Kofta Saniya (Middle Eastern Meatball and Vegetable Casserole)

 

I had a couple of eggplants and different peppers leftover in the fridge that needed using up... here's a great recipe for that sort of thing!

This is a delicious Middle Eastern casserole with spiced meatballs, a variety of roasted peppers and eggplant in olive oil, all baked in a zesty tomato sauce. 

For the meatballs:

- 1 lb medium ground beef

- 1 large bunch parsley, finely chopped

- 2 cloves garlic, minced/grated

- 1/4 red onion, minced or grated

- Salt and black pepper

Mix all of the above together and make gold ball sized meatballs .. now taper each side slightly by flattening it in your hand.  Set aside to marinade until the meat is room temp. 

For the vegetables:

- 1-2 eggplants 

- A variety of peppers - I used the long red and green ones like you see here 

- 1/4 cup olive oil (Goog EVOO from Olive That!) 

- 1 red onion, sliced in rings (set aside for later) 

Slice the eggplant lengthwise or into rounds, salt them lightly and set them flat on a plate for them to release some of their water. 

Clean the peppers out and cut them in thick ring sizes. 

Heat the olive oil in a pan and add the peppers, cook on medium high until they're slightly blistered and wilted/caramelized. 

Add them to a casserole dish. 

Now add the eggplant and sautee on both sides until nice and golden. Set aside. 

(I do this part outdoors!) 

Fire up the grill!! 

Add the koftas to the grill and allow them to get nice and grilled (marks and all) They should be still raw inside, so I use a high temperature and simply brown the outsides. 

Leftover ingredients 

- 1/2 jar pessata (strained tomato) 

 -1 tbsp turkish aleppo red pepper flakes

-3 slices of lemon (washed rind) 

Add the onion rings over the peppers in the casserole dish, and nestle the meatballs (koftas) from the grill nicely over the vegetables. Sprinkle the turkish aleppo red pepper flakes over.  Top with pieces of eggplant. Finish with the strained tomato sauce, pouring it over top, shake the casserole so some of the sauce goes to the bottom and coats everything.  Add slices of lemon to the top (optional!)

Bake at 375 for about 30-40 minutes or until the meatballs are cooked through and all it smells delicious! 

Enjoy with bread or white rice! 

Turkish Borek Appetizer (using Cookin' Greens)

I want to express my excitement for this product that I recently discovered, it's called Cookin Greens and it's basically all those good healthy greens that you should be eating but might be too intimidated to try, or maybe like me you're just too inconvenienced by the process of buying those large bunches of wet leaves from the supermarket and then having to shove them in the fridge somewhere and wash/chop/blanch whenever you have a moment in your busy life!

Who has time for all that? I'm sure those are some of the reasons that people are less encouraged to buy them regularly!  .... so you can imagine my excitement when I saw this bag of frozen greens on tv, I mean flash frozen greens which are at the convenience of your fingertips, just open the bag and throw it into soups, pasta dishes, casseroles, blanch, steam, make dip, whatever you fancy but you can at least sleep at night knowing that you've had your GREENS! Those greens that we keep hearing about as cancer fighting and probably the healthiest of all the vegetables.

I will be buying these, for sure! They are available at the organic frozen freezer in Metro, and Loblaws Superstore as well as other stores, check their site www.cookingreens.com for more details.   I think it's totally worth it because you're getting the healthy and fresh greens which you sometimes can't even get in the regular produce department.
I wanted to make something that is fun for parties so a Turkish borek was perfect, we make it regularly in our household and it's a hit with guests because it's crispy, delicate, fancy and vegetarian too but healthy all at the same time!  Normally we make it with spinach but adding the greens will just bump up the nutrition.  You can do it with just greens or greens and feta cheese.

Turkish Borek Appetizer  (using Cookin' Greens Designer mix instead of plain spinach)

Filling:


- 1 pack Cookin' Greens designer mix (it containers spinach, rapini, collards, onion, yellow wax beans)  I dumped it all into a shallow pan and picked out the wax beans then threw them back into the freezer for another use.

Blanch greens: Place in a pot with 1/2 cup water, pinch of salt and 2 cloves of garlic whole, steam for 5-10 minutes.  Strain the greens from the water really well and place into shallow pan.

Use the water for soup or just add some salt and drink it! It's healthy :)



- 1 cup feta cheese
- 1-2 tbsp lemon juice (optional)

Shell:
- 1 package phyllo from freezer, thawed overnight in fridge.

Batter, mix in a bowl:

- 1 cup milk
- 1 cup yogurt
- 1/2 cup olive oil (or melted butter) You can use another oil if you'd like.

- 2 eggs

Pinch of salt



Preheat oven to 350 F

Open phyllo package, lay the pieces flat.
Take 2 layers and place in pan, if the pieces are larger than the pan it's ok, crinkle them up a bit to make it fit.

Add a ladle or so of batter and spread over the phyllo layer, using hand make sure to cover all areas so the phyllo isn't dry.

Do another 2 layers, then batter, then another 2 and batter and another 2 then you would have achieved 8 layers.  No batter on the top here.

Add the greens, spread out.
Grate the feta with a large grater over top, sprinkle with lemon juice and begin with another 8 layeres, two at a time adding batter over top each 2 layers.  If you want them more crispy use less batter, you could have 2 ladle fulls leftover like me.

Score almost all the way through into long finger shapes or into squares, if making appetizers do them smaller.

Bake, and check in 35 minutes. Broil on top if needed for a golden layer (it boils in seconds so stay close to the oven)

Recipe adapted from this lovely video by Turkish Mother and Daughter duo cooking in the kitchen.

Enjoy!! :)
.. And there is no excuse when it comes to entertaining... I threw together this little party grazing station in seconds!!   Thanks to the mounds of stuff I collect from my favourite places like IKEA/ Chapters/Indigo and HomeSense as well as some small treats I had laying around (dry nuts/cookies, kettle corn)  it all came together.

My Middle Eastern twist on the Cheese Ball

This is my take on the cheese ball (the famous creamy soft appetizer served with some kind of crispy chip/bread at parties)

Here I've added my middle eastern touch, and served them with homemade lavash (it's really quite simple to make, you will be surprised!)

We'll start with the cheese ball(s)

I used soft savoury cheeses, no cream cheese here.

I start with Lebneh, it is a middle eastern soft creamy "cheese" made from yogurt, basically it's a strained yogurt, it's like the greek yogurt and it's the base used in dips or just served as a breakfast food drizzled with olive oil (you've probably seen it on my blog before!)

I made my lebneh because it's super easy, check out the basic instructions here  on my flickr.  Salt is added during the process so it's already seasoned.

Even after it's done sometimes lebneh can release some water as it sits so before making the cheese ball I strain some again by placing the desired amount into a bowl lined with a clean sheet of paper towel (a sturdy paper towel brand is better so that it doesn't fall apart)  This should just make it extra firm. 

The second cheese I used is goat cheese and the third variety is sheep's feta, both these were whisked together until creamy (feta is a bit crumbly so it requires a bit of whisking into the goat cheese to yield a smooth consistency)

I'd say the ratio is 50 % lebneh to 30%  goat cheese and 2% feta. 

For flavourings you can add whatever you like into the cheese or leave it plain!  I grated a small clove of garlic and zested a lemon (just a bit!)   No need to add salt and all these cheeses have enough salt. 

Blend, mixing well (you can set it in the fridge overnight!) 

Now I roll out 3  pieces of cling wrap and 3 big dollops of this creamy cheese mixture in the centre of each piece, divide in thirds so they end up equal.

Bringing the sides of the cling wrap together and twisting at the base, I tried to shape the cheese into a ball as best as possible then set them all on a flat plate and into the freezer for 20 minutes or so (this will make it easier to work with)

For the first cheese ball I rolled it in toasted pine nuts (toast the day before if you'll be too busy the day of your party!)  Toast in a dry pan on medium low until golden and move them around so they don't burn. 

Set aside to cool.

When I was ready to roll I  removed the balls and simply rolled the top and sides because this cheese is  pretty soft so I upwrapped the top and held the bottom with the cling wrap and just dunked top facing down into the pine nuts and then covered the sides by rolling gently. 

I set it gently on a plate and pulled out the cling wrap from under. 

The same technique worked for the chives (chopped finely) and the last one is covered in a light dusting of coloured pepper corns that were crushed in the mortar and pestle. Using coloured peppercorns is better that straight black ones because the green/pink peppercorns are more mild (I don't even think they're actual peppercorns but more like in the berry family or something)   I love black pepper but this one might be too intense for some people so you could switch this for anything else that you prefer. 

LAVASH:

The lavash is of 3 or 4 varieties but the dough is all the same.  It begins with the awesome recipe from my favourite bread book, Peter Reinhart's "The Bread Baker's Apprentice"  (I travelled around the world clutching this book and preferred to leave behind clothing just so that I'd be able to carry this book back with me! It is that fantastic!)

Check out the recipe here in case you do not have the book, but I highly recommend getting it.

I made the dough, proofed it overnight (yeah yeah, a little longer that I should have but anyway.. ) then divided it into 3 equal sized balls.

I rolled out and baked one at a time.  Rolling out each piece really thin, drizzled and wiped it with a bit of water and sprinkled the first with toasted sesame seeds, the second I did half with toasted cumin seeds and sea salt and the other half with toasted corriander seeds and sea salt. 

The last one I grated a bit of aged parm cheese (the real stuff) 

Bake, break 'em up into bite sized pieces and start dipping!!

Enjoy your party!

Mom's Schnitzel & my oven fries

Breaded steaks: 

Thinly sliced (and pounded) pieces of beet or veal (your choice!)   Usually it's the eye of round I believe, not sure but ask your butcher, or you can find it already sliced in the supermarket labelled schnitzel or frying steak.

However many you'd like to make, I'd do one per person if it's a bigger slice or two if they're smaller.

Take your meat and seaon with salt, black pepper and set aside.
Slice a large or medium onion in big strips and then toss all the onion with the meat in a casserole and set aside to marinade.  The onions will lend the meat great flavour  (if you are not a fan of onion - like some members in my family - you can leave it out although one person in my family doesn't mind the onion flavour and the other found it too oniony which caused heartburn)

Maybe use shallots, if you want, they're milder.

When ready to fry heat oil in wok or shallow pan for pan frying.

(remove meat from the onion - some moisture may be drawn out of the meat so just lay them on a paper towel)

This is assembly work so set out 3 shallow plates

- Flour  (season with Aromat- it's a German/european seasoning salt type thing, it may not be healthy but the flavour is too nastolgic for me to give up)   If you don't have it use salt, a dash of garlic salts and black pepper.
- Egg, beaten (add a dash of worstershire sauce, if you want)
- Panko or ground corn flake crumbs (this is what we use!)

..  and begin dredging the slices of meat in that order, flour, egg, and crumbs and then frying on both sides until golden and draining on more paper towel.

My Oven Fries: 

Heat oven to 425 F.

Peel (or you can keep the peels on) and slice potatoes into fries, not too thick or thin and they MUST all be equal in size as to cook evenly.

3 large potatoes works great, or 5 smaller potatoes.

Prepare a large baking pan, as not to crowed the fries and line with a sheet of parchment, make sure it's bigger than the pan for easy cleanup and so oil does not go everywhere.

- Toss sliced potatoes in a large bowl and add 3 tbsp oil or so and a big pinch/dash of salt. Toss and then pour them onto the tray and arrange so they're in a single layer.

Bake and flip over when bottom side is golden so the top can also brown.  If you have convection settings in your oven use it, as for me both in my oven and toaster oven both sides brown at the same time cutting down on baking time and yielding some crispy fries.  It takes about 30 mins of so on regular bake.

Simple Broad bean soup تشريب الباقلاء

Iraqi broad bean soup

This is a simple yet delicious traditional recipe that is often eaten in the fasting month of Ramadan.

These are not fava beans but broad beans and they're dried, they are large and flat, you may be able to find them at your local supermarket if you have a wide variety of legumes or try a middle eastern shop

Measure out desired amount of beans and soak the night before in a large bowl of water.

The following day place the beans and their water in a large pot and add more water over top.

Peel one or two large onions and throw them in whole then boil and simmer until they are tender. Salt it and simmer some more, at this point the onion may totally fall apart but thats ok.

If you have a pressure cooker this is a good place to use it, also if you salt beans too early sometimes they can become tough and not cook properly so I tend to salt once they become a bit tender.

You could add garlic in if you like but I like it very plain like that and then eaten with flat bread (even day old bread works because it will be torn into small pieces and placed in the soup, traditionally you place the bread in the bowl first and then pour the soup and beans over)

Add a wedge of lemon and enjoy!
** Usually because the peels of these beans are tough we don't eat them, so gently apply pressure to one side of the bean, either the top of bottom and the inside should come out easily to eat.

Here I made the bread myself because I did not have time to go to the store.

Here's my recipe for a tanoor style bread using an outdoor BBQ grill.

1 tsp instant yeast

1 tsp sugar

some water

proof for 10 minutes

Add 3/4 cups yogurt

1 tbsp oil

A dash of salt

3 cups flour and blend with hands until it comes together, it will be sticky but knead it with hands in a bowl until it is smooth.

Allow it to rise at least 2 hours.

Divide in smaller balls and place them on a tray lined with plastic wrap. Cover with another sheet of plastic wrap and let it rise until ready to use.

Heat bbq outdoor grill until it reaches above 500. Oil the grill, I have a cast iron so I clean and oil it every use.

Set a little bowl of flour close by and flour hands then pat the balls of bread one at a time into a flat shape, stretching and flattening

Place on the grill and flip over as soon as it is browned slightly on the bottom and bubbles formed on the top, it all happens very quickly.

Flip it over just until the puffy spots turn slightly brown and charred then remove it and place on a clean plate. Use a stick of butter to butter the top of each one.

Serve hot or set in the fridge or freezer for later use.

Garnish with fresh cilantro and a sprinkling of salt.

For the salt chop tomato and cucumber finely into small squares and season with salt and a squeeze of lemon juice, mix and enjoy with any arabic meal!