KooKoo Sabzi Recipe

Ingredients:

• vegetables (parsley, dill, coriander, lettuce, spring onion ends), about 1 kg
• 6 x large free range eggs
• Zereshk (barberry) 2 spoonfuls
• 2 handfuls of chopped walnuts
• wheat flour, one spoon
• sunflower oil
• salt
• ground black pepper

Wash herbs and rinse thoroughly. Chop finely. Add eggs, salt, pepper, flour, barberry and walnuts. Mix well and beat it to get lots of air into the mixture.

Heat oil in a non-stick pan until it is really hot. Pour in the mixture, flatten the surface with the back of a spoon, and place the lid on. Reduce heat and all to fry for about 10 minutes, until kookoo is cooked under. Cut into 4 equal pieces, turn over, and allow to cook on a low heat for another 20 minutes.

HINTS:

• Chives, sometimes called garlic chives are the same as “tarreh”. If you can’t find fresh chives, you can use the stems of either scallions (piazcheh) which are also called green onions, or Leek which is the same as “tarreh farangi”.

This is a great dish for vegetarians and goes well with rice or even in a sandwich with lots of lovely salad. I used to get leftovers of this to have in my sandwiches at school when I was younger…was always scrumptious.

Loobia Polow Recipe

Loobia Polow Recipe

• basmati or long-grain rice, 500 grams
• lamb or beef, 400 grams (I like using turkey mince)
• green beans, 400 grams
• 2 x medium onions
• 2 spoonfuls of tomato puree
• sunflower oil ( or any other cooking oil), small amount
• salt
• ground black pepper
• Tumeric

Directions:
Peel and slice onions and fry in oil until golden then add meat which has been cut into small pieces and fry over a medium heat until it all gets brown. Then cut the green beans into small-ish pieces and add them to fry for a small time too. After 5 mins add two glasses of water as well as the salt, pepper, tumeric and tomato puree and allow the whole mixture to boil down.

To prepare rice: wash rice twice and, if you have them time soak in salted warm water for 3-4 hours, otherwise just drain the water after cleaning. Pour water in a large non-stick pan until it is half-full and bring it to a boil. Add rice and a spoonful of salt and continue boiling until rice slightly softens and is half cooked. Pour rice into a drain and wash it with slightly warm water. Then finally add the meat-mix to the rice and mix well. Cover and cook over low heat for about 30 minutes. Remember rice cooks by steaming, so try not to life the top off too many times.

This dish can be made so that it is healthy by not adding too much salt or adding too much oil…I’ll leave that decision up to you.

I always have with a light salad (tomatoes, lettuce, cucumber) with a deliciously fresh olive oil, salt, ground black pepper and freshly squeezed lime dressing).

International Food Party

Sorry, I have been really busy and haven’t been updating my blog. This post is from Thurs 5 April…I know, I know, there is no decent excuse for this…I am going to try and catch up on everything in different posts.

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As a leaving do for one of the girls at work we arranged an international food party where everyone had to bring food from their country or origin (or a country that they decided to adopt). Well, my boyfriend and I naturally represented Iran and brought a whole host of Iranian delicacies and Shiraz wine (Wikipedia: Its name stems from Shiraz—the city of flowers, wine and poetry in Iran—in the heart of an ancient winemaking region). I cooked KooKoo Sabzi and Loobya Polow (recipes to follow in next posts) and we were treated to Portuguese (Padrón peppers with olive oil and lots of salt as well as pork sausage and Portuguese Verde wine), Israeli (Matza, horseradish, Jewish wine, sweet chutneys), Swiss (cheese fondue and wine), German (potato cakes with apple sauce, red cabbage and German bread) as well as homemade Australian desserts! See images below:

(Anzac biscuits, strawberry and passion fruit Pavlova and Lamingtons). We also had an Australian sing-a-long to Slim Dusty’s The Pub With No Beer. All topped off with some Bundy and coke!

The food was amazing and I must say, as it was staggered, I didn’t eat loads! Very pleased with myself.

A great night was had by all and we danced all night as everyone brought music from their own countries ranging from Kraftwerk and Keltzmer and yoddling music to traditional Iranian dancing songs (especially Baba Karam).

I did also manage to go to the gym yesterday and feel very happy with myself as too much food was consumed at the party! But I couldn’t resist eating food from around the world!