Okra and Pashley

I haven't posted anything in a very long time, and this is mainly because I decided to take a break from everything, including cooking. Alot has happened during this time, the highlight of that is getting promoted at work and buying a bicycle, and to be more specific, a Pashley bicycle! I am in love with my new bicycle.  The other exciting thing is that my bestfriend Rasha arrived from Dubai last Friday and she is staying in London for quite some time, I am very happy.

On Saturday we were sitting by Regent's Canal in Islington with Sachin and we were as usual hungry although we had lunch an hour ago. Then came the food brainstorming session, throwing ideas, talking about our cravings, and we surprisingly were in agreement! We were all craving Bemyeh, arabic word for Okra.

Today, Rasha and I decided that we're going to cook Okra in the evening to have it on Monday. Rasha coming from North of Lebanon, and me Beirut, we had to have a discussion on how the dish is made. Obviously there is a slight difference in the dish between the north and Beirut - although I am not sure if my way is the Beirut way. We finally settled that we will make both!


Here are the ingredients;

500g lamb cubes
Cinnamon sticks
Bay leaves
half a lemon

400g  Frozen Okra (it's very hard to find green okra in the supermarket in London)
a bunch of coriander chopped
5 cloves of garlic
3 tomatoes
tomato paste
Salt

Pomegranate molasses (For the Northern Lebanon version)

Boil the lamb cubes with half a lemon, cinnamon sticks and bays leaves for 20min or until the meat is cooked.

Meanwhile, chop the coriander very fine, crush the garlic and fry them together in a pot with sunflower oil. Peel and chop the tomatoes and add them to the mix and mix well together. Add the frozen okra and mix them well together. When the meat is cooked, pour the meat and the meat stock into the mix. Make sure you remove the lemon, the cinnamon sticks and the bay leaves. Add the tomato paste to the mixture until the colour of the mix becomes red. Add a pinch of salt to taste. Boil for 20min until the okra is cooked, slightly on the soft side. Voila!

For the Northern Lebanon recipe, do the same as above, but add pomegranate molasses to the mix and let it boil for 20min, until the okra is cooked. Delicious! Especially if you like 'lemony' taste.

Serve with rice on the side, add some lemon juice to taste, and cucumber or turnip pickles.

Meghli vs Muffin

                                                   [Notice how Andy eats the famous muffin]

What a day! Started by wanting to cycle to the city, walk around and take photographs on a beautiful sunny Sunday morning. Exciting plan if the weather and weather forecasts didn't betray us, from a sunny morning to a cold and rainy day. The good thing though is I got to discover the world of Lomography and have Ethiopian food for lunch at the Sunday market in Brick Lane, yummm! I have been watching films since 6pm, for more than 5 hrs. Started by The Wall Street I film ( finally got to watch it after watching part II ) and after that watched Part 4 of The Promise on Channel 4, a very intense ending to the 4 part series. A must see series-still available online to watch.

I promised Andy that I will write a post about him and his addiction to muffins (see earlier posts), which inspired me to make an equally , if not more, delicious and healthier traditional Lebanese dessert - Meghli. A better way to have a dessert without gaining extra weight, well at least much less than having a muffin.


Meghli is a dessert similar to rice pudding and is usually served in Lebanese homes after a baby birth. My mum makes it as well for Christmas to celebrate the birth of Jesus, and we have it as one of the desserts during Christmas dinner at my aunt's house every year. At home in Beirut, we love this dessert so much that we don't care if there's a birth in the family, we just make it and eat it whenever we crave it, no occasions needed :-)

Meghli is very simple and easy, takes about 45min to make.

Here are the ingredients:

• half cup ground rice
• 1 table spoon caraway
• 1 table spoon ground cinnamon
• 1 cup sugar

For the toppings, you will need

• desiccated coconut
• pistachio
• almonds
• pine nuts
• walnuts

Add all the ingredients in a pot, mix them well, then add 5 cups of water. Put the pot on the hub, stir well with a whisk until the mix starts boiling and becomes thicker. Lower the heat, add 1 cup of sugar, mix it well until the sugar dissolves.

To prepare the toppings, put the pistachios, almonds and pine nuts in a bowl with water for few hours until they soften. When soft, peel the pistachios and almonds.

When toppings ready, serve the Meghli with desiccated coconut and a mix of nuts, pine nuts, walnuts, almonds and pistachio.

I wish all desserts were delicious, nutritious and most importantly non fattening as much as the Meghli!

Muffin you're out, Meghli you're in! I hope I will keep my motto for tomorrow and not be tempted by another raspberry and white chocolate muffin!

Shish barak

It's been really hectic at work the past week or so, been coming home late every evening, working weekends, stress, and most importantly, not having time to cook anything or even write on the blog.
I left work on time today and decided to walk home. I love walking home after work, it takes me 40min door to door. On my way home this evening, I stopped by Green Valley on Upper Berkeley St. to buy some ingredients for today's dish, Shish barak.
Shish barak can be a very easy, simple and quick dish to make, especially if you buy the actual shish barak already made and frozen. Shish barak is similar to the italian tortellini but filled with minced meat and spices.

It takes less than 1 hour to make the Shish barak dish, and you will need the following ingredients:

• Yoghurt (1Kg) (In London, you need to buy special yoghurt that is suitable for cooking, there are many turkish brands in the grocery shops that you can chose from)
• Frozen shish barak (20 in a pack)
• Coriander
• Garlic (5 cloves)
• Salt
• 1 egg

Pour the yoghurt into a pot, add some water to it and 1 egg. Stir on the hob slowly with a whisk until the yoghurt starts to boil. Meanwhile, bake the shish barak in the oven for 15min until they turn slightly golden in colour. Add it to the yoghurt, mix it and turn the flame off. In a separate pot, fry the crushed garlic, and the chopped coriander, and add it to the mix of yoghurt and shish barak. A pinch of salt, and that's it, done!

Some people like to have this dish with rice, I personally don't, but you can always make rice on the side and serve it with the Shish barak. It's also quite tricky getting the yoghurt we get in London to bind together when cooked, and that's the reason the egg is needed as it acts as a binder and gives the yoghurt a consistent texture.

Kafta with tahini

I have been very stressed from work lately. Thursday morning I woke up stressed and I got really worried about myself, so the first thing I did that morning is research 'anti-stress foods'. Eventhough I do eat well and I always vary and balance everything I eat,  I am pretty sure that I have a deficiency in few vitamins. That morning I had 2 boiled eggs, pineapple and almonds! Strange breakfast combination.

I went to work and I forced Andy and Sachin to have 'anti-stress lunch' eventhough they were not stressed, I am a bit bossy sometimes, I am sure they will agree to that! I made a list of what my lunch should contain, and this included lentils, quinoa, broccoli, beetroot, potatoes, cabbage and dried figs for dessert. Lunch mission was accomplished and the day went down well with no stress - phew!

The weather is beautiful this morning, sunny, mild cold, reminds me of spring, and I am stuck at home trying to finish off some work. Nevermind, it's lunch time and I don't feel like spending time in the kitchen and needed something quick and tasty, so decided to make Kafta with tahini.

I usually don't make the kafta at home, I buy it from my local Lebanese butcher, Zein, on Moscow road. I love their meat, it's very fresh and tasty. Ramez, the owner, was making my kafta mix, while, as usual, we talk about Lebanese politics, and most of the time complaining about the politicians and the situation, typical conversation with any Lebanese person! I actually do enjoy going there, just to have a chat with him, it makes me feel I am in Lebanon. Once, I spent 1 hour there just talking politics again!

Back to cooking, Kafta consists of minced meat, parsley, onion and spices.

Kafta with tahini takes 30min to cook with hardly any preparation! So it's a super quick and delicious dish that reminds me of home.

Here are the ingredients:

• 500g Kafta
• Olive oil
• 1/2 cup tahini
• 2 lemons
• water
• salt

Put some olive oil in a pyrex pan, spread the kafta, and then put it in the oven for 15min to cook on 175 degrees. Meanwhile, to make the tahini sauce, mix 1/2 cup tahini with some water, squeeze the lemons and add the juice to the mix. Mix them really well until it is liquid, and add a pinch of salt. After 15min, take the kafta out, pour the tahini mix on top, then cook the kafta and the tahini together for another 15min. Voila!

Have it with lebanese bread!

PS:  I put too much olive oil this time, don't make my mistake.

Chaza's Blueberry and White Chocolate cake

I have been addicted to muffins for nearly a year now, thanks to our French Chef at work, Claire. She bakes muffins and cakes everyday for the cafe. The first thing we do or (I) do after switching on my computer at work in the morning, is go straight to the online cafe menu and check what's the muffin of the day. Her raspberry and white chocolate, mixed berries and pineapple and coconut muffins are to die for! Lately, we have been sharing 1 muffin amongst 3 or 4 of us as we all have been putting on weight. The best part of the muffin in the 'cantilevered' bit, it's part of the muffin that is hanging beyond the muffin case, don't ask!

Someone is competing with Claire these days, and it's my friend Chaza.

I just got back from an amazing dinner at Chaza's place. I had the chance to taste dishes cooked by her mum, salad dressing invented by her sister but executed remotely by Chaza and finally a delicious, and moist blueberry and white chocolate cake. I couldn't resist but have nearly half the cake, and take the recipe.

Here are the ingredients:

• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup oil (vegetable)
• 1 egg
• Vanilla extract
• 1 tsp baking powder
• Milk (as needed)
• White chocolate chips
• 1 box of blueberries

Mix all together and bake on 180 degrees for 20min, and then lower the temperature to 160 degrees for 15min (These are Chaza's exact words!).

Lentils with swiss chard

This morning, I went and had a lovely breakfast at Pain Quotidien in Notting Hill gate. I had scrambled eggs on brown toast eventhough I was craving poached eggs but they don't make it there. The nice thing about Pain Quotidien is the spreads they put on the table which vary from chocolate spreads to jams. Rhubarb jam is a MUST to taste!! It's delicious.


Getting hungry around lunchtime, I decided to make 3adass b 7amoud ; it takes less than an hour to make! It's a simple traditional Lebanese dish, with lots of nutritional value and very easy to make.

The ingredients:

• 1 cup of brown lentils
• 4 leaves of swiss chard
• 5 cloves of garlic (I love garlic, so I tend to put lots)
• 1 Onion
• 1 Lemon
• Salt
• Cumin

Clean the lentils really well, and put them in a pot with 5 cups of water. Let it boil, wait for 15-20 min until the lentils are a bit cooked. Chop the swiss chard and add them to the lentils and let it cook. Meanwhile, chop the onions and garlic and fry them in a separate pot with a bit of olive oil until the onions are gold in colour. Add the onions and garlic to the lentils mix, some salt and cumin to taste, stir the mix and voila! Squeeze the lemon and pour the juice at the end.

The Falafel Stall turning into Taamiya

I still haven't cooked the promised first dish, but I will make it on Saturday. However, I have to talk about the BEST falafel in London and it's actually down the street from my work. It's a small stall on Goodge Place and their falafel sandwiches are very close to what you get in Lebanon.

The falafel stall belongs to a bigger chain called Hoxton Beach Falafel, please check them out

http://www.hoxtonbeach.com/

The guys over there always greet me and give me sandwiches for free, few days ago my colleague Andy (http://www.andyhau.com/SPLASH.html)  got a free sandwich and today Sachin did! Lucky boys!! Must be my charm (joking...or maybe not) ;-)

Today, they served Taamiya instead of Falafel, it's the Egyptian version of Falafel, to show their support for the Egyptian protestors against Mubarak. They called it "Making the Mubaraks feel at home in London". By the time I arrived there with Sachin, they have sold out, so next Monday it's Taamiya day.

http://www.hoxtonbeach.com/index.php?/falafel/news/making_the_mubaraks_feel_at_home_in_london

I actually never had Taamiya, can't wait to taste that popular Cairo street food next Monday!

Green Valley

I have to say that here in London, we are very lucky to find all the ingredients needed to cook Lebanese food. Everytime I go to Green Valley, I feel that I am at home. Not only because of all the food around me, but also by the generosity and friendliness of the employees. I am always greeted and taken care of. Oh, and they always mistaken me for a 'foreigner'!
Yesterday I bought few ingredients for the first dish I will post on this blog, hopefully I will make it tomorrow.

Cooking 101

I have moved to London in August 2006, just after the Israeli war on Lebanon, to pursue my masters degree at the London School of Economics.

Being away from home, made me miss home cooked food, and this only includes the Lebanese traditional dishes we grew up with.; kebbeh b laban, koussa and warak 3enab just to mention a few. It was hard getting at restaurants the kebbeh or koussa the way our mums would make at home.

Cooking has never appealed to me as something I am able to do, I always thought of it as very difficult and time consuming. I have to say that I have never done any cooking in my life, I have only baked brownies when I was 15 which my school friends loved at the time.

Missing the taste of the Lebanese traditional food, I had to start making it myself. This has started in 2007 with my favourite dish ‘Koussa and Warak 3enab’, yes, one of the most difficult dishes to make, especially scooping inside of the courgettes out! I started calling my mum in Lebanon and getting the instructions over the phone, sometimes the dishes were a success and other times a disaster!

This morning, I woke up and finally decided to start a blog about cooking, and mainly about the Lebanese traditional dishes that I grew up with. I have always wanted to write about this, but I never have the time, as my job occupies most of my time these days.

I was out a couple of months ago to a friend’s leaving do in a bar in South Kensington, and there was a conversation going on between us about how nowadays girls my age do not know how to cook traditional Lebanese dishes. Knowing myself and my constant excited attitude, I was like “ I do, I do, I make koussa, I make bemyeh..” I make this I make that…Then I realised that it’s actually true, none of my friends know or want to cook these dishes. Don’t get me wrong, they do cook, but mainly western dishes, a lot of pasta, quiches etc.

I love western cuisine, and love going out to a nice restaurant and trying different things, but it’s not comfort food for me personally and it never ‘fulfils’ my stomach. 

This blog will document my journey with traditional Lebanese cooking, and how the conception of its difficulty in our minds is actually false. This blog is also my determination of keeping alive our food heritage, my mother and my grandmother’s recipes.