Southeast Asian Lentil Soup. I use that cultural appropriation loosely.
Ad hoc’d it with carrot, celery, and jalapeños because they were going south in the fridge.
3 Likes
Love those. British wife still calls them Yorkshire pudding pancakes.
Done countless of both. Yorkshire pudding is a little thinner and leaner batter (ie can add cream to pancake batter, can add water to Yorkshire), pan and fat need to be hotter when you pour, and cook longer. Pancake you take out before it gets firm enough to hold your gravy in.
1 Like
So this might be not interesting at all but I’m so bored it’s painful and I like talking about food.
It seems that there’s a rising interest in “Israeli food” in the culinary world, both in Europe and in the US. Last year James Beard award went to Zahav, an Israeli restaurant in Philadelphia. A year back it was Alon Shaya who took the James Beard Award for best Southwest chef for his Israeli restaurant in New Orleans.
Both restaurants serve pretty ‘basic’ Israeli-food. I’m sure they are high quality, but they would be extremely pedestrian menu in Tel Aviv.
Israeli celebrity-chef such as Eyal Shani and Assaf Granit already have 10+ highly successful restaurants in Europe.
I would imagine one misconception about Israeli food is its relation to what is considered Jewish food in the US. There is no such thing in Israel. No one eats Bagels. Lox and cream cheese is not a thing. Pastrami is made from turkey and is a lunch meat for kids. Oh, and Matzoball soup is only eaten at Passover and it looks nothing like the giant tennis balls served in NY Deli’s.
In fact, almost all popular Israeli food comes from the “Sephardic Jews”, especially the ones from North Africa and Iraq/Iran. That culture mixed with the Palestinian and Arab influence and European techniques is the base for almost all successful modern Israeli cuisine.
So now to what actually made me write this. Yuv wants dishes he used to eat all the time and can’t really get decent versions now. And the first dish is one of my favorite street food ever –
Sabich.
The origins are probably from Iraqi-Jews and a similar dish eaten on Saturday morning (Sabach means morning in Arabic). It is a vegetarian dish (although not vegan), eating inside a pita bread (or pita pocket as I think it’s called here). The main ingredient are deep fried eggplants strips or slices. The eggplant is not usually breaded so while it has a bit of crispy exterior, it is more of a ‘mushy’ or soft texture.
The other ingredients are Tahini sauce (the nectar of life). Usually on the thinner side (as oppose to a spread). “Salad” is an Israeli term for a chopped salad consisting of tomatoes, cucumbers, onion and parsley with lemon juice and olive oil. Boiled potatoes, which are on the blend side and mostly provide texture in my opinion. Sliced Hard-boiled egg, the only non-vegan element of the dish but a must. Amba, perhaps the most controversial, which is a mango-chutney type sauce that is very savory and pungent and usually fall into the “love it or hate it” category. And lastly Zhug, a Yemeni hot sauce.
Some people spread hummus in the pita, but they are wrong and probably spread coronavirus.
A good Sabich is first and foremost about the quality of the eggplants and the frying technique. If you see a bunch of pre-fried eggplants to sweat under a heat lamp, move away from the vendor. The second part is layering. Each bite must consist of all the elements inside the pita. The difference between a good Sabich and a legendary one is the ability to build the pita in layers.
While there are a few more famous places and Effi, the master in this video, has since retired, this was my favorite Sabich place in the universe. I lived right around the corner and while the line was terrible and the amount of time “wasted” on making each dish was almost comical, nothing could beat the results. I hope to see it on a Netflix “street food” episode eventually:
[sorry there’s no spell check option here plus I’m very hungry]
4 Likes
Taim in NYC has great sabich (and maybe the best falafel in the US).
I made a version of that crusty bread up there ^ but took out some steps I think. Did the 5:3.5 ratio, mixed it in a kitchenaid for like 5 minutes, added the salt, mixed for a minute, proofed in an oiled bowl for 30 minutes, folded it in half, proofed for another 1.5 hours.
Baked 15 min at 500 covered, 15 min at 450 covered, then 20 min at 450 uncovered. Forgot to sprinkle some flour in the pot so it took some prying out but the loaf came out perfectly. Crust was thick and chewy and perfect.
4 Likes
Bread Bros
Day 2 of the Guide to popular Israeli* dishes literally no one requested.
Today’s dish was my lunch 5 times a week when I worked across the street from Abu Hassan in Jaffa. It is called Musabbaha. This is a variant of Hummus that is served in almost every Hummusia (a place that specializes in Hummus).
Musabbaha are warm chickpeas, cooked until super soft, mixed with a lot of lemony Tahini, cumin, paprika, parsley, garlic, olive oil and the actual cooking water of the chickpeas. The whole chickpeas give the dish an entirely different texture than regular Hummus and the cooking water kinda act like it does in Pasta sauces like Cacio e Pepe in my opinion.
The best place in Israel for Musabbaha is also the first place I would take any tourist, is Abu Hassan in Jaffa. Here is a link from food vlogger Mark Weins eating the dish. It looks simple, but it’s literally liquid crack.
The dish is served with raw onions that can be used as a dipping tool. Fresh Pita bread and Tatbila sauce, which can be seen in the background of the picture and is made with tons of lemon juice, garlic and hot green peppers. My personal order includes extra chickpeas and spices.
*These are dishes that are popular in Israel, not necessarily Israeli food.
8 Likes
Inspired by something we saw on a Diners Drive Ins, and Dives mini binge that MrsWookie challenged me to make after I said I thought I could, this is homemade potato gnocchi with sautéed mushrooms and arugula, sliced steak, and a red wine pan sauce. As delicious as it is poorly plated.
9 Likes
Tried to make some imitation carbonara (bacon for guanciale, parmesan for pecorino). Got into a fight with the wife cause life, angrily drained the pasta forgetting to save some of the water, semi-burnt the bacon, added the egg-cheese mixture, forgot to turn off the heat.
Anyone interested in over cooked spaghetti a-la burnt bacon with scrambled eggs? :(
I ate breakfast at noon today, consisting of 1/3# bacon, 3 eggs fried in the leftover grease, and 2 English muffins with a shitload of butter. I may survive the virus only to die of an obesity-related illness.
2 Likes
Either that or a cholesterol-related coronary.
Made that bread again. Came out perfectly. Figured the oven was on so I sliced some potatoes thin and made chips while it cooked. Roughly ~40 min at 450.
5 Likes
But it is a noble death. That is all a man can achieve, really.
1 Like
Who has good recipes for stuff to make with scraps/leftovers?
I have reached the “we have a lot of half-used or leftover ingredients so let’s make fried rice” stage of lockdown.
I’ve found that cooking for two so often leaves half an onion, some lonely garlic cloves, half a head of broccoli, half the bunch of asparagus, etc left in the fridge after cooking other things all week. Fortunately by now I know it’s coming so I make extra rice so I can have some sitting in the fridge for this. I don’t want all that other stuff to go bad, so fried rice it is!
It’s super easy to make and you can have it come out tasting just as good as you can get in a restaurant. plus once you’ve prepped it takes like 5 minutes to actually cook. The true key is not really worrying about it being perfect. No peas? who cares. Have some random veggies? Use those! If you want meat you can use bacon, chicken, whatever the hell you have! I’ve even used a chopped up leftover brat (one of those bougie ones from costco) before.
Tonight is was garlic, onion, leftover diced chicken. Simple. No peas because we ran out. Half a head of broccoli, chopped small. The only ingredients you really need are eggs (or fake eggs if you’re vegan), leftover rice, and soy sauce. I make mine all in one go, no taking shit out once it’s cooked and putting it back in later. This ain’t fancy.
There are no fixed amounts of ingredients, either, because I just eyeball it based around how much rice I have.
I start with heating oil in the wok, then i throw in the garlic for ~30 sec, until the aroma releases (you’ll know), then come the onions for a couple minutes until they are cooked down. Next the meat, whatever it is, if it isn’t cooked. then the other veggies if you have them, if not, no biggie.
Push that all to the side of the wok once the meat is decently cooked, then pour in the eggs (I beat them first in a bowl, but you don’t even have to do that) and cook them in the bottom of the wok (like scrambled egg). Helps to have a flat or angled stir fry tool, but whatever. Don’t worry if some of the veggies and meat get scrambled with the egg, it doesn’t fucking matter.
After the egg is sufficiently scrambled, mix it all back together, then throw in the rice. stir it all up, put some soy sauce on it, stir that in and let the rice get hot.
If you have fish sauce, throw some of that on when you’re turning the heat off. It really adds a great umami flavor that is hard to replicate.
Done. Top with a few drops of sesame oil if you want.
I don’t put chili in mine because my hubby and like different spice levels, so we leave that for after it’s on the plate (sriracha or whatever)
I don’t have pictures because it’s fried rice, lmao. But I now have like 6 meals worth of fried rice, it saves well, and reheats like a dream.
note: don’t use freshly cooked rice! overnight (at least) in the fridge is the best way!
1 Like
I’ve found oyster sauce to be the magic ingredient to make fried rice taste like the restaurant version.
3 Likes
I bought the Instant Pot Ace Blender, so now I can turn leftover vegetables into creamy soups. Similar things can be done if you have an immersion blender.
1 Like
I pretty much always turn leftovers into sandwiches (leftover roast meat or the like), or else the stuff is just supposed to be reheated and eaten as is (soups and stews)