumin seeds
3/4 cup coriander seeds
3 cassia or bay leaves
1 teaspoon ground ginger
Dry roast seeds then combine all ingredients and
grind in spice grinder. Store in a dark jar. One
teaspoon is enough to mildly favor a liter of
prepared sauce.
115
Red Beans and Rice
Beans for Refritos
Serves 4 to 6
1/2 kilo dry red beans (pintos for frijoles refritos)
oil
broth of some kind, or water
a piece of ham hock or stew meat (optional)
salt and pepper and cayenne
Soak the beans in water overnight with a pinch of baking
soda (it takes the gas out).
For faster results, wash beans well, put in a soup pot with
plenty of water and bring to a boil. Boil 1 minute. Remove
from heat and cover. Let sit 1 hour. Drain and cook like
below, BUT USE BOILING HOT LIQUID.
Saut the onion and garlic until golden in the oil. Add the
beans, optional piece of meat, and broth. Simmer, half-
covered, until beans are soft. Add boiling water if necessary.
Season with salt, pepper and cayenne.
Serve with white rice: Mound the rice in a soup plate and
spoon beans over. Pass around hot sauce of your choice.
116
Deluxe Burritos
(or tacos or tostadas)
These are just the best things to eat when youve got a
bad case of the munchies. Theyre hot and cold and
bland and spicy and gooey and dry. Theyre not hard to
prepare, especially if you have other people who want
to munch out, too. Lots of chopping and grating, but
very little cooking. Thing is, you need a pot of beans,
red or pinto, so there is an element of planning involved,
unless you used canned beans.
As far as the frying goes for the corn tortillas, my frst mother-in-
law always let everybody fry their own. She kept an iron skillet
flled with oil on a low fre and whenever someone was ready
for another taco or tostada, they just got up from the table
and went and fried it. They stay hot and crispy that way.
And some people like them a little chewy and some people
like them extra crispy, so everybody gets pleased.
OK, refry a pot of pinto or red beans, cooked like for Red
Beans and Rice (see page ?), or do canned ones the same
way. That is: mash them up well (theyll mash easier if theyre
warm), then heat some oil in a heavy skillet and dump the
mashed beans in. Add some black pepper and a pinch of
oregano. Fry them on medium high, scraping them around
with a wooden spoon, until theyre pretty dry. Put the rice
thingy under the skillet and keep them warm.
Get your garnishes ready:
2 or 3 four tortillas per person, for burritos
3 or 4 corn tortillas per person, for tacos/tostadas
grated cheddar cheese
diced onion
diced tomato
sliced pickled peppers (jalapeos)
sliced ripe (not pickled) black olives
shredded lettuce
sour cream, lots
some hot sauce of your choice, like salsa fresca (page ?)
shredded already cooked roast beef or chicken, sauted
in a little chile sauce or with some tomato sauce and hot
peppers (optional - actually everything's optional except
the four tortillas and something to stuff them with)
Arrange all the garnishes on a big serving platter or several
smaller plates. Open the sour cream and stir it up. Heat
the four tortillas on your rice thingy, fold in half or roll loosely,
and put them in a bread basket in a clean kitchen towel.
And/or fry the corn tortillas in oil; drain on paper toweling
and then cover in a basket. Put it all on the table.
You should be quivering with antici...
117
...pation
Now, take out a tortilla and put it on your plate. I
imagine you can fll a taco; a tostada is just a fat
taco so go for it. For a well-rolled burrito, spread some
refried beans (a big spoonful, maybe two) on a four
tortilla just below the halfway mark. Or use the meat.
Sprinkle with some cheese (do this now so the cheese
will melt). Then put in whatever else you want, some
tomatoes, some onions, plenty of jalapeos, a couple
of globs of sour cream, a little lettuce. Now, is it so full
you cant roll it up? Youve screwed up then. A burrito
is a little donkey: it carries things. You gotta be able to
roll it up, so careful how much stuff you stuff it with. Fold
the bottom edge up over the flling. Then fold over
one side, both if youve got it really gooey inside, and
continue rolling. Pick it up and eat it. I just leave all the
stuff that falls out on my plate and eat it with a fork or
another tortilla at the end.
Variations
1) Breakfast burrito: Fry some potatoes and eggs with
some chile sauce. Roll them up with some grated
cheese in a four tortilla.
2) Enchilada style: Prepare burritos without lettuce
and tomatoes and place on oven-proof plates. Nap
with red chile sauce, green chile sauce or even salsa
ranchera (page ?). Cover with grated cheddar and
put under the broiler until cheese melts. Garnish plate
with plenty of shredded lettuce and top burrito with a
glob or two of sour cream, maybe some guacamole.
Eat it.
118
Gumbo
Vegetarian, Chicken or Seafood
This is my grandmother Speers recipe. She makes tons
of it when the summer produce comes in and freezes
it in boil-in-a-bags. You can stew chicken pieces
well-browned in some oil frst in it, too. Or add some
cleaned, whole shrimp half-way through the okra and
tomato cooking time. Serve it over white rice.
some okra, cleaned and sliced into bite-sized pieces,
one double handful per person
same amount of tomatoes, chopped
about half as much onion, sliced in half moons
1 or 2 green bell peppers, chopped
a couple of cloves of garlic, minced
some hot green chiles, sliced (optional)
oil
salt, pepper, cayenne
some broth or tomato juice or water
Saut the onion, bell pepper, garlic and optional green
chiles in the oil until tender. Add the okra, tomatoes,
salt, pepper and cayenne to taste (it should be a little
spicy). Fry for a bit, until the tomatoes really start to
render their water and the okra is bright green. Cover
with broth, juice or water. Let simmer until thick and
okra is cooked.
119
Quiche
Makes one, 4 to 6 pieces
This is just the way I make quiche. The crust recipe is back
in the Dessert section (page ?). There are plenty of other
ways. Serve with a beautiful salad and potatoes of your
choice.
Put an unbaked pie shell in a 180 C/gas mark 3/350 F oven
for 5 minutes. Take it out to cool but leave the oven on.
Now, crack some eggs into your blender pitcher. For a
small pie plate, use 4 large eggs. Use 6 for a bigger plate.
See how much eggs you have. 1/3 liter? 1/2 liter? The
blender pitcher should have measuring marks along the
side. Add the same amount milk, or milk and cream mixed.
Put in about 1/2 teaspoon salt and some black pepper.
Now decide what kind of quiche youre making. For just
plain, grate in a teeny bit of nutmeg. Blend it and pour
it into the prepared pie shell, which you have placed on
a baking tray so you can carry it without spilling it. Put it
in the oven and bake it for probably 40 minutes. At 35
minutes, check for doneness by wiggling the dish a bit.
If the uncooked (jiggly) bit in the center is the size of a
quarter (bariza) or smaller its done. Remove from oven.
Cool. The center bit will continue cooking, eggs are like
that. Slice and serve.
For variations, use classic combinations or your imagination.
You can put just about anything not too watery in a quiche.
Put your additions on the baked pie shell and pour the
egg mixture over.
1) Quiche lorraine: ham (or use any prepared meat:
crisp fried bacon, pastrami, salami, turkey breast, with
or without cheese) that youve sauted in a little butter
2) With cheese: over the ham, lay a layer of sliced swiss
cheese
3) Plain cheese or with herbs: sliced any kind of sliceable
cheese, crumbled for feta or roquefort cheeses, add some
herbs/spices to the egg mixture, caraway or coriander
with dutch cheeses, oregano for feta, lots of freshly
ground black pepper for roquefort, some hot mustard or
horseradish with cheddar or swiss
4) Spinach quiche (or other veg): barely cook spinach,
or zucchini, or asparagus or whatever, drain, then chop
or slice and lay it in the bottom of the pie shell, cover with
cheese if you want, add an herb or spice to the egg
mixture: spinach, emmental, nutmeg; zucchini (with or
without tomatoes), parmesan or mozzarella, oregano;
thick tomato slices sauted in a little oil until dry, with hot
peppers, cheddar cheese; asparagus, gruyre, pinch of
thyme; onion rings sauted in butter, emmental, a little
french mustard.
120
Peperonata
This is really easy. You can chill it and eat it cold like
salad or in sandwiches (with melted cheese), or you
can serve it hot next to polenta or gnocchi (au gratin!)
or rice. It will keep in a jar in the fridge for a long time if
youre careful about using clean utensils to serve it.
2 kilos bell peppers of mixed colors, just green wont
do, seeded and cut in big chunks
1 large onion, chopped coarsely
olive oil
salt and pepper
Heat about 1/4 cup of olive oil in a large heavy pan.
Dump everything in it. Stir it around. When it gets to
sizzling well, turn it way down and cook until everything
is soft, stirring occasionally.
Ratatouille
Ratatouille comes from the Provence. Touiller is provenal
for stir. Ratatouille is kind of a perjorative: a stirred up
vegetable mess. I think it and Tourli are related.
1/4 cup olive oil
1 large eggplant, cut in chunks
2 large green bell peppers, seeded and cut into strips
1 large onion, coarsely chopped
4 large tomatoes, peeled and sliced
2 large zucchini, cut in bite sized pieces
salt and pepper
thyme or oregano
Heat olive oil in a deep pan. Saut frst the eggplant for
2 or 3 minutes, then add the other ingredients, except
the zucchini and thyme/oregano. You may have to add
some more oil if the eggplant drank it all. The tomatoes
and peppers will yield up some water. When the mixture
begins to boil, lower the heat and let it simmer, stirring
occasionally, until the pepper pieces are almost cooked.
Add the zucchini and thyme or oregano. Stir it up and
cook until zucchini is tender.
Serve hot on or next to polenta (sprinkle with parmesan),
or as a garnish to grilled meat or chicken. Or use it instead
of tomato sauce to make lasagne (layer with pasta and
mozzarella).
121
Sauerkraut
For homemade sauerkraut, see page ?. Otherwise buy
it from the deli case, uncooked. Canned sauerkraut
is cooked already, so omit the frst 30 minutes of
simmering.
Wash your sauerkraut in cold running water. Squeeze it
out well. Dump it in a big pot. Now, pour some water
over it and bring it to a boil. Barely crush 1 teaspoon
of black peppercorns in the mortar and throw that in.
Not the mortar. Reduce heat and let it simmer.
Meanwhile, scrub some potatoes. Dont peel them.
Use the smallest potatoes you can fnd. About the
size of 2 bites. Red ones are nice. If you cannot fnd
potatoes that size, cut bigger ones into chunks that
size. After the sauerkraut has been simmering about 30
minutes, put the potatoes in on top of it. Add enough
cheap, dry white wine (or water) to cover them. Bring
up to a boil again.
Decide what favor you want: you have a choice of
caraway, juniper berries or cumin. I prefer caraway.
Bruise the seeds or berries in the mortar and add them
to the pot. For a liter or so of kraut, use 1 teaspoon
spice. Add a couple of tablespoons of butter. Add a
small handful of raisins. Simmer until potatoes are soft.
Taste. It may require salt, depending on the sauerkraut
itself.
Serve with good brown bread, maybe toasted with
swiss cheese melted on it!
Meat n Chicken and Lotsa Gravy
123
Moms Meatloaf
People didnt eat meatloaf for awhile. Considered
dclass. But now with all the stress of daily living,
people want what has come to be known as comfort
food. Like meatloaf and mashed potatoes, hot ap-
ple pie with vanilla ice cream. And there are a lot of
young cooks/chefs with young ideas/recipes, basically
just twists on old favorites. Like they use ground veal or
ground turkey, or both, when they make meatloaf. You
can fnd recipes like that in the cooking magazines.
This is the way my mom used to make meatloaf.
Feeds family of 4
1/2 kilo ground round or chuck (lean ground beef)
1 onion, grated
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
a few shakes of Tabasco
1 cup of tomato sauce, canned or homemade (2 half
cups)
1/2 cup of cracker crumbs or bread crumbs
1 egg
salt and pepper
Mix everything but 1/2 cup tomato sauce together in a
bowl. Mush it together with your hands. Form it into a
longish loaf and put it in the center of a nice baking dish.
Pour the other 1/2 cup tomato sauce over the top. You
can cut some potatoes, and maybe some carrots and
onions and put them around the meatloaf, drizzle them
with oil or more tomato sauce. Pour a 1/2 cup of water
around the meatloaf. Cover it loosely with foil.
Put it in the oven for 35-40 minutes. Take it out and remove
the foil. Look at it, it should be looking pretty cooked but
not browned. Is there still some liquid in the pan? There
should be. Add some, if necessary.
Return to oven and cook uncovered 20 to 30 minutes
more. Remove from oven and carefully pour most of
the pan drippings into another dish. You should have
between 1/4 and 1/2 cup of pan drippings (meat juices
and fat).
Make pan gravy with the juices (see pg ?). Put the
gravy in a gravy dish and serve with the meatloaf. Make
mashed potatoes if you didnt put potatoes in with the
meatloaf. This meatloaf is great the next day cold sliced
in a sandwich with mayonnaise.
124
Polly Schimmelfnnigs
Swedish Meatballs
Serves 6 to 8
Polly was the wife of a guy who worked with Frithiof.
We used to go over to Gus and Pollys house and eat
Swedish Meatballs and theyd come over to our house
and wed eat steak off the grill. Saturdays. These are the
best meatballs of this kind (not Italian) Ive ever eaten.
Youll see: theres a secret to the sauce.
Scrub really well 1 kilo of potatoes. Put them whole and
unpeeled in a big pot and cover them with water. Boil
until done but not soft. Pick potatoes out to cool. DO
NOT THROW AWAY WATER.
Meanwhile mix together in a large bowl:
1 kilo ground beef
10 saltine crackers, crumbled
2 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1/2 large onion, minced
1/2 teaspoon seasoning salt (a little minced garlic and
a sprinkle of cayenne will do)
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
Heat some vegetable shortening over a medium hot fre
in a big soup pot. Form meat mixture into balls the size
of small eggs and brown them in the big pot. Just brown
them well on all sides. As they brown, remove them from
the pot and put them on paper towels to drain.
When theyre all browned, pour off all but 1/4 cup of
the grease, being careful not to dump any of the pan
scrapings out. Return to fre and whisk in 3 tablespoons
four. Cook it a couple of minutes, whisking and scrap-
ing, then pour in the potato water, maybe not all of it,
be careful, add, add, add, stir, stir, stir, and stop adding
when the sauce looks like, well, sauce. Not watery, but
not too thick.
Crumble in 2 beef bouillon cubes. Add the meatballs.
Cut the potatoes into chunks the same size as the
meatballs and add them (peel them if you want, their
nutritional value is pretty much all in the water, anyway).
Simmer awhile and taste to adjust seasonings. Leave it
to cook at least 20 minutes to be sure the meatballs are
cooked through. Some nice bread is good to have to
sop up the sauce with. And a green salad to keep the
palate fresh.
125
Hamburgers
So, you can just make some ground beef patties and
throw them on the fre and call them hamburgers, but
you wouldnt get me to eat one. A hamburger is more
than a ground beef patty slapped on a bun along with
someones excuse for condiments. A hamburger is a
concept. If any component is lacking, the whole loses
integrity. There are burgers and there are Burgers (also
cheeseburgers and Cheeseburgers).
You begin to build your Burger with your bun (or Bun, if
you prefer). To sesame seed or not to sesame seed?
And what about whole wheat buns? I prefer sesame
seed buns. Whole wheat buns are great with avocado-
bacon burgers. Thing is, the bun shouldnt be too soft.
The bread should have some stamina, not like that
ucky white bread you can make pills with. So check
out your local supermarket or bakery for the best buns,
careful how you talk to the clerk! ;-) Slice them in half,
if they didnt come already split! Always heat your
hamburger buns, either in the pan that youve cooked
the burgers in, or on the grill. Both sides. Try to get the
inside faces a little toasted; it wont get so soggy when
you start piling things on it.
Then youve got the meat: the burger, itself. Use
ground beef with some fat in it so that the burgers will
be juicy. When you buy a whole flet, you can have
your butcher grind the small third with its fat. If you use
lean ground beef, the meat is waterier and the burgers
will shrink more. Make the patties much bigger than the
buns in such a case. Mix your ground beef with great
stuff, like for meatloaf. You can stretch the quantity of
meat to feed more people by adding 2 to 4 slices of
bread wet with milk.
So, basically:
1 kilo ground beef (make six burgers)
some Worcestershire sauce
some Tabasco
some salt and plenty of black pepper
some crushed garlic
1/2 large onion, grated
cracker crumbs, bread crumbs, or wet bread
(optional)
1 egg (optional)
Its useful to put the egg and crumbs or bread if youre
a maniacal hamburger fipper. It helps to keep the
burgers from falling apart.
126
Mush everything all together with your hands. Look at
your bun size. Shape the hamburger into patties just
larger around than the buns and about 2 cm thick.
Hopefully you get 6. Park them on a plate and cover
them. Put the plate in the fridge so the cat doesnt get
into them. Is your fre on your grill ready yet?
Or will you pan fry them? Turn them only once and dont
press on them unless you like them dry and well-done.
My dad likes to pour some beer from the can hes
drinking over the burgers as they cook on the grill. Over
a medium fre, for rare, cook the burgers 5 or 6 minutes
on the frst side, then turn and cook second side another
4 to 5 minutes. For medium, 1st side 7 or 8 minutes, 2nd
side 5 or 6. If you like them well-done, dont turn them
until gray stuff beads up on the top side, then turn and
cook another 4 minutes or so on the other side, pressing
on the burger lightly with a spatula every now and
then.
To tell how hot your fre is, put your hand over the coals
at the level you will cook the food and count, one
thousand one, one thousand two, . . . If you need to
remove your hand after 2 seconds, the coals are HOT;
3 seconds MEDIUM HOT, 4 seconds MEDIUM, 5 or 6
seconds SLOW. Isnt that an interesting and useful thing
to know?
Then there are the additions that turn the lowly ground
beef patty into a Hamburger (or Cheeseburger).
cheese, American, cheddar or Swiss
mustard, American, German or French
ketchup, A-1 sauce, Heinz 57, etc.
mayonnaise
sliced tomatoes
sliced onions
lettuce leaves
sliced dill pickles
jalapeos
secret sauce (see pg ?)
And the Custom Burger (all of these are really worth making
and eating):
1) Avocado-bacon burger: whole wheat bun, burger, sliced
avocado, 2 strips fried bacon or smoked turkey, swiss cheese
melted over it all, alfalfa sprouts or lettuce, mayonnaise
2) Chili-cheese burger: regular bun, burger, a big ladle of
chili, diced onion, cheddar cheese melted over it, eat this
one with a fork
3) Hawaiian or Polynesian burger: regular bun, burger cooked
with some soy sauce, slice of pineapple cooked/grilled with
some soy sauce, onion, lettuce
4) la bohemienne: sourdough bun, burger, a lot of onions
cut in rings and sauted in butter, top with melted swiss or
sprinkle with crumbled roquefort, tomato and lettuce
127
Steaks
For grilling, there are flets, rib-eyes, T-bones, sirloins, Porterhouses,
any kind of fat cut of meat. Grill a steak according to how
thick it is. Grill it over a medium to medium-hot fre (you have to
remove your hand after 3 or 4 seconds). Turn it once just over
halfway through the total cooking time. May as well mention
now that you should be cooking over hot coals, not a fre. You
have to let the fre die down and the coals glow nicely orange.
When the fat drips down and causes fare-ups of fame, have
a squirter bottle of water nearby to douse the fames. Its only
takes common sense to know that if you cook in fames, the
outside will burn before the inside gets cooked. A table:
Thickness Total time for Rare Total time for Medium
2.5 cm thick 12 -18 minutes 15 - 20 minutes
3 cm 18 - 25 minutes 25 - 30 minutes
4 cm 50 - 60 minutes 55 - 65 minutes
Buy your steaks well marbled with fat: theyll be more tender
and favorful. And leave the fat on around the edges, it helps
maintain the integrity of the cut. You dont have to eat it. Slash
it in several places so that when it shrinks cooking it doesnt
draw the meat up into some weird shape with it: so the meat
stays fat. Wrap steaks individually in plastic wrap, seal well,
and freeze for at least 10 days and up to 30. Aging improves
tenderness and favor. Or marinate them.
First rule: Dont salt the meat before you cook it or all the juices will
run out before you cut it and eat it. Remember osmosis?
For really nice cuts of meat, like filet and rib-eye and rib steaks,
just pepper the meat and poke it a little bit, not too deeply, with
a fork.
For tougher cuts, but still not cheap cuts, like T-bones and sirloins,
black pepper and Worcestershire sauce, maybe rub with a little
garlic if you want, and poke really well with a fork. But dont tear
it apart.
For cheap cuts of meat, extremely tough, marinate in an acid
solution. That means wine or tomato juice or vinegar or lemon
juice. Vinegar and lemon juice are so acidic that theyll cook
the meat, so use twice as much again oil with them. Cheap cuts
of meat are not so flavorful, so extra spicing is good.
Poke your meat all over both sides with a fork. Rub with mashed
garlic or french mustard if you feel like it. Shake on some
Worcestershire, again, if you feel like it. Grind some black pepper
over one side, turn it over and grind some more on the other
side. Pour some red wine or your lemon juice/vinegar-oil over it
or squeeze a tomato cut in half over it, and slop it all around both
sides. Cover and refrigerate for at least an hour, longer is better,
but turn it over. The meat may go dark, thats OK, its more
tender.
Grill according to table. Top with a dollop of your favorite
beurre compos (see next page). Serve with baked
potatoes and a great tossed salad.
128
Beurre compos: to 250 grams softened butter, add:
1) beurre matre dhtel: an equal measure of fnely minced
parsley and juice of 1 lemon
2) beurre danchois: 125 grams of pured anchovy flets,
juice of 1 lemon
3) beurre de roquefort: 150 grams of roquefort pured with
1 tablespoon cognac and 1 teaspoon powdered mustard
Pack into a dish just the right size and refrigerate.
For grilling a whole flet, trim off excess fat, rub with a
mixture of softened butter, black pepper and your favorite
mustard (this is Hany Sabet's Dahshour special), and throw
on a medium fre. Turn occasionally. Total cooking time
between 45 minutes (rare) and 60 minutes (medium) for an
average 2.5 kilo flet. Use a meat thermometer if you have
one (internal temps: rare 60 C/140 F, medium 70 C/160 F,
well 77 C/170 F). Whole flet is good to BBQ when you have
a lot of people who like their meat different ways: the ends
can be well-done and it goes towards rare in the middle.
Kebabs, Kabobs and Brochettes (no diference)
Buy some good metal skewers that ft your BBQ grill. Or you
can use the disposable bamboo ones, just be sure the ends
dont hang over the fre. Thread meat pieces alternated
with veg pieces onto skewers and marinate. Let them sit at
least 1 hour, 2 or 3 or even overnight is better.
1) Beef chunks (wrapped in bacon?), whole mushrooms,
tomato wedges, onion wedges, green bell pepper pieces;
marinate in red wine or tomato juice and oil, with crushed
garlic and black pepper, some oregano
2) Chicken pieces, pineapple chunks, green bell pepper
pieces; marinate in oil and a little soy sauce, crushed
garlic
3) Lamb or mutton chunks, tomato wedges, green bell
pepper pieces; marinate in oil and lemon juice, half an
onion grated, pinch of thyme
4) Fish pieces, lemon pieces; marinate in oil and lemon
juice
5) Whole unpeeled shrimp, lemon pieces; marinate in
lemon juice and oil, cayenne pepper
6) Veggie kebabs, the most grillable combination is
eggplant, onion, mushroom, green pepper, tomato. Cut
the raw vegetables into chunks and thread onto a skewer,
except the tomato. Put the prepared skewers in the glass
dish and pour the marinade from the marinated veg
recipe (see page ?) over them. When ready to grill, fnish
skewer with a piece of tomato.
And grill over medium coals (see page ?) turning them a
few times, for 15-20 minutes.
Sliced eggplant and sliced zucchini are another good
vegetarian grill treat. Just brush with a little olive oil (with
garlic?) and grill.
129
Barbequed chicken or ribs
Arrange cut up chicken or ribs in a shallow dish. Pour
barbeque sauce from page ? over it. Marinate an hour,
or covered overnight in the fridge.
Grill over medium hot coals (see page ?).
Or oven broil (light the top fre in the oven, cook the
meat on one side, then turn it over, baste it, and cook
the other side).
Use the marinade from out of the dish to baste with.
If you have extra, bring it to a boil again, simmer 5
minutes, then use as a table sauce. Be sure to boil it
again to kill any nasty micro-organisms that might be in
it from the raw meat.
To know when chicken is cooked, poke a sharp knife or
skewer into the fattest part of the thigh. The juice that
runs out should be clear, not pink. Itll take up to 25
minutes the frst side, and another 25 the second. Ribs
about the same.
The best way to grill fsh
This is the way they do it in Dalmatia.
Put a branch of rosemary in a small bowl of olive oil.
Take a cleaned, whole fsh, or a fsh cut up into steaks,
or some big shrimp or langoustines, or lobster cut in half
lengthwise. You can use fsh flets, too, but you need
to put them in one of those grilling racks that hold them
in place. Put on the grill over medium coals. Brush
frequently with olive oil using the rosemary branch.
Cook until done, turning twice.
Serve with boiled potatoes, dressed with more olive oil
and fresh rosemary, maybe a little garlic, a green salad,
and some coarse white bread to sop up the olive oil.
130
Miz Speers Chicken-fried Steak
This is my grandmothers famous chicken-fried steak. Use
the cheapest cut of beef you can fnd. She bought what
we called minute steaks: meat cut and rolled through
a tenderizer. You can use round steak (its cut from the
rump).
Cut meat into pieces about 10 x 10 cm (1 or 2 per person)
and pound with the pointy side of a meat hammer or the
wrong edge of a knife until the meat is about 1 cm thick.
Put some four, salt and black pepper on a dinner plate. Put
some milk in a bowl. Heat oil about 1 cm deep in a frying
pan, or use your deep-fryer at 180 C/350 F. Dip the steak in
milk, then dredge in four. Shake excess four off, dip again
in milk then in four. Shake excess off and gently place in hot
oil. Fry until golden brown, turning twice. Drain on paper
toweling. Serve with potatoes, mashed or fried, veg, and
cream gravy.
Cream Gravy
Bring 1 1/2 cups milk to a simmer. In a jar with a tight ftting lid,
put 1/2 cup cold milk and 1/4 cup four. Shake well. Strain
into simmering milk, stirring all the time. Add 1/2 teaspoon
salt and plenty of black pepper. Cook until thickened and
bubbly. Taste for seasonings. In Texas we even put it on
french fries.
Escalope pane (veal or turkey)
See chicken-fried steak. Pound meat out well with meat
hammer or wrong edge of knife. Max, an old roommate
of mine, insisted on soaking his veal escalopes in milk
for an hour or so before pounding them out. Swore it
made them even more tender. Substitute fne white
bread crumbs for four. Fry in a little oil with a small knob
of butter added. Garnish with sliced hard-boiled eggs,
capers. Serve with lemon wedges, tartar sauce.
131
Swiss Steak
Serves 4
This is excellent with venison (deer meat), also. Give it
a try with camel, too.
Cut round steak (up to 1 kilo) into pieces about 10 x
10 cm (1 or 2 per person). Dredge the meat in four,
salt and pepper, then pound it with a meat hammer
or the wrong edge of a knife. Be sure the four is well-
pounded into the meat. Heat a little oil in a frying pan
and brown the meat on both sides. Then add:
1 medium onion, chopped
1 large carrot, sliced
2 ribs of celery, sliced
4 large tomatoes roughly pured or 2 cups of canned
tomatoes (1 large can), chopped, with their juice
a big pinch of dried thyme (or oregano)
1 bay leaf
Cover and simmer an hour or two, until meat is tender.
Add more liquid when necessary (beer or water).
Is there enough sauce for everybody? If not, shake
together in a jar some cold water or milk (1/2 cup) and
a tablespoon of four. Strain and whisk into simmering
sauce. Adjust seasoning. Cook another 15 minutes,
until thickened and bubbly.
Served traditionally with rice or noodles, but nice with
mashed potatoes, too.
132
Moms Sunday Pot Roast
with Carrots and Potatoes
Preheat oven to 325 F/gas mark 2/160 C
Serves 6 to 8
You really need a covered baking dish for this. If you
dont have one, cover as tightly as possible with foil.
a roast, 1 1/2 to 2 kilos (either from the neck, shoulder
or rump, boneless preferred)
black pepper
the fat trimmed from the roast or a little oil
water (1 or 2 cups)
some potatoes cut in wedges, peeled or unpeeled
some carrots, peeled and cut into fnger-sized lengths
an onion, cut in wedges
Melt the fat or heat the oil over high heat in the oven
pan on the stove. Pepper the roast all over and place
in the hot fat. Sear each side frst quickly, so you dont
lose the juices, then brown all over. When the roast
is a lovely brown, remove pan from heat, pour in the
cup of water, cover and place in the oven. Cook for 1
1/2 hours then remove from oven and put vegetables
down around the roast. Add another cup of water if
necessary. Cover and return to oven for another 45
minutes. Remove from oven, lift out beef and veg
onto a serving platter and go on to the next page and
make pan gravy in the pan.
133
Pan Gravy
Pan gravy is a southern tradition. We make it whenever
we have pan drippings/scrapings or juices. Its quite
easy, you just have to fgure out which method will give
you the desired unlumpy result.
The frst way, method 1, is to whisk the four directly into
the pan drippings, then add liquid (water, stock or milk).
This works well when you have pan-fried something,
like chops or chicken or ham slices or sausage, and
the pan has fat and little crunchy pieces of whatever
you cooked. Cook the four a minute in the drippings,
whisking all the time and scraping up the bits stuck to
the pan, then whisk in the liquid (For Red-eye gravy,
splash in some of last nights coffee over sausage or
ham drippings.), salt and pepper, simmer 2 or 3 minutes.
For every 3 tablespoons of drippings, use 3 tablespoons
of four and two cups of milk, broth or water. You dont
have to measure it, just eyeball it.
The second way, method 2, works better with roasted
things because your pan juices tend to be more
watery than fatty. Shake together in a jar some four
and some water. Heat the juices in the roasting pan
on the stove top. If there is a lot and it tastes watery,
reduce by boiling awhile. When simmering lightly,
strain in the four-water mixture, stirring all the time and
scraping up the bits stuck to the pan. When it starts to
thicken, add some milk and simmer until thick enough.
Proportions are the same: for every two cups of liquid,
3 tablespoons (thats 1/4 cup) of four. Season with salt
and pepper. Add a bouillon cube if the favor is weak,
or for beef, just a little Worcestershire sauce.
To thicken already good tasting, well-colored pan
juices, just stir in a spoonful or two of Beurre mani:
whip together equal measures of four and softened
butter. Store covered in the fridge. It can be used to
thicken soups, too. It doesnt make lumps.
134
Chops (lamb, mutton, veal, pork)
Chops are about the quickest meat to cook. Trim off
excess fat and slash remaining fat in 4 or 5 places so
the chop stays fat when you cook it. Fast and easy if
you just serve them with a large tossed salad. Dinner
in 20 minutes.
You can pan-fry any chop in its own fat (trimmed off
earlier and melted in the frying pan), a little oil with a
knob of butter, or in olive oil. Lamb, mutton and veal
are especially good in olive oil. Throw a few unpeeled
garlic cloves in the pan to cook with the chops, then
sprinkle with fresh rosemary or thyme about 2 minutes
before end of cooking. Squeeze the softened garlic
out of its skin and use it in the pan gravy or just spread
it on some nice bread.
OR at the end of cooking, squeeze the juice of a lemon
or two into the pan.
OR pour in 1/4 cup white wine, or red wine or marsala
(for veal). Let most of the liquid simmer away. Use as
a thin sauce or make pan gravy.
Lamb, mutton and veal can be cooked medium (over
medium heat, 5 minutes each side) to well-done (7).
Pork must be cooked well-done.
You can also bread the chops, just dredge in four or
breadcrumbs with salt and pepper, shake excess off,
and fry in a little fat. Mom always did breaded pork
chops with pan gravy and mashed potatoes.
You can grill them, too, plain (all), or rubbed with garlic
and mustard-butter (veal), or brushed with BBQ sauce
(pork or mutton), or with olive oil using a rosemary
branch as a brush (all). It really isnt necessary to
marinate chops; they should be tender and favorful
enough.
135
Chicken
A note on salmonella: it can make you SICK. Very sick,
wish-you-were-dead-sick. Some chicken and some eggs
have salmonella. It is destroyed by cooking. Thats why we
always eat chicken well-done, and why we are warned
against eating raw eggs, and raw egg products (like
mayonnaise) that have not been properly refrigerated.
Protect yourself and your family and guests against
salmonella.
Always thaw frozen chicken in the refrigerator or a basin
of cold water. Do not let the chicken drip onto anything
else (especially already cooked food!) while it is thawing.
When youve got the chicken ready to cook, wash all
utensils and countertops with hot water and soap. I even
use a mild disinfectant or a little chlorine bleach on wooden
cutting boards or plasticware, since they are porous and
often scratched and the germs arent easily washed out.
At least if theyre still there, theyre dead. Wash your hands
and under your fngernails with hot water and soap. Rinse
out your sink with hot water and soap. So Im paranoid.
Buy your chicken, whole or in pieces. WASH your chicken
under cold running water inside and out. If the organs
have been left inside, just slide your hand down inside the
body cavity, with the backside of it against the interior
wall, and tear the membrane with your nails that holds the
stuff in place. Do the other side, too, then pull the stuff
out. You may have to twist and pull pretty hard to get
the heart out. Cut off the head if the butcher has left it
on: break the neck as close to the body as you can, then
pull the skin back some from the head towards the body
and cut between the vertebrae where you broke it. You
should be left with a fap of skin that will cover the opening
in the body you made by cutting the head off. Wash the
chicken again.
For Barbequed Chicken and Ribs, see page ?.
For whole chicken (roasting), salt the body cavity
moderately and rub it all around in there with your hand.
Set the chicken breast-side up in a baking dish. Pull the
extra neck skin down under the body and fasten it with a
toothpick (put a spoonful of stuffng in it frst, if youre going
to stuff the bird). Take a wing and open it out, then bend
and force the end back to stay behind the chickens back,
like twisting your little brothers arm behind his back. Do
the other one, too. This prevents the tips of the wings from
burning. Stuff the chicken now, if youre going to stuff it.
Then pull up on the skin between the legs, it makes a kind
of sling or pocket: notice your butcher left the chickens
butthole (sorry, I can't think of a nicer word: vent?) intact.
(There might be a lot of fat here, cut it off if you want.)
Wrangle the end of each drumstick into this sling, with
one end just wedged in the hole and the other under or
over it but restrained by the skin there. This ensures that
the chicken cooks evenly. Youre ready to roast. On to
page ?.
136
First cut off the legs and wings:
Grab the appendage and pull it away from the body
and cut through the skin down to the meat. Then break
the joint by pulling and twisting it the wrong way. Then
cut through the meat and the cartilage where the joint
is broken. Do both wings and both legs. If you want to
separate the thighs from the drumsticks, break the joint
and cut through.
Separate the breast and back sections:
Turn the chicken on its side and cut the ribs along the
breast on both sides. This is what poultry shears (scissors)
are for. Cut the back in half crossways below the ribs.
Cut the breast in half lengthwise: start cutting at the
bottom, leave the tip of the knife where the cartilage
begins then position the blade of the knife in the
center of the cartilage and bone. Hold the tip half
down with your left hand and press down hard on the
knife handle with your right. You may have to go up on
your tippy-toes and use your body weight to cut all the
way through the cartilage and bone. Wash the pieces
again and pat them dry with kitchen toweling.
To cut a chicken up you need a very sharp big heavy knife.
137
OK, to roast a chicken:
Youve got your chicken all cleaned and trussed up
(thats what you did with the wings and legs) and
laying nicely in her baking dish.
For plain roasted chicken, dot the chicken with butter,
pour 1/2 cup water into the baking dish, put some onion
quarters and a couple of pieces of celery inside her if
you like, make a foil tent and place it over the chicken.
Put her in the preheated oven. 1 hour 15 minutes for a
1 kilo bird; a 2 kilo bird will take almost 2 hours.
Baste the bird occasionally with the juices from the dish.
If the bird is not browning well under the foil, remove it
for the last 20 minutes of cooking time (the foil, not the
bird). For a beautifully browned chicken, sprinkle with
paprika before cooking. You can also bake chicken
pieces. Season them the same way, but bake only
about 50 minutes.
A chicken is done cooking when a meat thermometer
inserted deeply in the thigh, but NOT touching the
bone, registers 90 C/190 F, or when you poke a sharp
knife down into the thigh, the juices run out clear, not
pink. You can make pan gravy from the pan juices
(see page ?).
Variations (baste and roast as previously explained)
1) Roasted chicken with olive oil and rosemary: put
several sprigs of fresh rosemary in the body cavity and
rub the outside of the bird with olive oil, throw some
cut up, raw potatoes (drizzled with olive oil) around the
chicken 45 minutes before its done.
2) Lemon chicken: squeeze the juice of half a lemon
inside the chicken with the salt and rub it around, put
the used lemon half inside, too; dot chicken with butter
and squeeze another lemon over it.
3) Honey glazed roasted chicken: put a quarter cup
of honey in a small saucepan and squeeze the juice
of a lemon or an orange into it, heat gently and brush
over outside of chicken. Twenty minutes before the
bird is done, arrange very thin lemon or orange slices
on the breast of the bird and in the dish, brush with
honey mixture again and fnish cooking uncovered.
138
To stuf a chicken:
Prepare bird for roasting. Prepare stuffng. Stuff the bird
L O O S E L Y. Some people cover the stuffng where it
shows between the legs with a slice of bread. Useful
if its a large bird, so the stuffng doesnt over-brown or
dry out with longer cooking times. Other people like
the stuffng over-browned and a little dry. Roast as
usual, though it will take at least a 1/2 an hour longer,
depending on the size of the bird.
ALWAYS REMOVE THE STUFFING WHEN SERVING THE BIRD.
Scoop it out with a spoon and mound it around the
bird or between its legs. The stuffng cools more slowly
than the bird if left inside and this warmth is perfect for
growing microbes that will make you miserable.
Stuffngs for Chicken
1) Rice and giblets: Cooked rice, plain, or sauted
in butter with bits of liver, heart and neck meat (boil
them in lightly salted water frst), or mixed with peas
and carrots, or mixed with wild rice (follow cooking
directions on package)
2) Old-fashioned bread stuffng (with herbs): saut
1/4 cup chopped celery and a little chopped onion
in some butter, some garlic if you like. Boil the giblets
in a little salted water until done, then chop them. Put
2 cups dried out or semi-dried out white bread cubes
in a bowl. Sprinkle with your choice of dried or fresh
herbs. Sage and tarragon tend to be strong so dont
use much of either of them. Mix the sauted mixture
and the chopped giblets in with the bread cubes and
lightly moisten with a little chicken broth.
3) Cornbread stuffng (see page ?)
139
Southern Fried Chicken
chicken cut in pieces (cut thighs and legs apart),
washed and patted dry
a brown paper bag (nylon if you havent got a paper
one)
four
salt and pepper
paprika (optional)
vegetable shortening
Put a couple of cups of four in the paper bag and salt
and pepper it moderately. Some people get inventive
and add bread crumbs, crushed corn fakes, a little
seasoning salt or cayenne or some parmesan cheese
and oregano, at least sprinkle in some paprika, the
chicken will brown a prettier color. Shake it up.
Heat over a medium fre enough shortening in a frying
pan to end up being about two centimeters deep. Put
the pieces of chicken in the bag 3 at a time and shake
them up well.
Gently shake off excess four then lay each foured
piece into the hot fat, thicker pieces towards the middle
of the pan. Repeat with the rest of the chicken. Cook
uncovered for 10 to 15 minutes, turning occasionally
WITHOUT piercing the meat until browned evenly.
Reduce the heat to low and cover the pan and cook
another 30 minutes. Uncover the pan, turn the pieces
over, and cook another 10 minutes or so uncovered.
Chicken is done when it is easily pierced with a fork.
Remove to drain on paper toweling. Pour off all but
1/4 cup of the fat, leaving all the scrapings, and make
pan gravy, method 1 (see page ?).
Serve hot with mashed potatoes, and corn and green
veg. Or let the chicken cool, then refrigerate, and
take it on a picnic the next day with some potato salad
(make sure you keep the chicken and the potato salad
cool so you dont grow germs).
140
ChickennDumplins
My great-aunt Odessa used to make this. Its pretty
special.
cut up chicken (cut thighs fromdrumsticks)
vegetable shortening or oil
four (1/4 cup)
chicken broth (about 1/2 liter)
thyme
dumpling recipe
Heat oil in a big soup pot with good ftting lid. Brown the
chicken pieces well in the oil a few at a time. Remove
to a plate when brown.
Pour off all but 1/4 cupof fat, leave scrapings. Whisk in a
1/4 cup of four and cook, whisking occcasionally, until
browned. Pour in chicken broth all at once and whisk
until smooth and liquid begins to bubble and thicken.
Salt and pepper generously, add a pinch or two of
thyme and the chicken pieces. They should be well-
covered with the sauce. Simmer covered for at least 30
minutes (until done).
Remove chicken pieces to half of serving platter, or
moundincenter. Keepwarm. Tastegravyfor seasoning.
Add anything lacking. Now follow the dumplings
recipe. When dumplings are cooked, arrange themon
the serving platter with the chicken. Pour a little gravy
over the dumplings and chicken and the rest into a
separate bowl. Serve. Its nice to have good bread to
sop up the gravy. Last time I ate chicken n dumplins,
we had mashed potatoes, corn on the cob, green
beans, and fnished off with Ambrosia (see page?).
Dumplings
Serves 4
You can make these in a good soup, too, instead of
including potatoes, noodles or rice.
1 cup four
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg, slightly beaten
2 tablespoons chopped parsley
1/4 cup tablespoons chopped parsley
1/4 cup light creamor milk
Sift dry ingredients together. Add liquids and parsley
and blend until just moistened. Drop by teaspoonfuls
into rich, well-seasoned bubbling hot soup or gravy (like
for chickenndumplins). Cover pan and simmer 15
minutes.
DONOT REMOVECOVERWHILEDUMPLINGS ARECOOKING!
Chicken cacciatore
This is hunters chicken. The recipe is originally Italian. In Texas wed probably call it chicken rustlers chicken, see-
ing as how hunting chickens went out with the Pleistocene. Equally delicious with quail, dove, pigeon, partridge,
etc. Leave the smaller birds whole and half the larger. Serve it with rice or egg noodles (tagliatelle) or just some
excellent peasant bread and a salad.
1 cut up chicken
olive oil
1 large green bell pepper, chopped
1 large handful mushrooms, sliced (optional)
2 large tomatoes, chopped or sliced thinly (about 2 cups)
1 cup tomato sauce (canned or homemade)
a few cured black or green olives, cut off of the pits (optional)
salt and pepper
2 teaspoons oregano
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary, or one fnger-sized sprig fresh
1/4 cup dry white wine or beer
Saut the onion, garlic, bell pepper and mushroom in a little oil until tender. Scrape out into a large bowl.
Add more oil to the frying pan if necessary and brown the chicken pieces well. Turn them often so they brown
on all sides; it should take about 15 minutes.
Meanwhile, mix all the other ingredients into the sauted stuff in the bowl. When the chicken is well-browned,
pour the mixture over it in the frying pan. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes. Uncover and add the 1/4 cup of dry
white (preferred) wine, let simmer another 15 minutes or more, turning chicken occasionally, until tender.
Supremes de volaille a blanc
Amani has specially requested this recipe. Lord knows why. The supremes de volaille that youre most likely to
get outside a 4-star Michelin consists of pre-boiled breast meat cut in cubes, some pre-boiled peas and carrots,
maybe some mushrooms, all in chicken-favored white sauce. The real supremes de volaille is a little more com-
plicated.
Take some skinned boneless chicken breasts. Got some white truffes? Peel them and cut them in little slivers and
stick the slivers one by one down into the chicken breasts with the point of a knife, say 5 or 6 per breast. Salt and
white pepper the chicken breasts. Brush them with a little ghee (samna). Put them in a single layer in a buttered
baking dish (with cover) and squeeze a little lemon juice over them. Cover the dish and bake in a preheated
oven at 220 C/gas mark 5 plus/425 F for 25 minutes. Drain on paper toweling and garnish.
To garnish: cook your veg in a little water and butter, peas and carrots, or very young green beans or asparagus
spears.
Make Sauce supreme: equal parts of butter and four (2 tablespoons each to 1 cup liquid), cooked but un-
browned, strong chicken broth to desired consistency (use juices from breasts that you just cooked, too), simmer
down to a thick sauce, remove from heat and stir in some fresh cream, strain (if necessary) and keep warm in a
bain-marie (set the pan in a hot water bath).
Serve chicken breast and veg over toast points or puff pastry squares (frozen, followpackage directions) napped
with sauce. Buy yourself a Larousse if you want the whole charade.
143
Chicken Cacciatore
This is hunters chicken. The recipe is originally Italian.
In Texas wed probably call it chicken rustlers chicken,
seeing as how hunting chickens went out with the
Pleistocene. Equally delicious with quail, dove, pigeon,
partridge, etc. Leave the smaller birds whole and half
the larger. Serve it with rice or egg noodles (tagliatelle)
or just some excellent peasant bread and a salad.
1 cut up chicken
olive oil
1 large green bell pepper, chopped
1 large handful mushrooms, sliced (optional)
2 large tomatoes, chopped or sliced thinly (about 2
cups)
1 cup tomato sauce (canned or homemade)
a few cured black or green olives, cut off of the pits
(optional)
salt and pepper
2 teaspoons oregano
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary, or one fnger-sized sprig
fresh
1/4 cup dry white wine or beer
Saut the onion, garlic, bell pepper and mushroom in
a little oil until tender. Scrape out into a large bowl.
Add more oil to the frying pan if necessary and brown
the chicken pieces well. Turn them often so they brown
on all sides; it should take about 15 minutes.
Meanwhile, mix all the other ingredients into the
sauted stuff in the bowl. When the chicken is well-
browned, pour the mixture over it in the frying pan.
Cover and simmer for 30 minutes. Uncover and add
the 1/4 cup of dry white (preferred) wine, let simmer
another 15 minutes or more, turning chicken occasion-
ally, until tender.
144
Suprmes de volaille blanc
Amani has specially requested this recipe. Lord knows
why. Maybe because the suprmes de volaille that
youre most likely to get outside a 4-star Michelin
consists of pre-boiled breast meat cut in cubes, some
pre-boiled peas and carrots, maybe some canned
mushrooms, all in chicken-favored white sauce. The
real suprmes de volaille is a little more complicated.
Take some skinned boneless chicken breasts. Got
some white truffes? Peel them and cut them in little
slivers and stick the slivers one by one down into the
chicken breasts with the point of a knife, say 5 or 6 per
breast. Salt and white pepper the chicken breasts.
Brush them with a little ghee (samna). Put them in a
single layer in a buttered baking dish (with cover) and
squeeze a little lemon juice over them. Cover the dish
and bake in a preheated oven at 220 C/gas mark 5
plus/425 F for 25 minutes. Remove breasts from pan
and keep warm.
Make Sauce suprme: equal parts of butter and four
(2 tablespoons each to 1 cup liquid), cooked but
unbrowned, strong chicken broth to desired consistency
(use juices from breasts that you just cooked, too),
simmer down to a thick sauce, remove from heat
and stir in some fresh cream, strain (if necessary) and
keep warm in a bain-marie (set the pan in a hot water
bath).
To garnish: cook your veg in a little water and butter,
peas and carrots, or very young green beans or
asparagus spears.
Serve chicken breast and veg arranged artistically
over toast points or puff pastry squares (frozen, follow
package directions) napped with sauce.
a few fsh recipes
146
Soles la meunire
2 or 3 fsh per person, cleaned and the skin stripped
off the backs
pepper
four
butter
lemon juice
fresh snipped parsley
Clean the fsh: Make an incision with a sharp knife just
through the skin at the base of the fshs tail. Peel it
back a little with your fngernails or the knife blade.
When you have enough skin to grasp, grasp it frmly
between your thumb and the side of your index fnger.
Put your other hand on the fshs tail and hold it down.
Now rip the skin off towards the head. If the fsh is
nice and fresh it will skin cleanly; if it isnt some fesh
will come off with the skin. Soles dont have much in
the way of guts. Insert the point of a sharp knife into
the fshs (heres that word again!) butthole and slit the
belly skin towards the head. Scrape out guts and wash
well. Pat dry.
Pepper the fsh lightly and dredge lightly in four. Shake
off excess. Heat some butter in a frying pan over
medium heat (add a spoon of oil to help prevent the
butter from burning). Fry the fsh gently until golden, 6
or 7 minutes each side. Remove the fsh to a heated
serving platter. Leave the pan on a medium fre and
squeeze the juice from a lemon or two into it. Stir it
around and sprinkle with parsley. Pour over the fsh.
Serve with boiled new potatoes with butter, sauted
mushrooms, sauted spinach.
147
Red Snapper Veracruz
(huachinango a la veracruzana)
This is a super famous Mexican way to cook fsh, a Diana
Kennedy recipe.
Serves 4
2 garlic cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup fresh lemon juice
a 1 1/2 to 2 kilo whole red snapper, cleaned
For the sauce:
2 large onions, chopped
at least 8 cloves garlic
3 bay leaves
1 1/2 teaspoons dried oregano
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1/3 cup olive oil
6 cups tomatoes, including the juice, chopped
3 pickled jalapeo peppers, seeded and cut into thin strips
1 cup coarsely chopped green olives, pimento stuffed
(Spanish style)
1/4 cup fresh parsley, snipped
3 tablespoons capers (abu khangar)
For the garnish:
parsley sprigs
green olives
chile fowers (make ahead, see below)
Mash the garlic in a mortar with the salt, forming a paste,
and in a bowl stir together well the garlic paste and the lime
juice. With a sharp fork, poke several holes in the sides of the
fsh, put it in a large shallow dish, and pour the lime mixture
inside the belly cavity and over the fsh. Let it marinate,
covered and chilled, turning once, for 2 hours.
Make the sauce: saut the onion, garlic, bay leaves,
oregano, thyme, salt and black pepper to taste, in the oil,
over moderate heat, stirring, for 10 to 15 minutes or until
onion is soft and pale golden. Stir in the tomatoes and juice,
jalapeos, olives and capers. Bring to a boil and simmer for
1 to 1 1/2 hours or until very thick. Discard bay leaves and
stir in parsley.
Preheat oven to 180 C/gas mark 3/350 F. Transfer fsh to
slightly oiled baking dish. Cover with half the sauce and
bake covered for 50-60 minutes.
Garnish with parsley, olives and chile fowers (slit fresh chiles
lengthwise 2 or 3 times, leaving stem end intact, seed, and
leave in a bowl of ice water overnight, they will curl open
like lilies). Heat and serve extra sauce apart. Serve with
white rice.
148
Sayedeya
(Aqaba style fsh and red rice)
A Sayawd is a fsherman. I learned this Sayedeya from
Om (the mother of) Ahmed and Rahma, his wife.
The family is from Aqaba in Jordan, but has lived in
Hurghada on the Red Sea since before Ahmed was
born. They were fshermen by trade, but now Ahmed
Aly has dive boats.
thick fsh flets (at least 2 cm thick), cut into squarish
pieces, fnger length each side, 2 or 3 per serving
3 large onions, diced fnely (for 3 cups uncooked rice)
oil
salt and pepper
1 tablespoon cumin seeds (toasted and ground)
water
rice, well washed
milk
four
In a big soup pot cook the onion in oil. Put plenty of
oil and cook the onion very slowly over a low fre. Stir
it around with a wooden spatula every now and then.
Cook it until it is VERY VERY BROWN, BUT NOT CRISPY
OR BURNED. Pay attention because this is not as easy
as it sounds. Taste them when you think theyre done.
Dont use them if theyre burned, start over and be
more careful. Still, get them as brown as you can.
Now, to the onion, add water, salt, pepper, and a
pinch of ground cumin. Use enough water to half fll
the pot. Bring it up to a simmer and carefully place
the fsh pieces in it. Use a frying basket or steamer
rack if youve got one. Poach about 5 minutes. They
should stay frm, take care they dont fall apart. They
dont have to cook all the way, just favor the water.
Remove fsh pieces carefully from the poaching liquid
and set aside.
Go onto the next page.
149
Look at how much water youve got. Look at how
much rice youve got. Go back and look at Perfect
Rice. Pray. Dump the rice into the water. Does the
water cover the rice by 1 cm? Adjust accordingly- -
either add or take out some water. Give it a good stir
and cover it and cook it until done, 25 minutes or so.
Meanwhile, heat plenty of oil in a frying pan. Pour
some milk into a bowl. Pour some four, salt, pepper
and the rest of the cumin onto a plate, mix it up. Now
fry the fsh: dip each piece in milk, then four, shake off
excess, then milk, then four, then shake off excess, then
place carefully into the hot oil. Fry until golden. Drain
on paper toweling.
Mix the rice up well then mound it on a serving platter
and top or surround with the fried fsh. Some people
dont fry the fsh. Poach it lightly in the liquid, remove
it, add the rice, cook about 10 minutes, then place
the poached fsh pieces on top of the rice, cover it up
again and continue cooking.
Serve with lemon wedges, tahina, and Salata Beladi
(shredded lettuce, diced tomato, cucumber and on-
ion, dressed with vinegar and oil).
and the occasional turkey
151
Here it is, the American Thanksgiving classic (most Americans eat just about the same thing at Christmas). The
turkey itself is easy, its all the trimmings that get you started cooking at least two days in advance.
Well do this for dummies.
Here is your Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner menu, southern style:
Pickles and olives and raw veg and chips with dips
Sweet breads (any or all of these: fruitcake, pumpkin, banana, zucchini, carrot)
Stuffed roast turkey and corn bread dressing
Vegetarian alternative, stuffed winter squash (ara asli) with corn bread dressing
Cranberry sauce
Giblet gravy
Mashed potatoes
Sweet potato pie
Green veg with butter (peas or brussels sprouts or green beans)
Waldorf Salad
Ambrosia (fruit salad)
Assorted bread rolls and butter
Pumpkin pie (ara asli)
Pecan pie
Something chocolate
152
Your timetable
Day 1
Clean out your fridge
Buy a turkey, if frozen, thaw it in the fridge (this can
take as long as 3 whole days)
Buy everything else you need, make a careful list while
you read through the recipes
Make 2 recipes of cornbread and put them cooled,
loosely wrapped, in the fridge
Make 24 baking powder/buttermilk biscuits, refrigerate
in plastic bag
Bake your pumpkin (winter squash) if youre making
your pumpkin bread and pies from scratch, pure half
only if youre making the veggie alternative, cover
other half with foil and refrigerate
Day 2
Bake your sweet breads, cool well, wrap in foil and
refrigerate
Make cranberry sauce, cover and refrigerate
Day 3
Bake your pies and chocolate whatever, cool, cover
with plastic wrap and refrigerate
Day 4
Turkey Day (get up at 6 am, put on your most
comfortable shoes)
Clean and wash turkey and put in roasting pan
Put neck and innards (liver, gizzard, heart) on to boil
for gravy
Make stuffng/dressing
Stuff turkey and put in oven
Remove winter squash from fridge and bring to room
temp (or bake winter squash for veg alternative)
Put potatoes on for mashed potatoes
Make Waldorf and Ambrosia salads
Clean meat off neck and chop, cut innards into little
pieces
Feed your carnivorous pets so they dont steal or beg
(Start checking squash to remove from oven)
Remove some fesh from squash for stuffng and gravy,
set aside
Set dining table and buffet if you havent already (salt,
pepper, butter)
Cut sweet breads and arrange on plates, set out
Turn the page
153
Get pickles, olives, raw veg and dips into serving dishes
and set out
Clean green veg and get it ready to cook
Get dressed (yourself)
Is turkey done? Test and remove from oven onto
serving platter, cover tightly with foil
Stuff squash and put in oven
Put dressing in oven
Finish mashed potatoes, keep warm
Make gravy, keep warm
Put sweet potatoes in oven
Cook green veg, butter and keep warm
Set desserts out on far buffet
Uncover turkey and remove stuffng from cavity,
recover with foil
Wrap bread rolls in aluminum foil and put in the oven
to warm
Put turkey, dressing, sweet potato pie on table (all
covered), salads, too
Make yourself a drink
Sit down somewhere semi-quiet (go outside)
Drink your drink and smoke a cigarette or something
Drag your tired ass back into the kitchen
Put potatoes, gravy and veg in serving dishes on table
Take rolls out of oven and put in a basket with a clean
towel or napkin
Uncover everything, make fnal check of table and
buffet
Interrupt the football game and stand back!
154
Now the recipes in order of use:
1) Cornbread, page
2) Biscuits, page
3) Pumpkin pie, page
4) Fruitcake, sweet breads, pages
5) Cranberry Sauce
You can buy your cranberry sauce or make it. There
are lots of different ways to make the sauce, but I like
this pretty much plain old cranberry sauce way.
fresh or frozen cranberries
equal weight sugar
Mix together in a saucepan over low low low fre. Cook,
stirring often, until almost all the cranberries have burst.
Cool in pan then pour out and refrigerate covered.
You can eat it like this. Or cook until all the berries have
burst and then you can strain it or pure it. Strained is
better than pured, it turns pinkish, rather than brilliant
garnet, when you pure it. Some people grate orange
peel and chop orange fesh into it, even add fnely
chopped walnuts. But thats gilding the lily.
155
6) Sweet Potato Pie
sweet potatoes or yams, peeled and sliced thickly
(batata, the orange ones)
water
butter
salt
raisins (optional, use with chopped nuts topping)
brown sugar (or sugar and/or molasses, or honey)
cinnamon
nutmeg
choice of toppings: marshmallows (plain, not favored),
or chopped nuts
Boil sweet potatoes in lightly salted water with a little butter
until soft. Meanwhile, cover raisins with boiling water, if
youll use them. Drain potatoes and raisins and place in
baking/serving dish.
Melt plenty of butter in a small sauce pan, add sweetening
(how much depends on you and the potatoes), a pinch
of cinnamon and double grating of nutmeg. Mix it in with
the sweet potatoes and smooth out the top.
If you want to use nuts, do it now. Chop enough walnuts
or pecans to cover the potatoes. Melt some butter in a
frying pan and toss in the chopped nuts, when they are
sizzling, lower the fre a bit and sprinkle on some brown
sugar (or sugar and/or molasses or honey). Cook,
stirring all the time with a wooden spatula, for about
2 minutes. Spread over the sweet potatoes. Dot with
butter. Cover and refrigerate to await Turkey Day.
If you want to top it with marshmallows, cover it with foil
now and refrigerate it; when youre ready to bake it,
butter around the top edge of the mixture in its baking
dish, and cover the WHOLE top of the casserole with
the large size marshmallows.
Bake uncovered at 180 C/gas mark 3/350 F, about 25
or 30 minutes, until bubbly and top is browned.
156
7) Pies and chocolate whatever, pages
8) Dips, pages
9) Cornbread Stufng/Dressing
Crumble your 2 pans of cornbread and 24 biscuits into
a large, deep, baking dish.
Saut in plenty of butter until onions are softened:
at least 4 cups chopped celery (karafs ferangi)
at least 1 huge onion, chopped
Pour over crumbled bread. Add 1 tablespoon crumbled,
dried sage, some black or white pepper. Toss together
well. Sprinkle generously with broth from innards, or
vegetarian broth if you have vegetarian diners and/or
will stuff a squash. Toss it around with your hands. The
mixture should be completely moistened, but not wet;
so you can pick up a handful and squeeze it and it will
hold together (somewhat), but not drip liquid.
Stuff turkey loosely, like for chicken (page ?). Youll
have a lot left over for dressing.
Dressing: Into the leftover bread mixture in its baking
dish, pour 6 beaten eggs and stir well. Add enough
broth or hot water to where the mixture just sloshes in
the pan.
Bake at 180 C/gas mark 3/350 F for 45 minutes or until
top is golden brown.
157
10) Turkey
Thaw, clean, (pick out any pinfeathers with a pair of
tweezers under running water in the sink), wash, salt,
and stuff and truss like for roasted chicken (page ?).
Rub all over with plenty of softened butter or oil.
Cover bird loosely with foil, like a tent. Pinch the foil
down onto the roasting pan at the neck end and the
other end. Roast at 165 C/gas mark 2/325 F.
A table:
Turkey size Roasting time
3 1/2 kilos 3 1/2 to 4 hours
4 to 5 kilos 4 to 4 1/2 hours
5 to 7 kilos 4 1/2 to 5 1/2 hours
Leave an air space between the turkey and the foil:
its a tent. Baste occasionally. Uncover the last 45
minutes of roasting and baste 3 times or so.
Its done when juices run clear from the meatiest part
of the thigh when you poke it with a 2-pronged fork
or sharp knife. Take its temperature: stick a meat
thermometer in the underside of the thigh, into the
meatiest part, not touching the bone, cooked is 90
C/190F. Or another test is to twist the drumstick upwards
and out: if its loose, its done.
158
11) Giblet Gravy
So you take the neck, liver, gizzard and heart and put
them in a saucepan and cover them with water. Salt
it a little. Pepper it a little. Put in half an onion studded
with 4 cloves. Put in a sprig of fresh thyme or a pinch
of dried. Simmer until done, maybe 30-40 minutes,
depending on their size. Strain. Save broth and meat
pieces, toss veg and herb in the trash (or put in the
dogs dish).
Chop the organ meat fnely. Hopefully the gizzard is
clean inside, if not, clean it out or toss it to the cat (who
has been sitting there begging since 6 am). Strip the
meat off the neck and chop it up. Give the neck bones
and skin to the cat, too. Set the chopped meats aside
until the turkey is done. Protect from the cat.
Making the gravy: after you remove the turkey from
the roasting pan, put the pan on the fre. Bring the
liquid to a simmer. Shake together in a jar with a tight
ftting lid, 1/4 cup four and 1/2 cup cold water or broth
from the innards. Strain into pan juices, whisking all
the time. Add the rest of the broth from the innards
and the chopped meats. Simmer until thickened and
bubbling. Taste. Add salt and pepper. If the color is
weak, add a pinch of ground turmeric (some people
add enough that their turkey gravy is yellow). If the
favor is weak, throw in a chicken bouillon cube.
OR, make a great variation.
Variation for turkey gravy
Saut 1/2 onion, chopped fnely, and 1 clove garlic,
minced, in a little butter. To them, add about 1/2 cup
of winter squash pure. Salt it lightly and pepper it
generously. Add a pinch of dried sage or thyme (or
rosemary). Stir it around over medium fre with the
onions and garlic, until its hot and bubbly.
Now, either mix it with the prepared, not terribly favorful
gravy from the turkey, or, scrape it into the pan juices
after you've removed the turkey and make the gravy
on top of it. Understand? You can either put the spiced
pure in at the beginning (best) before you thicken it,
or at the end (workable if your gravy from above didnt
turn out favorful).
159
12) Stufed Winter Squash
a winter squash (ara asli)
oil
some butter
garlic to taste, minced
cornbread stuffng, #9 above
EITHER chopped walnuts or pecans or sunfower seeds
and some butter
OR mild melting cheese cut in cubes
Wash the squash well and cut it in half lengthwise.
Remove the seeds with a tablespoon. Get out the
strings, too. Put some oil on your hands and rub the
squash halves all over, inside and out. Place them, cut
side up, on a baking tray and cover with foil. Bake
in a 165 C/gas mark 2/325 F oven until just soft. The
amount of time, of course, depends on how big your
squash is. Itll take an hour or more, anyway. To tell if
its done, poke the thick part near the stem end with
a 2 prong fork; it should go in and out easily. Remove
squash from oven. If youre making pumpkin pies or
pumpkin bread, you can use one half for those and
the other for dinner.
Hollow the squash out partly by spooning out some of
the fesh from the stem end onto a cutting board. Chop
it fnely. Save a mounded 1/2 cup for the gravy on the
previous page. Saut the rest of the chopped squash,
onion, and garlic in butter and add to cornbread
stuffng. Mix well.
Now, EITHER saut your nuts/seeds in butter and mix
into stuffng, OR mix in the cheese cubes (unsauted).
Mound stuffng into squash halves (half). Place on a
baking tray and cover tightly with foil. Bake at 165
C/gas mark 2/325 F for 20 minutes. Remove foil and
dot with butter and bake a further 20 minutes. Slice to
serve.
Vegetarian gravy for stuffed squash: equal parts butter
and four, plus water/broth, the spiced squash pure
from the variation for turkey gravy on the previous
page, simmer stirring.
160
There is no 13.
14) Mashed potatoes, page
15) Waldorf salad, page
16) Ambrosia (fruit salad)
This is an old family favorite. I imagine somebody got it
off a can of fruit cocktail or package of coconut. Its
delicious. Refreshing AND sweet, somehow.
2 large cans of fruit cocktail, drained*
3 navel oranges, peel cut off, sectioned, cut into
chunks (see illustration)
2 big bananas, cut in quarters lengthwise then sliced
3/4 cup coconut fakes
1 cup whipping cream, very cold
Mix fruit and coconut together. Whip cream. It helps
to put it in a small, chilled bowl inside a bigger bowl
that has ice cubes in it. Fold into fruit/coconut mixture.
Thats all.
Variation
Use yoghurt, plain or favored, instead of whipped
cream. Lower fat, less sweet.
*If you want to use fresh fruit, peel and cut into small
chunks 2 orange fruits (peach or mango), 2 white fruits
(pear or guava), at least one cup of pineapple, and a
handful of pitted cherries if youve got them. Its really
excellent with fresh fruit.
17) Boiled veg (Come on, you can do it! As little water
as possible, butter, salt, pepper, optional fresh or dried
herb, maybe a little white sauce?)
Drinks for the Holiday Season and Beyond
162
Light-as-a-Cloud Eggnog
Ive tried lots of recipes for eggnog, but the old Better
Homes and Gardens has always given me the best
results. All eggnog is made with raw eggs. Make sure
they are fresh shake each egg gently, then harder, it
shouldnt come loose inside.
Makes 15 wine glass size servings
6 egg yolks
1/4 cup sugar
2 cups milk
1/2 cup rum*
1/2 cup bourbon*
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
Beat the egg yolks well with a whisk or electric beaters.
Beat in the 1/4 cup sugar. Beat until thick and lemon
colored. Stir in the milk, liquor(s), vanilla and salt. Cover
and refrigerate.
Then:
1 cup whipping cream, very cold (crema labani)
6 egg whites, room temperature
1/4 cup sugar
ground nutmeg
Whip the cream (it helps to put it in a small, chilled bowl
inside a bigger bowl that has ice cubes in it) and set it
aside.
In your largest bowl, beat the egg whites until soft peaks
form. MAKE SURE THE BOWL AND BEATERS ARE CLEAN
AND DRY, otherwise the egg whites wont beat up right.
By hand that takes about 4 minutes, electrically 1 1/2.
Gradually add the 1/4 cup sugar, beating all the time,
until it forms STIFF peaks.
Thats meringue, by the way. Turn the page.
*or all rum, or all bourbon, or all brandy, or mix them together (!!!); for non-alcoholic, increase milk to 3 cups (Look, dont
increase the liquor, even if you really want to, without adjusting the other liquid ingredients. You can get away with adding
another 1/3 cup liquor and reducing milk by 1/3 cup, but anymore and the egg wont nog.)
163
Very carefully, with a spatula, fold the yolk mixture
into the beaten egg whites, then the whipped cream.
Grate nutmeg on the surface. Serve it right away.
If you cant serve it all right away, if you want to have
the punch bowl work all evening, you have to sacrifce
some of the eggnogs cloudiness.
Go ahead and give the eggnog a couple of rounds
with the whisk or beaters after youve grated in the
nutmeg, it will be homogeneous instead of having
lovely cloudy bits of meringue and whipped cream in it.
Either freeze some into a ring (a jelly mold, very pretty,
and foat it in the punch bowl), or place your punch
bowl in a larger bowl of ice. Youll probably have to
give it a brisk stir every now and then so it keeps its
consistency. Anyway, its so rich, only a real sybarite
will drink more than two.
If youve hired a b artender, you can keep a reserve
of eggnog in the fridge and have the bartender work
with a blender, just hitting the ON switch a couple of
times before he flls the glass.
Eggnog is most beautifully served from a crystal punch
bowl in little crystal mugs.
164
Mulled Wine
1 bottle cheap dry red wine
1 fnger length cinnamon stick
1/2 cup sugar
1 orange, sliced
1/2 liter water and more
Put everything in a large NOT ALUMINUM pot. Just the
frst 1/2 liter of water. Set it over a low fre and leave it.
Dont let it bubble at all. Keep it just below the point
of ebullition. You may have to put the rice-cooking
thingy under the pot. Its probably mulled enough to
drink after an hour, but it gets better. Add water every
now and then. Serve in mugs. Classic garnish is orange
slice (from the wine pot) and cinnamon stir stick (not
from the wine pot).
Hot Buttered Rum (or brandy)
1 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
Beat together and put in a dish and refrigerate.
To make, put a shot of rum (any kind, gold is best, but
white or dark is fne, or brandy, or bourbon) in a mug.
Take a well-rounded tablespoon of spiced butter and
put it, on the spoon, in the mug. Add a slice of lemon
or orange if you want. Pour boiling water over it, stirring
it all the time. Sip and Aaaah!
165
Mint Julep
In the bottom of a very tall glass, put 5 leaves of fresh
mint and a heaping teaspoon of sugar. Mash them
up however you can. With your pestle from your
mortar and pestle, just make sure it doesnt taste like
garlic. (There is a special masher for juleps; it looks like
a stirstick with a mini-masher on one end.) PACK the
glass full of shaved or fnely crushed ice. Fill to the brim
with the best bourbon you can fnd. Garnish with a
sprig of mint.
Look at it frosting up. Give it a little stir. Drink it. Drink
another. Wow, that tastes good. Even drink another,
but fgure out where youre going to sleep before you
sip at number.. hmmm, how many of those have I
had?
Sri Krishnas Hangover Cure
This is an adaptation from The Krishna Cookbook. It
really works. The cayenne and lemon clean out
your mouth and stomach. Water, honey, and lemon
replenish vital nutrients. 70% of headaches are due to
dehydration of the brain. Drink a lot. Make a pitcher
as big as your hangover.
Into a pitcher put 1/4 teaspoon of cayenne pepper
fakes (shatta boudra). Squeeze lemons to make 1/4
cup of juice and pour over the cayenne. A purist
would strain the lemon juice. Add a little hot water
and 1/4 cup of honey. Stir it around until the honey is
mixed in. Top up with close to a liter of cold water and
some ice. Garnish with a slice of lemon if you want to
get fancy.
166
Sun Tea
Another recipe that I never thought Id write down. Sun
tea is lighter and less bitter than brewed tea because
the tannins and caffeine dont leach out so heavily
into the water.
Fill a huge jar with cold water. My family has always
used a gallon size jar. For every half liter of water, put in
one tea bag or 1 level teaspoon of loose tea. You can
put a mint tea bag in it, too, its very refreshing. Set
the jar out in the sun. When it gets the color you like,
its done. In the summer, 2 or 3 hours; in the winter, all
day. Either pull out the tea bags or strain the tea into
a pitcher. Sugar the way you like it. Let come to room
temperature and refrigerate. If you put it in the fridge
warm it will go cloudy on you. You can still drink it but
it doesnt look nice.
Serve over ice with slice of lemon, or sprig of mint or
basil, or both.
In a pinch, just put a couple of tea bags in a bottle of
water and leave it out on the counter overnight. Not
the same depth of favor, but better than plain water.
Desserts
168
Fruit Salads
I dont know what to say about fruit salads. It seems
impossible that anyone could mess up something so
simple, but, on refection, they mess up green salads,
too, and I think I wrote 2 pages on that, so . . .
Back to the principles of salad. All freshest, highest
quality ingredients. Pay attention to color and texture.
And season - - like spring, summer, autumn, winter. I
dont mix different seasons, it doesnt make sense to
me. Even though a lot of people nowadays can get,
say, cherries, year-round, its weird to mix them with
apples. Its also nice to keep tropical fruits all together.
You can use bananas with any other fruit.
Spring fruits: apricots, cherries, peaches, plums,
raspberries, strawberries, other berries
Summer fruits: some apples, blackberries, blueberries,
fgs, grapes, guavas, mangoes, melons, nectarines,
papayas, peaches, pears, plums
Autumn and winter fruits: apples, citrus fruits, pears,
persimmons, pomegranates
Other: bananas, coconut, dates, kiwi, pineapple
169
Making a fruit salad
Squeeze a lemon into a bowl. Start with the hardest
fruit, like apples, and fnish with the softest, like bananas.
Peel tough-skinned fruit and cut all the fruit all into the
same size pieces into the bowl, except small berries,
grapes and cherries. Those, cut big ones in half and
leave small ones whole. Red berries and cherries will
color the salad pink if you cut them in half. Think if you
want a pink salad. Mix the fruit around in the lemon
juice as you go so it doesnt turn brown.
Decide what you want to bind the salad with: yoghurt,
whipped cream, mayonnaise, sour cream.
Decide if you want to sweeten it, and with what: sugar,
molasses, honey.
Decide if you want to spice it: cinnamon, pepper, basil,
dill, mint, balsamic vinegar, caraway . . .
Hints
1) bananas, peaches and cherries or strawberries, with
honey and whipped cream
2) fgs, grapes, guavas and yoghurt, drizzle with honey
3) apples, oranges, pomegranate seeds, honey
4) apples, pears, mayonnaise, dill weed
Rather than mix different types of fruit, when youre in
high season and you can get beautiful fruits for a good
price, just use one kind of fruit, and customize it with...
Da-da-da-daa!... your imagination (and good
taste). Like mangoes with fresh basil and balsamic
vinegar (try that one with fresh fnely sliced garlic
next to grilled chops!); strawberries with honey, one
teaspoon vinegar and a pinch of black pepper;
green apples with a little mayonnaise, salt and
pepper, and some fresh dill; peaches with honey
and cinnamon; and the classic, berries and cream.
170
Mems Chocolate Cake
Serves 10
This is the only cake Mem makes. If youre only going
to make one cake in your life, this is a good one to
make.
Preheat oven to HOT (230 C/gasmark 6/450 F)
5 eggs
1 1/4 cup melted butter
1 1/4 cup sugar
1 1/4 cup four
1 box instant chocolate milk powder (150 grams)
2 heaping teaspoons baking powder
Beat eggs and sugar and melted butter together. Add
dry ingredients. Beat until smooth. Pour batter into a
greased and foured large (like 10 inch/25 cm) cake
tin. Bake in hot oven until it rises and a crust forms on
top (about 20 minutes). Turn oven off. Leave cake in
oven for 5 minutes then remove and cool in pan. It will
fall and be fudgey and gooey inside. If you overcook
it, it will be like a slightly heavy regular cake. Remove
to serving plate and dust with powdered sugar.
You can serve it still warm with vanilla ice cream on
top. Or...
171
make a Chocolate Climax.
Put some scoops of double chocolate ice cream in a
large goblet. Cut some still warm chocolate cake into
squares the same size as a scoop of ice cream. Or
heat the cake in the microwave. Put the cake down
the sides of the goblet next to the ice cream. Top with
hot fudge and sprinkle with chopped walnuts.
Hot Fudge
Makes 1 cup
Use hot fudge to top ice cream or crpes, or crpes
with ice cream. Some banana slices, some nuts. Store
hot fudge in a jar in the fridge. To reheat, set the jar in
a pan and run hot water in around it.
60 grams unsweetened chocolate
1/3 cup water
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
Put the chocolate and the water in a small pan. Set
the small pan in a larger pan flled with boiling water.
Melt chocolate over boiling water. Stir in sugar and
dash of salt. Cook stirring every now and then until the
sugar is dissolved and mixture thickens. Remove from
heat. Beat in butter and vanilla.
172
Charlottes Pumpkin Bread
This is Rick Needhams moms recipe.
Grease 1 large loaf pan or two small.
Mix together in a big bowl:
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 cup oil
2 eggs
1 cup pumpkin pure, canned or see page ?
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon allspice
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
Sift together and beat into pumpkin mixture:
1 3/4 cup four
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
Then stir in:
1/3 cup water
1 cup raisins
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
Pour into the prepared pan(s) and bake 45 minutes for
small loaves, 65 for large, until a table knife inserted in
the center comes out clean. If you use 2 round cake
tins, bake for 35 minutes.
Variations: Banana and Zucchini Bread, Carrot Cake
Use 1 cup mashed ripe banana instead of pumpkin.
Or grated carrot or zucchini or crushed pineapple.
Dont use mango; I tried it and its weird.
173
Plugged Watermelon
An old tradition.
1 whole watermelon
peach schnapps and vodka
or banana liqueur and rum
or substitute sherry or port (total liquor probably less
than 2 cups)
Stand the watermelon on end in a bowl, stem end up,
and cut a plug out around the stem. Remove the plug,
scoop out about 2 inches of the fesh, and pour out the
excess liquid. Drink it. With a long skewer pierce the
fesh inside to the bottom and in all directions without
penetrating the rind and pour out any excess liquid.
Drink it. Pour equal amounts of the schnapps and
vodka into the melon gradually until it cannot absorb
any more and replace the plug. Chill the melon on
end for at least 15 hours and up to 2 days. Serve cut
into wedges.
Plugged Oranges
Another old tradition. We used to take these to football
games because it was against the rules to bring in cans
or bottles.
oranges, well washed
vodka (or rum, and what about Cinzano?)
a hypodermic syringe with needle
Soften the oranges by gently pressing down on them
and rolling them on the counter. Fill the syringe with
vodka and inject it into the oranges. Make 4 injections
in 4 different places on each orange. Chill. You dont
eat them, you suck the juice out. You can buy those
little plastic thingies that you insert in the orange, and
suck on while squeezing the orange. Or you can cut a
little plug out of the orange with your pocket knife. Put
your mouth over the hole, squeeze the orange slightly
and suck. Careful how many you drink. They taste
really good, but can be potent as hell.
174
A Note on Pies
Pies are a typical American phenomenon. Other
nationalities do tarts (tartes) and what they call pies,
but the crusts are different, the pie plates are different
and the fnished product is different. A pie where I
come from is a very special thing.
We have the easy-as-apple-pie pie, the can-she-bake-
a-cherry-pie pie, the various cream and custard pies,
deep-dish pies and cobblers. There are pies for the
holidays and pies for every day. Lattice-topped fruit
pies of seasonal fruit and black-bottom pie, and of
course jus pie (popularly known as Chess Pie, bet you
didnt know that!).
The recipes below are for the smaller size of pie plates,
we call them 8 inch pie plates (theyre usually metal).
You may have 9 inch pie plates (usually glass). Youll
need to increase the flling recipe by 50% to fll a 9-
inch plate properly. And for easy, quick and delicious
desserts, try the fruit cobbler recipes.
Basic Standard Flaky Pie Crust A
This is a Better Homes and Gardens recipe.
Single crust Double crust
1 and 1/4 2 cups four
1/2 1 teaspoon salt
1/3 2/3 cup shortening
ghee or butter
3 to 4 6 to 7 tablespoons cold water
You need a pie plate and a rolling pin (a big jar or wine
bottle works if you dont have a rolling pin).
Put the four in a big bowl and sprinkle it with salt.
Add the fat, cut in pieces. (You can use oil in a pinch,
but the crust wont be as tender. Dribble the oil in
tablespoon by tablespoon.) Mash the fat into the four
with a dinner fork or a pastry cutter (if youve got one).
Mash it in really well, the mixture should look like coarse
crumbs.
175
Now, with the fork, divide it in half in the bowl, just
scrape 1/2 off to one side. Take 1/4 cup cold water
and sprinkle half of it over one half while youre kind of
fuffng up the four with the fork.
Do it to the other half, too. Push the two halves back
together and fuff it around some more. It still wont
look much like pie dough.
Flour your hands and the counter and rolling pin lightly.
With your hands make a ball of the dough. If it wont
stick together, sprinkle in a little more cold water, spoon
by spoon.
DO NOT KNEAD THE DOUGH. It will make it tough.
Make it into a nice, fairly homogeneous dough ball by
squeezing and tossing it from hand to hand. Flatten it
a little in the palms of your hands.
Now set it smack down in the middle of the foured
counter and press it fatter with your hands. When its
a little bigger than the spread of your hand (your right
hand if youre right-handed, left otherwise), turn it over
and start rolling it out with the rolling pin. Roll from the
center outward in all directions. Turn it over once again
when its still not too big to make sure its not sticking
to the counter. Sprinkle a bit more four underneath.
Keep rolling. Try and make it round.
When you think its big enough, set your pie plate in
the center of it and make sure: the dough should be
at least 3 cm bigger around than the pie plate, 4 is
better.
OK, now to move it. Set the pie plate right next to the
dough. Take your rolling pin and place it just below the
top edge of the dough circle. Peel up the top edge of
the dough and fip it over the rolling pin. Now carefully
roll the rolling pin back towards you. Dont press down.
The dough will roll onto the rolling pin.
Pick it up and lay it at the edge of the pie plate, with
some dough hanging over, and gently unroll the dough
onto the plate. Now, also gently, adjust the dough
down into the dish. Try and get the hanging-over-the-
edges all even, trim them with a knife or kitchen scissors
and save the dough scraps to patch any tears or holes
you may have made in the dough. Smear a little water
around the edge of a tear and pinch it together; patch
holes with water-moistened scraps.
176
For a double crust pie, fll it now, then...
Roll out remaining dough and place on top of flling. Cut
either the top dough piece or the bottom (whichever
is smaller) to ft exactly the edge of the pie plate. Fold
the other over or under it and crimp like below. Cut
vents in the top crust. (For lattice and crumble tops,
see the cobbler recipes on page ?.)
Crimping the edge
Now you take that at least almost one inch hanging-
over-the-edge and fold it under and squeeze it
together gently around the very edge of the pie plate.
It should stand up some. Now take the index fnger
and middle fnger knuckles of your left hand (if youre
right handed) and place them along the inside of the
ridge you just made around the edge of the pie plate.
Take your right thumb and place it on the outside of
the ridge so it fts between the two knuckles, squeeze,
move around the plate, crimping the edge as you go.
Isnt it beautiful? Kind of fatten it a bit so the edges
dont burn.
For a pre-baked pie shell, prick crust all over evenly
with the tines of a fork. Fill crust half-full with dried
beans (any kind, but dont try to cook them after, keep
them for pie crusts, they serve to keep the pastry from
puffng) and bake at 180 C/gas mark 3/350 F for up to
15 minutes, until crust is golden brown.
177
Apple, Pear, Apricot and Peach Pies
Preheat oven to 190 C/gas mark 4 plus/375 F
Makes 1 pie
Crust for double crust pie
4 heaping cups fruit, peeled and chopped
(sprinkle with lemon juice so they dont turn brown)
1/3 to 1 cup sugar
2 heaping tablespoons four
pinch of nutmeg
butter
Mix the fruit thoroughly with however much sugar you want, four, cinnamon and nutmeg. (Throw a small handful
of raisins in with the apples or pears if you want.) Pile into unbaked crust. Press down frmly but leave fruit slightly
mounded in center. Dot with butter. Fit top crust. Cut vents. (Or a lattice top is pretty.) Set pie on a baking
tray because it will probably bubble over and you dont want to mess up your oven. Equip with foil collar (see
illustration page ?), and bake 25 minutes. Remove foil collar and bake another 20 minutes or so, until crust is
golden brown.
Best served quite warm with ice cream. Or melt a thick slice of sharp cheddar cheese on a slice of apple pie
under the broiler or in the microwave.
Cobblers
178
Cobblers
A cobbler is a fruit pie without a bottom crust.
Butter a baking dish. Fill it with the fruit mixture from fruit pies
above. Fit only a top crust.
I like to make them lattice topped. Roll out the dough for a
single crust pie and cut it in strips about as wide as your fng-
er or thumb. You can either weave the strips together over
the fruit, or you can just lay them there in an approximation
of weaving.
Start at the corner of the dish, with one strip going along the
short side and another along the long side. Add short strips
frst then the long ones, one by one, weaving them through
the short ones. Look at the picture. Its easier to do than to
explain. Tuck the dough edges down the sides.
Much easier, you can make a crumble top. Mix together
1/2 cup each four and sugar, spice it with 1/2 teaspoon
cinnamon, then mash in 1/4 cup butter. Sprinkle it over the
top of the fruit.
Bake 40 minutes at 190 C/gas mark 4 plus/375 F. Serve warm
topped with vanilla ice cream.
179
Graham Cracker or Cookie Crust
graham crackers, digestive biscuits, butter cookies or
chocolate cookies
1/4 cup butter, melted
Crush crackers or cookies (3 biggish handfuls) in
a plastic bag with a rolling pin. Crush them fnely.
Dump them into a pie plate and moisten with the
melted butter. Spread the mixture out, then, starting
in the center, compress it into an even layer with your
fngertips. As you work outwards the mixture will rise up
the sides. Compress it against the sides, too, then pinch
up a small ridge around the edge of the plate.
Nenaws Lemon Meringue Pie
Makes 1 pie
This was my grandfathers favorite pie. My gran made
at least 2 a week. We like it very lemony so Nenaw
used 2 large, juicy lemons.
graham cracker or digestive biscuits crust
juice of 2 large lemons (limoun adalia, or 1/2 cup of
limoun beladi juice)
1 can sweetened condensed milk (Bonny milk)
2 eggs, separated
3 tablespoons sugar
pinch of cream of tartar
Beat the lemon juice, milk and 2 egg yolks together.
Pour into the pie crust.
Go onto the next page for meringue.
180
Meringue
In a clean, dry bowl, with clean dry beaters, beat the 2 egg whites (use
4 egg whites and 1/3 cup sugar, large pinch cream of tartar, for a really
high meringue) until they form soft peaks.* Keep beating and add the
the sugar little by little, whisking all the time, and the cream of tartar
which helps to prevent them from collapsing. Pretty soon, after your
arm is about to fall off, about 4 minutes by hand, 1.5 electrically, the
stuff really begins to look like meringue, it becomes shiny and the peaks
are much stiffer. Then its done. If you keep on beating after that, theyll
collapse and youll have to toss them and start all over.
Top the pie with the meringue, making sure that the meringue touches
the crust or else it will shrink. Make some lovely swirls and peaks. Bake for
about 10 minutes or until the peaks of the meringue are brown and the
valleys are golden. Cool before refrigerating. Eat it cold. Wet the knife
before cutting through the meringue so that it cuts cleanly.
*A note on egg whites: Egg whites beat up easier when they are at room
temperature. They will not beat up if they, the bowl, or the beaters are
contaminated with egg yolk. Or almost anything else, even water. All your
utensils should be clean and dry. Use a deep bowl.
181
Chocolate Dream Pie
Makes 1 pie
This pie is heavenly. I found the recipe in the September
94 issue of Southern Living. It was sent in by Maryanne
Kachelhofer of Birmingham, Alabama. The Gates of
Paradise will surely be open for her!
1 1/4 cups sugar
1/2 cup four
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
dash of salt
4 egg yolks
2 cups milk
1/4 cup butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 pre-baked 9 inch pie shell, or chocolate cookie
crumb crust
meringue, use 6 egg whites (plus 1/2 cup sugar and 1/4
teaspoon cream of tartar)
Combine frst 4 ingredients in a medium saucepan.
Beat egg yolks and milk together in a bowl and stir into
the sugar mixture in the saucepan.
Add the butter and cook over medium heat, stirring
constantly, until the mixture thickens and bubbles.
Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Pour into prepared
pie shell.
Make your meringue (see previous page) and spread
it over the flling, sealing it to the edges so it doesnt
shrink, and make some nice peaks in it with the spatula.
Bake until the peaks are brown and the valleys begin
to get golden, no more than, say, 15 minutes. Remove
from oven, cool, then chill. Serve cold. Wet the knife
before cutting the pie so the meringue doesnt stick
to it.
182
Aunt Bernices Pecan Pie
Makes 1 pie
This is just about the sweetest thing you can eat. My
great-aunt Bernice (Ber nis, not Ber niece) is my moms
moms sister. They were 9 kids in the family. I think Aunt
Bernice is the oldest girl. Everyone in the family uses her
pecan pie recipe. I cant remember a Thanksgiving
or Christmas without at least 2, more likely 4, of Aunt
Bernices pecan pies on the buffet. We call them Aunt
Bernices Pecan Pie no matter who made them, Yall
wooden lak anuther piece of Aunt Bernices Pee-cawn
Pie, wud yall? Mix each pie separately or youll end
up with things which resemble cow patties more than
pecan pies.
3 eggs, slightly beaten
1 cup corn syrup (glukoze or karo syrup)
1 cup sugar
1 cup broken pecan pieces (walnuts will do)
1 unbaked pie shell
Put the pecan pieces in the pie shell. Make a foil collar
for the pie plate. Look at the picture on page ?. It
keeps the edge of the crust from over-browning. Mix
the other ingredients together lightly with a fork and
pour over the pecan pieces. Cook for 10 minutes then
lower the oven temp as low as it goes and bake until a
table knife inserted near the center comes out pretty
clean. This could be another 40 minutes, but check
the pie at 30 min to be sure. Remove from oven and
cool.
Serve at room temperature, plain, or with unsugared
whipped cream (dusted with cinnamon), or vanilla or
caramel ice cream.
183
Pumpkin Pie
Makes 2 pies
This recipe is called Pumpkin Pie, but you can use
baked and mashed yams or sweet potatoes, or baked
and pured winter squash (ara asli).
Youll need a big heavy knife. Just cut the squash in
half lengthwise, remove the seeds and strings with a
spoon, oil lightly inside and out. Place them, cut side
up, on a baking tray and cover with foil. Bake in a 165
C/gas mark 2/325 F oven until just soft. The amount of
time, of course, depends on how big your squash is. Itll
take an hour or more, anyway. To tell if its done, poke
the thick part near the stem end with a 2 prong fork;
it should go in and out very easily. Scoop out the fesh
with a spoon and pure it. Bake a pumpkin the same
way, but cut it in wedges. Its much better to bake it
than to boil it: the favor is much better and you get no
added water.
Prepare 2 pie shells, pre-baked for only 5 minutes
(page ?) with foil collars (page ?), and place them on
a baking tray or cookie sheet.
Beat together in a quite large bowl:
3/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1 1/2 cups pumpkin (or other) pure
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Beat together in a separate, but not necessarily as
large, bowl:
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
2 tablespoons rum or 1/2 teaspoon rum favoring
(optional)
Beat the egg-cream mixture into the pumpkin mixture. Pour
into prepared pie shells and bake for 10 minutes. Lower
the oven to 180 C/gas mark 3/350F and bake another 25
to 30 minutes. The very center of the pies will have a spot
the size of a small coin still loose, uncooked. Dont worry.
All custard pies and quiches do that, the egg will continue
cooking when you take it out of the oven. A table knife
inserted off-center will come out clean. Cool thoroughly,
then store in the fridge.
Serve plain or with whipped cream (dusted with sugar-
cinnamon) or with vanilla, caramel, or cinnamon ice cream.
184
Super Strawberry Pie
This is very easy to make and its not too sweet, just
strawberry-y. And its gorgeous to look at.
about 6 cups of fresh strawberries (about 1 1/2 kilos)
3/4 cup sugar
3 tablespoons cornstarch
1 cup water
1 pre-baked pie shell or cookie crust
Wash and cut the tops off of the berries. When you
come across a beautiful berry, set it on the counter,
pointy side up until you get a circle as big as your pie
plate. These will be the top.
Take the softer berries and mush them down into a one
cup measure. Put the crushed 1 cup of berries in a
saucepan with the 1 cup of water and bring them to a
boil, then remove from the heat.
The rest of the berries, slice thickly into the baked pie
shell. Fill the pie shell just over half full just now.
Make the fuit glaze: Put the sugar and cornstarch in
a small sauce pan and stir them around. Strain the
cooked berries mixture into the sugar and cornstarch.
Cook over a medium fre stirring all the time until
thickened and clear, about 5 minutes.
Pour less than half of this glaze over the berries in the
pie shell. Jiggle it down in. Slice some more berries on
top of them, then arrange the perfect berries pointy
side up on top. Try to put the biggest berries in the
center and gradually decrease to the smaller ones
around the edge. Pour the rest of the glaze over them,
being careful to coat them completely, sealing with
the glaze to the pie crust. You may have to rewarm the
glaze to keep it pourable. Chill several hours.
Serve plain or with whipped cream, or ice cream, if
you want.
185
Banana Pudding
This recipe is from the back of the Nabisco vanilla
wafers box. Its excellent.
vanilla wafers, about 40 (or 2 packs Danish cookies or
1 pack Biscuits Marie)
ripe bananas (about 1 kilos)
Layer the cookies and bananas (sliced) in a big bowl,
about a 2 liter size. Start with cookies and end with
cookies. Dont pack them in too tightly, leave some
space in between.
Make custard sauce.
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup four
pinch of salt
3 cups milk
1 egg yolk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract or 2 packs vanilla sugar
Mix the sugar, four and salt in a saucepan. Set it over
a medium fre and whisk in the milk. Stir constantly until
sugar is melted then cook, stirring occasionally, until
thickened and bubbly. Remove from heat.
Beat the egg yolk in a cup or small bowl. Gradually stir
in some of the hot mixture, spoon by spoon, until egg is
heated. Whisk warmed egg mixture back into pan.
Replace on fre and cook, stirring, another minute or
two. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla.
Quickly pour over cookies and bananas. Shake the
sauce down into the dish. Let cool to room temp, then
refrigerate. Eat it cold.
Variation
Black-bottom Banana Pudding: Pour off a quarter (or
more) of the custard sauce into another saucepan.
Beat in 1/4 cup instant chocolate milk powder (or
more). Heat gently. Pour the chocolate custard over
the sliced bananas and cookies, then fnish topping it
with the vanilla custard.
186
This recipe developed over the years of my cooking
life. I frst encountered a refrigerator cheesecake
recipe on the back of a package of WhipnChill when
I was a teenager. Typical American convenience
foods recipe, everything store-bought and whipped
together. They said to use cherry pie flling for the top.
It was quite good, but my perceptions of good have
changed over time to stress nutritional value more
strongly. Convenience is still important, and happily very
little is sacrifced in this latest version of the recipe. You
can use a pie plate or a real springform cheesecake
pan. If you use the springform pan youll need to line
the ring with butcher or halawani (waxed) paper. Cut
a cardboard circle for the base, too, if you want to
remove the cheesecake to display it nicely. Double
the recipe for large springform pans.
1 cookie crust (see page ?), made from digestive
biscuits, 1 to 1 1/2 packages, and at least a full cup of
melted butter, make the crust a little bit thick, including
the walls, chill well
225 grams cream cheese, such Philadelphia or Kiri,
softened to room temperature (individual Kiris are
easier to unwrap while they are still cold)
3/4 cup fnely granulated sugar
4 to 6 small pots plain yoghurt, room temperature
Cream together sugar and cream cheese very
thoroughly. The sugar has to melt into the cream cheese
and there should be no lumps. Beat in yoghurt, pot by
pot, until the mixture is smooth and has the consistency
of mayonnaise.
Pour and scrape into prepared crust and spread
surface evenly. Chill. You can eat it plain like this or go
onto the next page...
Incredible Refrigerator Cheesecake
187
and prepare a fruit topping.
Go back to page ?, Strawberry Pie, and prepare fruit
and glaze according to the recipe. You can use any
kind of fruit you like except melon or bananas. Fresh
strawberries or mangoes, or canned cherries are what
I usually use. Use the juice from the canned cherries to
make the glaze.
Arrange beautiful fruit artfully on top on chilled cheesecake
and cover with glaze, taking care that each piece of fruit
is adequately covered and that the glaze touches the
crust. Mangoes can be sliced and arranged in a sunburst
pattern. Very pretty! You may have some glaze left over,
put it in a jar in the fridge and use it to dress up ice cream
or crpes. Chill well before serving, at least 6 hours.
Variations: most of these are Nooras inventions, yum yum.
Im sure you can come up with some equally delicious
variations. Just be careful about how much liquid, or fruit
that becomes liquid, gets added to the mixture or the
cheesecake wont set up properly and the crust will be
soggy.
1) Lemon Cheesecake: Beat into the flling 1/4 cup strained
lemon or lime juice and zest of one lemon or lime, sprinkle top
with more lemon/lime zest.
2) Orange and Dark Chocolate Cheesecake: Make
chocolate sauce. Either see Hot Fudge, page ?, reduce sugar by
half and increase water by 1/4 cup, or mix some instant chocolate
drink powder (or cocoa and sugar to taste) with enough warm
water to make a thickish sauce- cool to room temperature before
putting on cheesecake. Beat into the flling 1/4 cup strained fresh
orange juice and zest of 1/2 orange. Spread the flling evenly into
the (chocolate cookie?!!) crust then pour the chocolate sauce
in a spiral pattern on top. Drag a toothpick through it, starting in
the center and dragging outwards towards the edge as many
times as you have pieces, 8 or 10 depending on size of dish, to
make a lovely design. Then chill well.
3) Banana Cinnamon Cheesecake: Add 1/2 teaspoon
cinnamon to the cookie crust mixture. Slice 2 or 3 ripe but still hard
bananas into just over half the cream cheese mixture and mix
gently, pour and scrape into crust, and spread out evenly, top
with the rest of the mixture. You can put another 1/2 teaspoon
cinnamon in with the cream cheese, too, if you want. Chill well.
4) Pina-Colada Cheesecake: Lightly toast 1/2 cup coconut in a
dry frying pan over medium heat and mix into cookie crumbs
for crust. Drain a can of pineapple well. Use a cup of the juice to
make a glaze. Set aside enough pineapple rings to garnish the
top, you might want to cut them in graduated arcs and arrange
them so that you can cut the cheescake with the design rather
than squashing it all up trying to cut through whole pineapple
rings. Chop the rest into small pieces and stir into cheese-yoghurt
mixture with the juice of half a lemon. Garnish and glaze.
188
Mary Ellens Oatmeal Rocks
This is my step-mothers oatmeal-raisin cookie recipe.
The frst time she made them my dad thought they
were rocks sitting on the counter. Theyre not the best
looking cookies, but they taste great and they only
dirty one bowl!
Makes 6 to 7 dozen
1 cup raisins
1 cup water
3/4 cup shortening
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 1/2 cups four
2 cups oats (Quaker)
1/2 cup walnuts or pecans, chopped, (optional)
Simmer the raisins in the water for about 10 minutes, or
until they are plump. Drain them and save the liquid. If
necessary, add enough water to the saved raisin liquid
to make 1/2 cup.
Beat together until creamy shortening, sugar, eggs and
vanilla. Stir in reserved liquid.
Mix dry ingredients together then blend them thoroughly
into the wet ingredients. Carefully fold in raisins, and
nuts if you want.
Drop by heaping teaspoons onto a cookie sheet and
bake 8-10 minutes. Prepare 2nd cookie sheet while 1st
is in oven. Dont put them too close together because
they spread a little when they cook. Cool thoroughly
before storing in a covered container-- buy a cookie
jar!
189
Fruitcake
This is an approximation of the recipe my mother, aunts
and grandmothers have always used. They always
bought candied cherries, candied pineapple, blond
raisins and candied citrus peels, and used pecans or
walnuts. You dont have to do that. Buy whatever is
available and looks interesting to you. Its nice with
different combinations.
You can use candied cherries, candied orange peel,
blond raisins and blanched almonds; or you can use
dates, fgs and walnuts or hazelnuts; or you can use
candied pineapple, candied lemon peel, shaved
coconut and (!!!) macadamia nuts. Just think about it.
Its good to use at least one citrus peel.
And you dont have to use expensive liquor; you can
even use white wine, apple, orange or grape juice, but
cheap brandy or a full-bodied rum is best.
Youll need a clean kitchen towel for each fruitcake
and some heavy-duty aluminum foil. Also some brown
paper or baking parchment.
Grease or butter 3 small or 2 large loaf pans then line
them with brown paper and grease or butter the paper.
Cut the paper like in the picture on page ?. You do this
because it is a heavy, sweet batter and cooks slowly for
a long time and will overbrown on the bottom before
the inside cooks if you dont. And it wont be worth
doing, much less eating, so do it: line the pans with
paper. Also, make these cakes at least 3 weeks before
you want to eat them.
190
Fruitcake instructions
Makes 3 small loaves or 2 large
3 cups four
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon allspice
2 cups chopped nuts, such as pecans, walnuts,
blanched almonds
8 cups mixed candied fruits, such as cherries, dates,
pineapple, raisins, peels (cut into pieces no bigger
than 1 cm X 1 cm)
4 eggs
1 3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
1 cup fresh orange juice
3/4 cup melted butter
1/4 cup molasses
brandy, rum or wine
Stir together all the dry ingredients in a Very Big Bowl.
Toss in all the candied fruit. Toss it all together until the
fruit is well dusted with four.
In a smaller bowl, beat the eggs until foamy and add
the sugar, o.j., butter and molasses. Beat it all up then
dump it on the fruit and four.
Stir it together until all the fruit is moistened. Dont try to
beat it. Its like sweet asphalt. Spread the batter into
the pans equally; it should reach about 3/4 way up the
sides of the pans.
Bake for 2 hours or until a table knife inserted in the
center comes out clean, but not dry (it will be wet from
the fruit, but not doughy from the batter). After about
1 hour of baking cover the pans loosely with foil so the
tops dont burn or dry out. Cool thoroughly in the pans.
Turn out onto the counter and peel off the paper.
Turn the page.
191
Fruitcake instructions continued
Put whatever alcohol (or juice, if you insist) you choose
in a small bowl, soak a clean kitchen towel in it and
wring it out pretty well.
Lay the towel fat out on the counter and wrap a
fruitcake in it. Then wrap that carefully in some foil. Do
it nicely because every 3 to 5 days youre going to open
it back up and soak the towel with more alcohol.
Do each fruitcake like that. The used alcohol you can
pour back into the bottle and store it in the fridge for
further use. Sometimes I use a different alcohol on
each one. If you do, label the foil with a marking pen.
Now put the fruitcakes in the fridge for, like I said, 3
weeks to 40 days, taking them out and moistening the
towels with liquor every few days. Just lightly moisten
the towels and rewrap in foil. Dont wet them too much
or youll lose the crust of the cake. Itll turn to mush and
stick to the towel.
To serve, unwrap and slice thinly. You can even slice
the thin slices in half. Its really great cake and worth all
the time. Its not Christmas without fruitcake; everyone
says they hate it but everyone eats some, too. And
it's usually the store-bought ones they're talking about
anyway.
Pickles and Such
193
Dill Pickles
It is extremely important that your cucumbers are
perfectly fresh. Break one in half. It should snap. Bite
one. It should be crunchy.
2 kilos fresh, frm, small cucumbers, scrubbed clean
a bundle of fresh dill (shabat)
choose other pickling spices (optional), such as
white mustard seeds, coriander seeds, peppercorns,
cinnamon bark, whole dried red chile peppers,
peeled garlic cloves, regular cloves
Find some jars with sealing lids. Either with rubber
rings, or like jam jars that have that little pop-up
button in the center of the lid so you know if the seal
has been broken. You can be sure these are heat-
tempered. Make sure your cucumbers are not too
big for them. Wash the jars in hot soapy water. Leave
them in the kitchen sink flled with hot water. Put the
lids in a dish of hot water.
BRINE (generally, for every 1 tablespoon salt, use 3/4
cup vinegar and 2 1/4 cups water)
13 1/2 cups water
4 1/2 cups vinegar
6 tablespoons salt
Put the water, vinegar and salt in a big pot and bring
it to a boil.
Meanwhile, pack the jars:
Dump the hot water out and start with the dill and other
pickling spices. For a 1/2 liter size jar, put 4 branches
of fresh dill and a tablespoon of other spices, as you
like. I personally like to use a dried chile pepper, some
mustard seed, a cinnamon stick, and a couple of garlic
cloves. You can do each jar differently.
Now pack the cucumbers down into the jars. Get
as many in as you can. Set the flled jars on a folded
kitchen towel with space in between them. Put each
lid next to its jar. Now pour the BOILING water-salt-
vinegar over the cucumbers in the jars. Leave 1 1/2 cm
headspace (fll the jar 1 1/2 cm from the top). Make
sure the cukes are down in the brine. Close each jar
tightly immediately. As they cool, they will seal.
194
When theyre cool, check the seal by pressing on the
little pop-up button: it should have been sucked down,
or stick down when you press it. These jars you can just
stick in the cupboard. Any jar that hasnt sealed needs
to be refrigerated. Its a good idea to put a sticker on
each jar with the date on it. These pickles take about
10 days to be pickles. If you slice or cut the cucumbers
into spears, you can eat them after 3 days or a week.
Refrigerate after opening.
To make overnight pickles, cut the cucumbers into
quarters lengthwise, then in half crossways. Put them
with double pickling spices in an open dish, glass or
stainless. Pour the boiling brine over them and set
them out of the way. You can eat them the next day.
Refrigerate what you dont eat.
Variations
Use carrot sticks and/or caulifower forets instead of
cucumbers. Or use fresh hot green chiles. Forget the
dill and other pickling spices.
Before making the brine, saut an onion cut in rings
in a little oil, then make the brine on top of it in the
same pot. As the brine comes to a simmer, add the
cleaned cut-up veg and a teaspoon of oregano.
Simmer 5 to 10 minutes. For caulifower and carrots, the
5 minutes is good. They shouldnt cook, youre only
par-boiling them. The carrots should be bright orange,
the caulifower still crunchy. For peppers, simmer until
the peppers just begin to lose their brightness of color,
this can take up to 10 minutes. Pour into prepared jars
and seal.
195
Just about any fruit chutney
Makes about 1 liter (4 regular jam jars)
Look at page ? to prepare your jars.
1 or 2 kilos not-quite-ripe fruit (papayas, mangos,
guavas, green tomatoes, pears, peaches)
2 large onions, diced
1/2 to 1 cup raisins (depending on sweetness of fruit,
more raisins for less sweet fruit)
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup molasses
1 cup vinegar, cider is nice
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 tablespoon black mustard seeds
1 tablespoon red chile pure* or chili powder
1/2 teaspoon cayenne (optional)
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon garam masala (Bengali or other Indian
dry spice mix, see page ?)
Peel and chop fruit. You should end up with about 4
cups. More is OK, less is not.
Mix everything except the garam masala together in
a big non-reactive pot. Put over a low fre and simmer
covered until fruit and onion are soft, but not mushy.
Add 1 teaspoon garam masala. Give it a good stir and
simmer some more, uncovered, until thickened. Spoon
still bubbling chutney into sterile jars, wipe mouths with
clean cloth. Seal. Same storage as for dill pickles.
*Like for Mexican Chile con carne, page ?
196
Sauerkraut
Get some jars with good lids ready. Wash them in hot
soapy water. Rinse them well. Know how much your
cabbage weighs.
Take the outer leaves off of a fresh cabbage and throw
them away. Cut the stem out. Slice the cabbage as thinly
as you can.
For every kilo of cabbage, sprinkle sliced cabbage with 1
tablespoon coarse salt. Mix in around with your hands.
PACK the cabbage into jars. Press it down frmly with your
fst or the pestle from your mortar and pestle if your hand
wont ft into the jars. Fill with cold water. If your tap water
is not very good, use bottled water.
Put the lids on loosely and set the jars on a towel out of
the way somewhere, but in plain view. The cabbage will
begin to ferment. It will bubble and froth. Release any
pressure that builds up in the jars daily or twice daily for
probably 3 days, maybe four. Dont forget or they could
blow up.
When it has stopped bubbling up, screw the lids on tightly
and stick the jars in the cupboard and forget about them
for 4 to 6 weeks. You can keep them up to a year, maybe
even more.
To cook, see Sauerkraut in the veggie meals section, or
choucroute lalsacienne in your Larousse.
197
Corned Beef
1 1/2 to 2 kilos brisket or fank steak
salt
1 tablespoon pickling spices
1 teaspoon saltpeter (potassium nitrate, KN0
3
)
1 clove garlic
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon peppercorns
1 onion, sliced
Prick meat all over with a 2 prong fork. Refrigerate.
Place enough water to cover meat in a crock big enough to hold
it and add about 1/2 cup salt. Stir to dissolve. Continue adding
and stirring in salt until an egg foats in the liquid. Add spices,
saltpeter, garlic, sugar and peppercorns and bring to a boil. Cool
thoroughly.
Add meat and onions and cover with heavy foil. Let stand at
least 48 hours.
Always rinse meat before cooking to remove surface salt.
To cook:
Boil with bouquet garni (page ?) for about 3-4 hours, adding
carrots, turnips and potatoes after 2 hours or so. Remove to a
serving plate and slice some of it. Put the veggies around it.
Serve with hot mustard, horseradish, pickles and cabbage
cooked separately. Some good brown bread. Slice leftovers
thinly and use in sandwiches.
Reuben Sandwich
Butter both sides of two slices of good brown bread. Pile some
thinly sliced corned beef or pastrami on one, spread generously
with some 1000 Island dressing and then pile some well-drained
sauerkraut on that. Top with a slice or two of swiss cheese and
the other bread slice. Place the sandwich carefully in a frying
pan over medium heat and toast each side perfectly. Cover the
pan for the frst side so the beef and kraut get hot and the cheese
melts down into them... yummmmm.
198
Mexican Chorizo (sausage)
This is an adaptation of Diana Kennedys chorizo recipe
from her book The Cuisines of Mexico. Its the best Ive
found. Normally the sausage would be stuffed into
clean intestine, tied off in sausage lengths, then hung
in the shade to dry, or in the smokehouse to smoke. This
is the patty-freezer version.
1 kilo lean ground pork (or veal or goat or camel)
7 chiles anchos (page ?)
2 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/3 cup chili powder
1/2 teaspoon coriander seeds plus pinch of cumin
seeds, toasted
3 whole cloves
1/2 teaspoon black peppercorns
1/2 teaspoon oregano or dried mint
4 cloves garlic, well-crushed
2 tablespoons paprika (sweet)
2/3 cup wine vinegar
Toast chiles in a dry frying pan. While warm, slit them
open and remove the seeds. Theyll get crispy as they
cool.
Grind the spices with the chiles in the grinder attachment
of your blender. Combine all ingredients. Mix well with
your hands. Wash your hands properly afterwards. Fry
a little up and taste to see if youve got enough salt
and seasoning. Adjust seasoning if necessary.
Put into a colander and cover the sausage surface
with plastic wrap. Set the colander in a bowl. Itll drip.
Let stand covered in refrigerator for 3 days, dumping
the juice out of the bowl every day.
Make balls the size of small eggs and fatten them
into patties and freeze them (frst in a single layer on a
cookie sheet, then bag them).
To use, just fry the patties over low fre, breaking them
up as they thaw and cook. Add eggs for breakfast
and eat with tortillas. Or sprinkle some boiled, sliced
potatoes with fried chorizo, grate some cheese over,
and put under the broiler until the cheese is melted.
Yum. Or spike some tomato sauce with it, or crumble
some in your lasagne or quiche.
199
Kitchen Utensils
This looks like a lot, but it isnt.
a good blender with spice grinding jar (khalat)
at least 2 cutting boards, one with a gutter for the juicy stuff
a medium size mortar and pestle, brass rather than wood,
wood for pesto, though (hone)
at least 3 good, sharp knives, one serrated
a large slotted spoon or skimmer
a large ladle (kapsha)
several wooden spoons and spatulas
a wire whisk (madrab silk)
a lemon squeezer
a pair of scissors
a muffn tin
at least one sturdy baking sheet, 2 are better
a set of measuring cups
a set of measuring spoons
a rolling pin
a good standing grater
a set of three mixing bowls, if theyre nice you can use them
for serving
one of those things you put between the fre and the pot to
keep the rice from burning
at least 2 colanders (masfa blastic)
a large wire mesh strainer (masfa silk)
a potato masher or ricer, if you like mashed potatoes
a meat thermometer if you like your meat less than well
done
a glass or clay rectangular baking dish
a large, deep baking dish with cover
two cake tins
two large loaf pans or three small
two pie tins
a non-reactive soup pot with lid, tefon, enamel or stainless
ditto saucepans, one small and one large, say 1/2 liter and
3 liter sizes
ditto frying pans, one crpe/omelette size and one large
with cover (the same cover as the soup pot?)
a steamer basket
save some jars with tight-ftting lids for pickles and such
wish you could have electric beaters/mixer
OK, to start off, you dont need a lot of stuff to cook well and with variety, but . . . you do best by buying the best in the things
that matter. Thats all food stuffs, plus knives and pots and pans. Good equipment saves a lot of hassle, and fresh, high-quality
ingredients make a big difference in the fnal product. Some people need all the help they can get.
200
Kitchen Utensils
This looks like a lot, but it isnt.
a good blender with spice grinding jar (khalat)
at least 2 cutting boards, one with a gutter for the juicy stuff
a medium size mortar and pestle, brass rather than wood,
wood for pesto, though (hone)
at least 3 good, sharp knives, one serrated
a large slotted spoon or skimmer
a large ladle (kapsha)
several wooden spoons and spatulas
a wire whisk (madrab silk)
a lemon squeezer
a pair of scissors
a muffn tin
at least one sturdy baking sheet, 2 are better
a set of measuring cups
a set of measuring spoons
a rolling pin
a good standing grater
a set of three mixing bowls, if theyre nice you can use them
for serving
one of those things you put between the fre and the pot to
keep the rice from burning
at least 2 colanders (masfa blastic)
a large wire mesh strainer (masfa silk)
a potato masher or ricer, if you like mashed potatoes
a meat thermometer if you like your meat less than well
done
a glass or clay rectangular baking dish
a large, deep baking dish with cover
two cake tins
two large loaf pans or three small
two pie tins
a non-reactive soup pot with lid, tefon, enamel or stainless
ditto saucepans, one small and one large, say 1/2 liter and
3 liter sizes
ditto frying pans, one crpe/omelette size and one large
with cover (the same cover as the soup pot?)
a steamer basket
save some jars with tight-ftting lids for pickles and such
wish you could have electric beaters/mixer
OK, to start off, you dont need a lot of stuff to cook well and with variety, but . . . you do best by buying the best in the things
that matter. Thats all food stuffs, plus knives and pots and pans. Good equipment saves a lot of hassle, and fresh, high-quality
ingredients make a big difference in the fnal product. Some people need all the help they can get.

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