Category Archives: rosewater

Dinner Party: Middle Eastern Feast

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Stevie, Alexxa, and I are attempting a bi-coastal book club. While we haven’t actually talked about anything yet, I read the first book on the list: Annia Ciezadlo’s Day of Honey. It’s an American woman’s memoir of her time in Iraq and Lebanon during the conflicts of the past decade, told from the perspective of the people she met and the food she ate amidst the bombs, checkpoints, and other dehumanizing aspects of war. I loved the book and found it so inspiring and challenging. Especially when it came to my palate.

I have very little experience eating Middle Eastern food–outside of the occasional shawarma and falafel–and even less cooking it. So, why not cook a feast dedicated to the subject for ten people? That seemed like the most logical way to me to understand more about this cuisine. I spent one entire weekend sourcing ingredients (thank you Sahadi’s); soaking lentils, beans, and bulgur; cooking onions so long that they puffed up like Rice Krispies; and creating some of the most interesting, at least texturally speaking, dishes of my life. Who knows how authentic everything was, but in the end, it was all delicious.

My Middle Eastern Feast Menu
Mezes:
Homemade Hummus, Babaganoush, Labne Cheese served with Croatian Olive Oil, Stuffed Grape Leaves, Leftover Caponata (I threw this in there, since I had it in my fridge and Sicilian cuisine is heavily influenced by Arabic culture)

 The bulgur and greens dish shown here was one of my favorites, perhaps because the texture was one more familiar to me… it reminded me of cous cous.

Main (served family-style):
Lebanese Wheat Berry and Dried Corn Soup with Yogurt
Bulgur and Greens with Pistachios and Yogurt
Slow-Roasted Tomatoes with Rosewater and Sesame Seeds
Mjadara (Red Lentil Stew)

 These roasted for 4 hours in a 250-degree oven, dressed with a mixture of turbinado sugar, coarse salt, and cinnamon, then were topped with toasted sesame seeds and rosewater.

Dessert:
Greek Semolina and Yogurt Cake
Rice Pudding

 
The semolina cake was delicious and moist, topped with a lemon sugar syrup. 

Wines:
I’ve been doing some research on Lebanese wines, so we tasted a few bottles from the portfolios of Massaya, Chateau Kefraya, and Chateau Musar.

We washed the meal down with a series of Lebanese wines,
including the 2003 Hochar Pere et Fils featured here.

Many recipes inspired by and adapted from Paula Wolfert‘s Mediterranean Clay Pot Cooking and Ciezadlo’s recipes in Day of Honey. Photos by Anique Halliday.

Food Adventure: Rice Pudding

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I have had rice pudding on the mind for over a year, but I have somehow never gotten around to making the dish, despite having bought all of the ingredients. So when I read about mighli in Annia Ciezadlo’s Day of Honey and started to plan a Middle Eastern dinner party, I thought it might be the perfect time to try out the dish.

Mighli is a rice-based dish served throughout the Middle East for a variety of occasions, according to the culture. In some places, like Lebanon, it is the dish of celebrations, such as the birth of a child. In others, it is a dish of sorrow, perhaps to commemorate a death. Regardless, it is a dish that gathers people together to acknowledge the cycles of life, so it seems like a wonderful thing to have in one’s culinary repertoire.

I tried my hand at the dish, drawing inspiration from a variety of sources and from my own pantry. Warning: this makes a LOT of rice pudding.

  • 3 cups water
  • 1 1/2 cup basmati rice
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 3 cups whole milk
  • 1 cup heavy whipping cream
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/2 vanilla bean, split
  • 1 tablespoon freshly ground ginger
  • 1 tablespoon rosewater
  • 1 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

Bring water, rice, and salt to a boil; simmer, covered, until water is absorbed. Add the remaining ingredients, being sure to scrape the seeds from the bean. Return heat to medium heat, stirring occasionally as the mixture comes together, about 30 minutes. When it achieves a thick, creamy, pudding-like texture, remove from heat. This can be made ahead of time, refrigerated, and kept for up to a week.

Dinner Party: Inspired by Chenin Blanc, a Middle-Eastern Feast

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I’d been waiting for some time for the epic dinner that took place at Stevie’s house with four of my favorite people (myself not included). While in South Africa at Glen Carlou, I’d tasted through their portfolio, including a sweet wine made from 100% Chenin Blanc. I bought a bottle with the express desire to share it with this group – and I was overjoyed when the day finally came.

This wine, combined with my lamb supply and Stevie’s desire for Kuku Kadoo, resulted in the following delicious menu:

Pan-fried lamb chops, scented with cumin
Kuku Kadoo
Persian zucchini frittata
Parsley and tumeric cous cous
served with lamb jus
with rosewater, strawberries, and whipped cream
We sipped on some lovely riesling provided by Stevie and Josiah while cooking, and quite soon, the boys discovered what a seamless cooking team Stevie, Alexxa, and I have become:
Stevie manning the Kuku Kadoo and the wok

Alexxa, hard at work on chopping strawberries

Whipping the meringue
The team at work
We sat down for our lovely Middle-Eastern-inspired dinner with fingers crossed, hoping that all of the elements would meld together… and they did. The use of complementary spices throughout the savory dishes was fantastic, and the various textures – from the smoothness of the Kuku Kadoo to the graininess of the cous cous and the bite of the pesto a top the crispy (and still medium rare) lamb – added a fuller dimension to the meal.

The spread.
Once the meal was complete, we assembled the tasty-but-not-so-beautiful meringues layer by layer, while Josiah, with his rippling forearms and new two-pronged wine opener (recently procured on a trip to Burgundy), opened the Chenin Blanc.
Wonderful, with its chewy texture and rosewater accent

The somm in action.
When I had tried the wine in Africa, I’d been hesitant. I am not the biggest fan of sweet dessert wines, but rather than the cloying sweetness I expected, I had been surprised – it tasted like eiswein, usually grown in the world’s coldest regions and made from frozen grapes, giving the wine a high level of acidity that cuts through the residual sugar. This wine, though from the hot growing region of Paarl, had the same effect on the palette. AND it was delicious with the nutty, floral, and fruity dessert.