Yemen - How I made Saltah

Research into the national dish of Yemen very quickly brought me to a dish called سلتة Saltah, which is very close to the Arabic word سلت which means salt.  I don't know what the real thing tastes like, but the version I made wasn't too salty.  There seems to be only one recipe for Saltah knocking about on various different websites and this was the one I used.


Ingredients:

The Ingredients for Saltah, Hilbeh and Zhug

كوب واحد من النفط  one cup of oil
بصل 2 onions
البطاطا 4/6 potatoes
لحم مفروم minced meat (I used beef, but you could also use lamb)
لحوم البقر الأسهم beef stock
طماطم 2 tomatoes
بيض 2 eggs (which should be beaten)
عصير الليمون lemon juice
تشيليز 3/4 chillies
فصوص ثوم 6 cloves of garlic
حلبة نبات fenugreek seeds
كمون ground cumin
هال ground cardamom
كزبرة fresh coriander

Preparing Hilbeh and Zhug

Preparing Hilbeh

Preparing Zhug

Saltah is usually served with two condiments called Hilbeh and Zhug which are stirred into the dish at the very end.  I prepared these first, so I could put them in the fridge and chill them slightly.

Spices

Zhug and Hilbeh

Hilbeh حلبة نبات is a green-coloured condiment based on fenugreek.  It was my first time ever cooking with this spice (the English name comes from the Latin for Greek hay).  Fenugreek is popular in Indian cooking and is often used to make curries.  I steeped the seeds overnight in a glass of water, as recommended by the recipe, then blitzed them in the food processor, with some water, 2 garlic cloves, a green chilli, chopped coriander and the juice of a lemon.

To make Zhug مهدي الشوق I mixed some red chillies, oil and coriander with 4 garlic cloves, ground cumin and cardamom seeds.  Zhug is a popular condiment throughout the Middle East and I'm sure many of us have had this on kebabs or falafel.

Preparing the Saltah

Fry the onion

Fry the beef

To make the Saltah, you start by frying the onions in a frying pan, then adding the minced meat and frying this until it is brown.  I fried the meat and onions in a pan, then added them to the main stewing pot later - this was mostly because I'd underestimated the amount of space I would need to cook this dish - however, it worked out quite well doing it this way, so I would also cook the meat separately in future.

Heat the tomatoes and potato

Add the beef stock

I parboiled the potatoes before adding them to the main pot with the tomatoes (which I had salted) and fresh coriander.  In retrospect, I probably should have added the coriander later. Once the tomatoes had softened a bit, I added beef stock and brought the mixture to the boil.  It was at this point that I added the meat and onions to the pot and reduced the heat.

Saltah

The original recipe recommends simmering for one hour, but I was in a bit of a hurry, so I let the ingredients simmer for forty minutes, before stirring in the egg and adding the condiments.

It was a really straight-forward dish to make and incredibly delicious.  I made quite a bit portion, so we also had Saltah for dinner the next day.  I'm sure you could add rice to the mixture (which would make it a bit like kabsa) but we decided to eat it with yummy slices of country bread.

Traditional Yemeni food in London

The Queen of Sheba restaurant

Halloumi starter

I decided to add a new element to my learning experience this time, by visiting a traditional Yemeni restaurant.  I'm sure that most of the world's cuisines are represented in London and, sure enough, there is a traditional Yemeni restaurant, not far from Paddington Station, called The Queen of Sheba.

Kabsa Lahan

I went there with some friends and, this being Ramadan, the restaurant was pretty empty, most of the bookings being later in the evening, after sunset.  Unfortunately, I couldn't try their Saltah, but we had a range of starters - halloumi, falafel, moussaka and kibbah (which I hadn't tried before).  We all ordered lamb-based dishes and I tried the Kabsa Laham which was quite good.  The portions were massive and, for the first time ever, my partner couldn't finish his dinner (he's usually asking for more!)

It was a nice addition to the learning experience and one I hope to repeat in future blogs.   

Image credits:

All photos were taken by me - please feel free to use this under the following Creative Commons license:

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Veneto - the Makings of a Venetian Feast!

I was really excited about making some traditional Venetian dishes and I spent most of last weekend, when I wasn't watching DVDs or blogging, preparing three Venetian meals, which I want to share with you below.

To compliment the three meals, I also went the extra mile to get some authentic Italian ingredients.  There's a really lovely shop in Marylebone, La Fromagerie, that stocks all kinds of regional European wines and cheeses, so I stopped off on my way from work, one day last week, to hunt down some Venetian cheese and wine.  Okay, it's a little bit pricey, but worth it, if you want to taste authentic Venetian ingredients. 



Asiago and Ciabatta

 For the cheese, I chose a sample of Asiago.  Probably the most famous Venetian cheese, it's a D.O.P. (Denominazione di Origine Protetta) and I got fresh Asiago, rather than mature, as I wanted to eat it with bread.  I also bought a fairly expensive bottle of Valpolicella, Villa Spinosa Classico Superiore from 2005.  To go with the cheese, I bought a delicious Ciabatta in Waitrose and a cheap bottle of Soave, a Venetian white wine, which I used in my cooking. 

Spaghetti alle Vongole

The first dish I prepared, on Saturday night, was a very traditional Spaghetti alle Vongole - the vongole in my case being some capesante (scallops) which I had in my freezer (I was being a bit economical with Saturday's meal!).  I also threw in some Gamberi (prawns) for good measure.  The other ingredients included:



Ingredients

 Olio d'oliva extra vergine Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Prezzemolo Parsley
Spaghetti
4 spicchi di aglio 4 garlic cloves
2 scalogni 2 shallots
Burro non salato Unsalted butter
Peperoncino in polvere Chilli powder
Vino bianco White wine (preferably a Soave)

By the way, ignore the limone (lemon) in the photograph.  I got a bit too enthusiastic, when I was grabbing things from the fridge!

First I prepared the spaghetti in the normal way, making sure it was al dente and adding a big lump of unsalted butter to give it a slightly oily taste and stop it sticking to the pan.  I try to keep my spaghetti in boiling water for as short a time as possible and let it continue cooking in its own steam, with the water removed, when I take it off the heat.


Spaghetti with unsalted butter




Shallot & garlic with chilli powder



Next I fried the garlic and shallots until they had softened, adding the chilli powder to give it a bit of a kick.  Chilli is not something I would normally associate with Italian cuisine, but I think the food in Venice is a little bit spicier, which makes sense, considering Venice built its vast fortunes on the spice trade. 

After this I added the scallops, prawns and white wine with chopped parsley.  I simmered the dish for about 20 minutes, until the liquid had boiled off a little bit, then I served with the spaghetti. 

Spaghetti alle Vongole



Risi e Bisi

On Sunday morning, I turned my hand to Risi e Bisi or 'peas and rice', a very traditional Venetian dish which is associated with spring time.  It's a kind of soupy risotto - but it shouldn't be very liquidy.  It reminded me a lot of the Caribbean dish I love 'peas rice', except without the spices.  It was dead easy to make.  Here are the ingredients I used:



Ingredients for Risi e Bisi

 Prezzemolo Parsley
1 cipolla 1 onion
Pancetta tagliata a dadini Diced pancetta
Brodo vegetale Vegetable stock - it's good to make this from the pea shells, but I cheated with Oxo cubes!
Parmigiano-Reggiano (the original Parmesan cheese)
Burro non salato Unsalted butter
Arborio Risotto Risotto, short-grain rice - you'll find this in any supermarket in the UK
Piselli Peas - I used the frozen variety (cheating again!)

To start with I fried the chopped onion, then added the diced pancetta.  I let both of these cook for about 5 minutes, then added the rice.  I know some people struggle with risotto, but I think the key is extreme vigilance.  I covered the rice, onion and pancetta with vegetable stock, then topped up after a few minutes, when the risotto had absorbed the liquid, then topped up again, added the peas, then topped up again . . . and again, until I had added about a litre of vegetable stock to the pan. 


Fry the onion and pancetta




Add the risotto, stock and peas
















Add the parsley

 

Add unsalted butter





Add Parmesan cheese



Risi e Bisi












To be honest, I probably added a little bit more stock than I normally would for a risotto, but I wanted to stick to the Venetian version of this dish, which is meant to be a little bit soupy.  Finally I added the chopped parsley, then the unsalted butter, then the parmigiano and served with thin slices of ciabatta, with the creamy asiago cheese! 

Sgombri Affumicati in Umido

My plans to make Anguille (Eel) in Umido were scuppered by the fact that my local Waitrose didn't have any eel (shame on them!).  I was really looking forward to cooking eel for the first time and it's incredibly Venetian!  Anyway, I had to improvise, so we had sgombri affumicati (smoked mackerel) instead.  I think in umido translates into English as 'in humid', but I'm not entirely sure what that means!  The ingredients I used were:



Ingredients for Sgombri in Umido

 Olio d'oliva Olive oil (a light one this time)
Passata di pomodoro Tomato passata (or concentrated tomato)
1 cipolla 1 onion
1 limone 1 lemon
1 spicchio di aglio 1 garlic clove
4 filetti di sgombro affumicato 4 smoked mackerel fillets
polenta
salvia sage
Vino bianco White wine

First I prepared the polenta.  I'm never quite sure how to do this, so I boiled some water, then added enough polenta to thicken into a sloppy paste.  I absolutely love polenta, but it can be unexciting, not to mention messy, when you serve it up.  To make things a little bit more interesting, I used the juice of the lemon to add a bit of zest to the polenta.  I then used a ramekin to mold polenta cakes - letting the polenta sit in the ramekin long enough to solidify, before turning each cake out onto a metal tray I use for cooking pizzas.  Once I had used up all the polenta in this way, I grilled the cakes, which helped harden the exterior, but left the polenta still soft and steamy inside.  Yum yum!



Tomato passata and Polenta



Making polenta cakes



Grilled Polenta cakes












I also prepared the tomato passata by heating it in a small saucepan, adding a glassful of white wine to give it a more liquidy texture and keeping it on a low heat until I was ready to add it to the fish.

Finally I fried the onion until it softened, added the smoked fish until it was heated through and starting to bubble a little bit.  Then I added the lemon rind, then the chopped sage.  When the mixture had cooked through, I poured over enough of the tomato passata to cover everything, let it come to boiling point, then reduced the heat and simmered for about 15 minutes. 




Fry the onion and smoked fish




Add the lemon rind



Add the parsley



Add the tomato passata












I served with the grilled polenta cakes, a couple of slices of ciabatta and the delicious Valpolicella. 

Why not give this a try at home - if I can do it, anyone can, believe me!



Sgombri Affumicati in Umido












Image credits:

The image of the flag of Veneto was provided copyright-free on Wikimedia, the original image having been supplied by wikuser Vajotwo with this derived version being added by wikiuser Flanker - you can see a more detailed description of this image at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_Veneto.svg

All photos of the food were taken by me.  Please feel free to reuse these images under the Creative Commons License, Attribution Share Alike - preferably with a link to this blog!

Saudi Arabia - Chicken Kabsa

Saudi Cuisine

I'm a big fan of Middle Eastern cuisine, so I was really looking forward to getting stuck in to a traditional Saudi dish.  After a bit of research online, I came to the conclusion that the staple of Saudi Arabia is a dish called Kabsa.  Not dissimilar to Uzbek plov but with lighter ingredients, such as orange, and not as much oil.  The recipe I used for this was from a website called inmamaskitchen.com

The ingredients

There was nothing unusual in this dish and I already had all of the spices in my cupboard, so it cost next to nothing to make.

The main ingredients are:

Chicken, which should be cut up into bite-sized mouthfuls.
Two onions, which should be chopped up finely.
Two carrots, which should be grated.
Orange zest
Four cloves of garlic, chopped (although this might have been overkill)
Tomato puree
Two tomatoes, chopped finely
Four cloves, four cardamom pods, a cinnamon stick, broken up

As much rice as you need for four people
Almonds, which should be cut into slices and raisins (I used sultanas) to scatter on the meal at the end.
Salt and pepper to taste.

Process:

I started by heating oil in a large saucepan and adding the chopped onions, letting them fry for a few minutes until they'd started to turn brown.

Once the onions have browned a bit, I added the chicken, garlic, chopped tomatoes and tomato puree and stirred these together for about five minutes until the chicken had turned white on the outside.  The recipe requires the addition of orange zest and, not wanting to waste the juice of the orange, I marinated the chicken in orange juice and then added this to the mixture when I added the chicken.  I don't know whether or not this was a good idea and the whole thing certainly tasted very orange-y, so I guess it's a matter of taste. 

After the chicken had fried a bit, I added the grated carrot and all of the spices and some salt and pepper.  This idea of this dish is that the chicken will cook with the spices for about twenty minutes or so.  After twenty minutes, you remove the chicken and add the rice, so that the rice cooks in the liquid of the Kabsa.  I must admit, I struggled a bit with the idea of removing the chicken at all, but I decided to go with the recipe in the end and kept the chicken warm in a metal contained with a foil covering. 

The rice should be long-grain - I used regular long-grain rice, but you could also use basmati.  To prepare the rice, I washed it in a sieve, which I think softens the rice and makes it easier to cook when you add it to the pot. 

The result was pretty delicious and I'll definitely be adding it to my international cuisine Smörgåsbord. 

(<-- After the chicken has been removed and the rice has been added)

(<-- Boil the rice for about twenty minutes)

(Chicken Kabsa, don't forget to scatter with almonds and raisins, or sultanas -->)

Image credits:

All photos were taken by me.