Every week for 10 weeks the "grannies" met to eat, drink and be merry. We also talked and talked about art, family, history, love, life, and food.
The Grannies:
Betsy Cordes
Lena Zentgraf
Deirdre Visser
Neha Gupta
Marsha Rose
Amanda Curreri
Diala Khasawnih
 | ||
my tahini twirls.
|
Diala's Menu
Olives including some cured by deirdre. And salmon introduced by lena. Amanda brought triangular nigiris
Thyme mix with olive oil crackers.
Beer and red wine.
Lentil soup
aubergine mtabal
fasoulyeh bilzait
and mhalabyeh
The lentil soup: in a large pot heat a bit of olive oil, then add chilli (I prefer to add one or two dried red ones) and chopped onions (the golden ones). Mix in some cumin seeds, a dash of salt and when the onion is softish add in some chopped carrots and a chopped potato (no need to be smartly chopped since I later go through the whole thing with a hand held blender), add a lot of cumin powder to it and mix. In five minutes or so I add in the lentils (the orange crushed ones) and mix in, add a lot of water. As the soup cooks I add more cumin powder and salt according to taste. Yesterday I used 4 cups of lentils, one large onion, two medium size carrots, one tomato and one chili. The soup could have used more water, depending on what thickness you prefer. When everything is mushy, use the blender, again it is up to you how uniform you like the soup, each their own. Just before serving I added the parsley leaves (could be used for the big bowl as garnish too).
The aubergine (mtabal): I wiped two large aubergines with olive oil and made slits along their lengths and a cross at the bottom since it is a thicker part and can use the slits to cook along. I am not sure how long they stayed in the oven, meanwhile I flipped them to cook on all sides, but I made sure they were really soft before taking them out—Neha you say it takes a long time in the oven so maybe 30 min-45 min? When I took them out it was easy to peel away the skin (no harm if the skin stayed I think). I made a mix of tahini, lemon juice, crushed garlic and salt and mixed it into the aubergine after I chopped them in large mushy chunks. I think the mint leaves work well for both garnish and flavour and a swirl of olive oil never hurts.
The green beans (fasoulya): I washed the green beans and then trimmed off the tips on both sides, sometimes the beans have a string along their “seams” so I try to pull that out along with cutting off the tip, very often there is no string to mention. Then I boiled them in water and a little bit of salt just to make sure they are somewhat soft. Separately in a large pan, I heated some olive oil, added whole garlic cloves (I feel that the more the merrier), one chili, and half an onion (the dried golden type) and salt. When the onion was soft, I added 4 chopped tomatoes and stirred around till those were soft too, then added in the beans and stirred and left them to cook at a lower heat. This dish is meant to be served cold and the bites scooped up in pita bread. One can enjoy fresh chili bites along and raw onions.
Note: There are variations in cooking the green beans, if you wish to add a lot more olive oil to the dish then they can be cooked with the rest of the ingredient together for a long time. Again the dish is meant to offer really soft green beans.
Dessert milk pudding (mhalabiyyeh): a whole carton of full fat milk with 2 spoons (I am confused as to how much, the milk needs to thicken like a pudding) of corn starch mix and continue till boils, meanwhile add sugar and a drop of lemon blossom water (could add rose water too). Place in fridge, serve cold. When serve sprinkle crushed pistachios, or add a few petals of something pretty.
Tahini Twirls
With some variation, I used a recipe that I found on line searching for tahini desserts, I think because Lena made a special sound when I added the tahini to last week’s aubergine mtabbal dish. http://www.turkishcookbook.com/2007/01/tahini-bread.php
I replaced the sugar with black honey (which in my mind was meant to be carob or date black honey). To be specific, instead of 2 spoons of sugar for the dough, I put in two spoons of black honey, and instead of one cup of sugar for the filling I put in half a cup of black honey.
more can be seen at:
http://grandmastable.wordpress.com/
and pictures by Lena: check Galleries: Grandmas Table at http://lenaz.photoshelter.
