I have a little problem. I'm addicted to cookbooks, food writing, recipe collecting, and cooking. I have a lot of recipes waiting for me to try them, and ideas from articles, tv, and restaurants often lead to new dishes. I started losing track of what I've done. So now I'm taking photos and writing about what I've prepared—unless it's terrible in which case I forget it ever happened.
I’m always on the lookout for vegetarian recipe inspiration, and Middle Eastern food is an excellent source. The latest book from Greg and Lucy Malouf is New Feast: Modern Middle Eastern Vegetarian, and I received a review copy. In the introduction, it’s explained that the climate and terrain of the Middle East is suited to growing a variety of vegetables and less so to raising animals for meat at a large scale. So, we easily find many vegetable, grain, and legume dishes with plenty of herbs and spices. As the authors set out to create this vegetarian cookbook, they wanted to excite people who are trying to eat more plant-based foods and offer some new ideas to those already on that path. The chapters include Breakfast, Breads, Butters and Preserves, Dips and Spreads, Pickles and Relishes, Soups, Stuffed Vegetables, Fritters, Savory Pastries, Raw Vegetable Salads, Cooked Vegetable Salads, Hot Vegetable Dishes, Grains, Rice, Legumes, Pasta and Couscous, Ices, Desserts, Sweet Pastries, and Cakes and Cookies. And, there’s a Menu Ideas list for how to group dishes for different occasions. One of my favorite menus is the Middle-of-the-week working lunch menu: Semolina Bread with Aniseed and Sesame; Artichoke and Lemon Labneh; Baked Tomatoes with Saffron, Bulgur, and Barberries; Shankleesh Salad with Parsley and Pomegranate; and Lemon Posset with Fennel Shortbread Thins. Some other recipes I’d like to try include the Middle Eastern Granola with Pomegratate, Sour Cherries, and Pistachios that’s made even prettier with dried rose petals and the Honey-Roasted Carrots with Dates Dandelions and Moroccan Dressing. But, I got completely distracted by the Breads chapter. The soft, pillowy-looking Sesame Joujou Breads were a strong contender, and then I saw the Griddled Flatbreads and all the suggested options for toppings. To go with the flatbreads, the Spicy Carrot Pickle looked like a fun pairing, and as warned in the head note, it is addictive.
I started on the flatbread dough first since it needed to proof. Flour and baking powder were sifted before the yeast was added. Warm milk along with olive oil, yogurt, an egg, and salt were added next. Everything was combined in a stand mixer and then kneaded with the dough hook on low speed for several minutes to create a very smooth dough. It was placed in a bowl, covered, and left to rise for an hour. Meanwhile, I moved on to the carrot pickle. Carrots were cut into matchsticks and set aside. For a spice paste, cumin seeds and dried chiles were ground to a powder. Salt, minced garlic, and grated fresh ginger were added along with turmeric. In a saucepan, oil was heated and cumin and mustard seeds were fried until they popped. Curry leaves were called for, but I failed to procure them and left them out. The spice paste was added to the oil followed by apple juice and apple cider vinegar. The carrot matchsticks were stirred into the mixture. The heat was lowered to allow the carrots to barely simmer for about 15 minutes. Moving back to the flatbreads, the dough was divided into six pieces, and each piece was rolled just before cooking. The breads were cooked in a dry pan over high heat for a couple of minutes per side. After removing each bread from the pan, it was brushed with olive oil and sprinkled with herbs and spices. I used a mixture of sumac, za’atar, and fresh oregano on some breads and crushed fennel seeds and Aleppo pepper on others.
The carrot pickle was nicely spicy. I tore off pieces of bread and spooned carrot matchsticks onto each bite. I kept thinking how delicious the carrot pickle would be on a sandwich. And, the breads bubbled just as they should while cooking and came out of the pan crisp on the edges and deliciously chewy in the middle. Eating vegetarian is an easy sell with flavors like these.
This is a wonderful all-purpose dough that suits both griddled and naan-style baked flatbreads, which are the most popular accompaniment for Middle Eastern meals. Use the basic recipe to make a batch of dough and fry them plain, or choose the filling that you fancy from below. The quantities of dough and fillings are sufficient for six large-ish flatbreads or eight smaller ones.
MAKES 6–8 450 g (1 lb) strong (bread) flour, plus extra for dusting 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 2 teaspoons dried active yeast (7.5 g / 1/4 oz sachet) 2 teaspoons caster (superfine) sugar 150 ml (5 fl oz) hand-hot milk 30 ml (1 fl oz) vegetable oil 150 g (5 oz) natural yoghurt, lightly beaten 1 egg, lightly beaten clarified butter, for brushing
Sift the flour and baking powder into the bowl of a stand-mixer. Add the salt to one side of the bowl and the yeast to the opposite side (salt can kill the yeast).
Dissolve the sugar in the hand-hot milk then add it to the bowl, along with the oil, yoghurt and egg. Mix briefly to form a ball.
Knead with the dough hook on a slow–medium speed for 10 minutes. You may need to scrape it up from the bottom of the bowl every now and then. Once the gluten has developed and the dough is smooth and satiny, shape it into a ball with lightly oiled hands and transfer to a large bowl. Cover with a tea towel and set aside in a draught-free spot for an hour, or until doubled in size.
Punch down the dough and knead by hand for a few minutes. Divide into 6 or 8 equal balls. At this point you can fry the breads as they are, or fill them with one of the stuffings, as outlined below.
Keeping the rest covered, roll out one ball of dough onto a floured work surface, to a 30 cm (12 in) round for large breads or 23 cm (9 in) for smaller ones.
Heat a large, heavy-based frying pan over a very high heat. Fry the bread in the dry pan until large bubbles start to appear on the surface – it should only take 1–2 minutes. Flip over and fry for a further minute, or until lightly golden.
Brush with clarified butter while still warm and serve. Repeat with the rest of the dough.
Spicy Carrot Pickle
This much-loved pickle seems to go with just about everything. We think you’ll find it’s addictive; we’ve been known to finish a jar in one sitting.
MAKES AROUND 4 X SMALL-ISH (340 G / 12 OZ) JARS 1 kg (2 lb 4 oz) carrots 2 teaspoons cumin seeds 2 teaspoons mustard seeds 6 fresh curry leaves (or dried will do at a pinch) 100 ml (3 1/2 fl oz) apple juice 200 ml (7 fl oz) cider vinegar
Spice paste 2 teaspoons cumin seeds 3–4 small dried red chillies (depending on their heat) 1 teaspoon sea salt 5 cloves garlic, roughly chopped 50 g (1 3/4 oz) fresh ginger, peeled and roughly chopped 1 teaspoon turmeric 75 g (2 1/2 oz) soft brown sugar 3 tablespoons vegetable oil
Cut the carrots into roughly 6 cm (2 1/2 in) lengths, then cut into matchsticks. Set aside.
To make the spice paste, combine the cumin seeds and dried chillies in a mortar and grind to a fine powder. Add the salt, garlic and ginger to the mortar and continue to grind to a fairly smooth paste. Add the turmeric and sugar and mix in well.
Heat the oil in a wide casserole pan – a cast iron Le Creuset is ideal. Add the cumin and mustard seeds and fry for 10 seconds or until they just start to pop. Add the curry leaves and fry for 1–2 minutes, until they turn translucent. Add the spice paste and cook, stirring, for 2 minutes. Add the apple juice and vinegar and bring to a vigorous simmer. Add the carrots and stir well, so that they are all coated with the spicy liquid.
Lower the heat to a gentle simmer and cook for 15–20 minutes, stirring every few minutes to ensure they cook evenly. By the end of the cooking time the carrots should be soft, but still retain some texture and the liquid should have reduced by about one-third.
Leave to cool slightly then transfer to sterilized jars and store for up to 3 months. Once opened, store in the fridge and use within 5 days.
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When I was telling you about the new book Basic to Brilliant, Ya'll, I mentioned that I planned to make the shrimp rillettes for Thanksgiving. Well, I did, and I’m so glad that I did. I made the fennel flatbreads too which was the option for making this basic recipe brilliant, and they were fantastic as well. After the shrimp were cooked and pureed with butter and cream cheese, the mixture needed to be chilled for at least eight hours, but a quick taste let me know we’d be in for something delicious. While the rillettes chilled in a covered ramekin, I set about making the flatbreads and learned a good lesson. After rolling out pieces of dough as thinly as possible, they were supposed to have been placed directly onto a baking sheet that had been brushed with olive oil. I somehow thought it would be a good idea to use a silpat brushed with olive oil and placed on a baking sheet as you can see in the photo below. The silpat prevented the flabreads from browning in the oven. So, then I did as I was told in the recipe and baked the next few directly on a baking sheet, and they were golden, crispy, fennel seed-flecked perfection.
To begin the rillettes, shallots were sauteed in oil with a bay leaf, and then peeled and deveined shrimp were added with some white wine. The shrimp were seasoned with salt and pepper and just cooked until pink. The mixture was transferred to a food processor and pureed with butter, cream cheese, lemon zest, and chives. You could then place the rillettes into individual jars for serving, but I placed the entire mixture into one ramekin and covered it with plastic wrap pressed directly on the surface. The ramekin was chilled overnight, but it could have been made a few days in advance. The dough for the fennel flatbreads was quickly mixed in the food processor. Bread flour, sea salt, fresh thyme leaves, and fennel seeds were pulsed, and then cold water was added and pulsed until the dough formed. The dough was removed from the processor bowl and kneaded until smooth. Then, it was divided into ten pieces, and each piece was rolled out as thinly as possible. After rolling, each piece was sprinkled with salt and pepper and given one more roll with the rolling pin. To bake, the flatbreads should definitely be placed directly on a baking sheet that has been brushed with olive oil. They baked for about 20 minutes.
The flatbreads were fragrant from the thyme and fennel seeds, and they snapped easily into bite-size pieces to be spread with the rillettes. And, those rillettes were rich and decadent, and the wine and lemon zest added lovely flavor. This is an ideal item for a party since you’re required to make it in advance, and the flatbreads also store well for a few days. Once it’s served though, it disappears quickly.
I grew up in Illinois, the very center of the Midwest US, where we used to say that every recipe had a can of soup in it. Yes, despite being the agricultural mecca of the country, the Midwest was known as a land of casseroles more so than one of fresh, fabulous food, but all of that might have changed in the last few years. I received a review copy of the new book Heartland the Cookbook and learned of several new things about the food scene there. The number of artisan food purveyors has drastically increased. There's now La Quercia in Iowa which makes prosciutto from heritage Berkshire pigs, foraged foods are showing up on high-end restaurant menus, microbreweries and microdistilleries are making small batch products, and Prairie Fruits Farm in Champaign, Illinois and other small dairies are making chevre. Years ago, I attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and I don't recall any local cheese purveyors in town back then. I was thrilled to read about this change and the growing focus on local foods. I also learned that the Midwest now has thirty-three Slow Food chapters making it second only to the California Oregon Washington region. In addition to delivering all of that great news, the book is also full of beautiful photos of rural landscapes and, of course, food.
The recipes include breakfast dishes, breads, nibbles and drinks, salads and soups, main courses, and desserts. Several of the dishes recommend locally made items like that chevre from Champaign, Illinois or Chicago-made Vosges chocolate that's used in a hot fudge sundae with salted caramel sauce. I haven't made it back to the Midwest for a visit lately, so instead of using specific products from there, I cooked with the spirit of the book by using what I could get locally in Austin. There's a recipe for four seasons flatbread which showcases seasonal items in different toppings. The flatbreads themselves are made from no-knead recipes also in the book. I chose the no-knead sour caraway rye dough topped with a fresh herb cheese, sliced radishes, and chives. I used a feta, spinach, and herb spread made by Full Quiver Farm, and I found pretty, Easter egg radishes, and some green garlic which I added to the toppings, at the farmers' market last weekend. The no-knead dough was as simple as dough gets. Bread flour, rye flour, instant yeast, salt, cocoa powder for color, caraway seeds, molasses, yogurt, and water were mixed in a large bowl. Since there's no kneading, you do need to mix thoroughly with a spoon, but then the dough just sits to rise for a couple of hours and that's it. The dough was patted into an oval on a baking sheet, and it baked until browned and crisp on the surface. Once cool, the cheese was spread on top, and it was covered with sliced radishes and green garlic and chopped chives.
Fresh, early spring flavors of radish and green garlic and a thin layer of rich cheese were complemented nicely by the rye flatbread with caraway, cocoa, and molasses. As soon as local heirloom tomatoes appear, I'll use them for the flatbread version made with clover honey dough. The other recipes I'm looking forward to trying are prairie panzanella made with cornbread, an heirloom bean ragout in an acorn squash, and the next time we use the grill, I'm making the smoked goat cheese. Mostly, I'm looking forward to my next visit to the Midwest where I'll be seeking out some of the food artisans I learned about in the book.
I’m submitting this to Yeastspotting where you’ll find some seriously well-made bread.
If you have any questions about what to do with late summer eggplant, I have the answer. Make this fragrant, delicious spread and enjoy it with some flatbread. This was in the Paula Wolfert article in the May issue of Food and Wine. Then, I saw these double tomato flatbreads on Yeastspotting a few weeks ago, and the two seemed to belong together. The eggplant is cooked whole on top of the stove, and then the meltingly tender flesh is combined with garlic, olive oil, canned, diced tomato, fresh herbs, and spices. This is a mixture that I knew would be a good one, and it smelled fantastic as it cooked, but the flavor was even better than I anticipated once I tasted it. I imagined there would be leftovers for lunch the next day, but the entire bowl was emptied quickly. I’m hoping to get a couple of eggplants at the farmers’ market this week so I can make it again but as a double batch this time.
I used a dutch oven which was heated on top of the stove, and the big, one and a quarter pound eggplant was pierced and placed in it. It was covered and left to cook in the dry pan over low heat for 40 minutes. The eggplant was turned after 20 minutes. Then, it was placed in a colander in the sink and cut down one side so it could drain. Once cool, the flesh was scraped into a large skillet, and minced garlic, tomatoes, olive oil, parsley, cilantro, paprika, cumin, and cayenne were added. This was cooked until the liquid evaporated, and then lemon juice was squeezed into the mixture.
Making the flatbreads couldn’t have been easier. I wasn’t able to find the suggested tomato powder for the dough, so I used tomato paste. That was combined with flour, yeast, sugar, salt, and paprika in a food processor. Water and vinegar were added while the processor was running. Sun-dried tomatoes were added and pulsed to combine, and then the dough sat in the food processor for about 30 minutes. The dough was divided, rolled into rounds, and quickly cooked in a hot cast iron skillet until it bubbled and was browned. We did have a few pieces of bread left over because this made eight pieces, and they freeze and re-heat nicely.
Any flatbread would work fine here, and if I don’t have time to make homemade flatbread next time I’ll probably buy pita to go with it, but this tomato bread with bits of chewy sun-dried tomato was a very good match. The cumin, cayenne, and paprika in the eggplant added depth of flavor, and the herbs and lemon perked it up well. I could have made a meal of just the eggplant and flatbread, and with a few olives on the side and a glass of wine, it’s a great way to enjoy summer coming to an end.
We’ve arrived at the end of our CSA’s summer season, and the fall season won’t begin until October. Our last pick-up included both summer and winter squash along with sweet potatoes, okra, edamame on the stem, cucumbers, chiles, green bell peppers, basil, and black-eyed peas. The winter squash threw me for a bit of a loop. I wasn’t ready to see that kind of vegetable. I had to think for a while about how I should use it because it’s too soon for a serious, heavy kind of squash dish. I had also just received some camembert from Ile de France, and I decided to put the two together. The winter squash was smallish and round and mostly orange with some green, and I have no idea what variety of squash it was. I cut it in half, removed the seeds, roasted it, then peeled away the skin, and chopped it into chunks. I got inspired by some long, oval flatbreads I saw in one book or another and thought the squash and cheese with some cremini mushrooms sauteed in olive oil with rosemary would make good toppings.
I used my quick, standard pizza dough recipe which starts with one packet of dry yeast mixed with one cup of warm water in a large mixing bowl. To that, three-quarters cup of whole wheat flour and a quarter cup of unbleached, AP flour are added. Once stirred together with a wooden spoon, two tablespoons of olive oil, half a teaspoon of salt, and a few turns-worth of cracked black pepper are added. Then, two more cups or so of AP flour are stirred in until the dough forms a ball. The ball of dough is turned out onto a floured board and kneaded with more flour as needed for about five minutes. It is then placed in a large, oiled bowl, covered with a towel, and left to rise for at least an hour. Once risen, it’s removed from the bowl, kneaded a few times, and left to rest on the board for 20 minutes while the oven pre-heats to 500 F with a baking stone on the bottom rack. The dough was rolled into thin, slipper shapes and topped with the sauteed mushrooms, rosemary, and the remaining oil in the saute pan. The squash chunks were scattered about, and the cheese was applied on top. The flat breads were slid onto the baking stone, one at a time, to bake for seven minutes each.
It was a simple combination of flavors that balanced the squash’s sweetness with the earthy mushrooms and herbal rosemary. The camembert was rich and smooth and couldn’t possibly have done anything wrong. These flatbreads tasted a little like fall but not too much. They were crunchy and fun enough to not be too serious about the winter squash, and camembert was the perfect choice for cheese.
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, and I received a review copy. In the introduction, it’s explained that the climate and terrain of the Middle East is suited to growing a variety of vegetables and less so to raising animals for meat at a large scale. So, we easily find many vegetable, grain, and legume dishes with plenty of herbs and spices. As the authors set out to create this vegetarian cookbook, they wanted to excite people who are trying to eat more plant-based foods and offer some new ideas to those already on that path. The chapters include Breakfast, Breads, Butters and Preserves, Dips and Spreads, Pickles and Relishes, Soups, Stuffed Vegetables, Fritters, Savory Pastries, Raw Vegetable Salads, Cooked Vegetable Salads, Hot Vegetable Dishes, Grains, Rice, Legumes, Pasta and Couscous, Ices, Desserts, Sweet Pastries, and Cakes and Cookies. And, there’s a Menu Ideas list for how to group dishes for different occasions. One of my favorite menus is the Middle-of-the-week working lunch menu: Semolina Bread with Aniseed and Sesame; Artichoke and Lemon Labneh; Baked Tomatoes with Saffron, Bulgur, and Barberries; Shankleesh Salad with Parsley and Pomegranate; and Lemon Posset with Fennel Shortbread Thins. Some other recipes I’d like to try include the Middle Eastern Granola with Pomegratate, Sour Cherries, and Pistachios that’s made even prettier with dried rose petals and the Honey-Roasted Carrots with Dates Dandelions and Moroccan Dressing. But, I got completely distracted by the Breads chapter. The soft, pillowy-looking Sesame Joujou Breads were a strong contender, and then I saw the Griddled Flatbreads and all the suggested options for toppings. To go with the flatbreads, the Spicy Carrot Pickle looked like a fun pairing, and as warned in the head note, it is addictive. 
, I mentioned that I planned to make the shrimp rillettes for Thanksgiving. Well, I did, and I’m so glad that I did. I made the fennel flatbreads too which was the option for making this basic recipe brilliant, and they were fantastic as well. After the shrimp were cooked and pureed with butter and cream cheese, the mixture needed to be chilled for at least eight hours, but a quick taste let me know we’d be in for something delicious. While the rillettes chilled in a covered ramekin, I set about making the flatbreads and learned a good lesson. After rolling out pieces of dough as thinly as possible, they were supposed to have been placed directly onto a baking sheet that had been brushed with olive oil. I somehow thought it would be a good idea to use a silpat brushed with olive oil and placed on a baking sheet as you can see in the photo below. The silpat prevented the flabreads from browning in the oven. So, then I did as I was told in the recipe and baked the next few directly on a baking sheet, and they were golden, crispy, fennel seed-flecked perfection.
and learned of several new things about the food scene there. The number of artisan food purveyors has drastically increased. There's now La Quercia in Iowa which makes prosciutto from heritage Berkshire pigs, foraged foods are showing up on high-end restaurant menus, microbreweries and microdistilleries are making small batch products, and Prairie Fruits Farm in Champaign, Illinois and other small dairies are making chevre. Years ago, I attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and I don't recall any local cheese purveyors in town back then. I was thrilled to read about this change and the growing focus on local foods. I also learned that the Midwest now has thirty-three 
It was a simple combination of flavors that balanced the squash’s sweetness with the earthy mushrooms and herbal rosemary. The camembert was rich and smooth and couldn’t possibly have done anything wrong. These flatbreads tasted a little like fall but not too much. They were crunchy and fun enough to not be too serious about the winter squash, and camembert was the perfect choice for cheese.