A little about lentils

It's a nice thing to go back into your childhood food memories every now and then, especially when you're lacking inspiration. It comes to you that there are ingredients rooted in your culture, waiting to be used but failing to appear in your kitchen. I've decided to pull out the lentils and put them to good use. Here's this week's column and recipe published on Saturday, October 20th, 2011. 

In my mind, lentils are those that make up the steaming mugs of spiced lentil soup, warming my hands, sipped on gently while huddled under a blanket in the winter. They are the delicateness in Koshary, a dish we rarely realize is built around lentils; but for the most part, lentils are ignored, almost on purpose. If there's one thing I've noticed, the sad little lentil is at the core of bad Egyptian food jokes and belongs in prison with the people who have been naughty and are undeserving of meat consumption. Of course, it helps that it's cheap.

As important as they should be in Egyptian cuisine what with their abundance and health benefits, the overlooked lentils just aren't.

My love for lentils is rooted in Indian food with my grandmother's extra helpings of slow-cooked creamy Dal Makhani and when I was first told that my beloved crispy Dosa, a crepe made of fermented rice and black lentils, was rich in protein and gluten-free. Apart from that, it has recently occurred to me that I know very little about lentils, away from their tender swollen bellies and fragile skin.

Some rummaging through my treasure trove of books awakened me to the enormous number of perks you're treating your body to while ingesting these little gems. It now makes absolute sense that they'd be served in prison, minus the bad recipe and additional heapings of nastiness.

Let's run through some of those fringe benefits you're providing your body with by choosing lentils. Lentils are the third highest source of plant-based protein after hemp and soybeans and have been touted time and time again as one of the world's healthiest foods. They contain a cholesterol-lowering fiber that works to aid blood sugar disorders with their high fiber content and with only 230 calories to a cup of cooked lentils, you can fill yourself up with no fat involved. Lentils being the clever little things that they are also work at lowering your risk of heart disease with their significant levels of magnesium and folate. I could continue for a while longer but I think it's sufficient to say that they're really, really good for you.

After completing the first half of Ramadan and indulging in its nightly culinary excesses, my body cannot take much more and neither should yours want to. Maybe it's time to start eating properly again, cleansing our systems like we try to do with our souls, of our gluttony and self-indulgence.

Inspired by the flavors of the mini puff pastry pizzas we would find at birthday parties when we were children, this tart is just as addictive and combines many of those bold slap-in-the-face flavors while eliminating the extra cheese as well as replacing the canned with fresh ingredients that will leave you feeling full, thanks to the lentil fiber that we just learned about, minus the heaviness. As for the pastry, puff pastry is a gift to feed that tiny little glutton you've decided to hold on to for just a bit longer.

Aromatic Lentil Tart
Serves 4

You'll need:
1 sheet of ready-rolled frozen puff pastry, thawed
1 egg, lightly whisked
½ a cup of brown lentils, rinsed
2 cups of vegetable stock or water
2 garlic cloves, sliced
2 medium-sized tomatoes, sliced
2 tablespoon of olive oil
6 pitted Kalamata olives, roughly chopped
½ a medium onion, finely diced
5 fresh button mushrooms, sliced
1 teaspoon of thyme
1 medium-sized red bell pepper, roasted, peeled, deseeded and diced
1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar
1 loose handful of grated Parmesan cheese
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius. Cook the lentils in a pot of simmering vegetable stock or water over medium heat for 10-15 minutes and set aside. Place the sliced tomatoes in an over-proof dish, drizzle with 1 tablespoon of olive oil, salt and pepper and roast for 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and set aside. Sautée the onions in 1 tablespoon of olive oil until translucent then add the mushrooms in 1 tablespoon of olive oil and 1 teaspoon of thyme until tender and set aside.

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius again. Lay the puff pastry sheet out on a baking tray and fold over 3 cm of each side to create a border. Poke holes with a fork inside of the border you've created and brush lightly with olive oil. Brush the border of your pastry with the whisked egg. Begin to layer the tart. Spread half of your cooked lentils and garlic slices to cover the bottom of your tart. Begin to layer your roasted tomatoes, roasted peppers and olives then top with a second layer of lentils and sautéed mushrooms. Drizzle with a tablespoon of balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper and move the tart to the oven. 10 minutes into baking and using a light hand, sprinkle the Parmesan cheese over the top and continue to bake until the pastry reaches a golden brown color. It should take around 15-18 minutes to bake in total.

Chicken Quesadillas, because leftovers are boring.

In our house, we have a problem with leftovers. That problem is as simple as this: we don't like them. Having spent many years in our parents' homes being taught not to waste by coming home from school and barging into the kitchen to be greeted by reheated leftovers, we rejoiced at the idea of not having to deal with lifeless leftovers in our future grown up homes. Never again, our pre-married selves screamed. How naïve and mistaken we turned out to be.

It starts with what many experts have stated time and time again but falls on mostly deaf ears. We eat with our eyes first. This is evident in the pretty plates presented to voracious customers at restaurants, it is displayed in the homes of those hosting dinner parties and it is especially present during the holy month of Ramadan.

You enter the kitchen and gradually begin increasing the quantities you will be serving. A few extra grams won't hurt and neither will one more cup. Everyone will need to eat more than that, or so you think. After creating a lavish spread of complementary colors and watching everyone eat to their heart's content, you push them to push a little more into themselves and say a little prayer for no leftovers. It almost never works.

After one too many a time of leftovers going bad, the pangs of guilt consumed my thoughts. I would open the fridge and sigh in despair at the foods that I didn't want to eat for days in a row.

What a sad mess it all was.

Wilting salads clung to the edges of the bowl to avoid drowning in their dressing, pastas drank up all their beautiful sauces to become gluey, unfriendly specimens and chicken would just become cold, unappetizing and boring enough not to have any appetizing way to describe it.

As easy as it is for some people to go through life inconsiderately, with no thought of another's suffering, it was not about that I could not do it anymore - I would not.

Leftover bread would be toasted and made into finely ground bread crumbs, to be used later on breaded chicken or sprinkled onto a simple linguine dish. Apples would be saved from their fateful death and cooked into apple sauce and best of all, rotisserie chickens would be reinvented to fit into everything - creamy chicken soups, cold sandwiches and crisp salads.

Forcing myself to conjure up my previous self, that which worked at an advertising agency, reinvention was key.

Sohour, your past-midnight Ramadan meal, is an ideal occasion for leftovers and one of the most filling things to choose to eat is the Mexican quesadilla; and for me, the chicken quesadilla. Load it up with onions, mushrooms, peppers and olives or keep it plain, it always turns out to be better than the thought of eating reheated chicken.

Overcoming my leftovers dilemma, while liberating, also reminds me on a daily basis of the hungry and the weak and of what I can do to stretch what we have a little further so that our home doesn't end up one that is wasteful and weak-spirited. Before you groan about the day-old dry chicken lounging in your fridge, think again. You could end up making something you would order at a restaurant, except this time you would know where that cooked chicken is coming from and how old it actually is. That's a better deal in my book. I'm taking it.

Chicken Quesadillas

You'll need:
1 large flour tortilla
½ a grilled chicken breast
½ a medium onion, sliced
¼ cup of grated mozzarella and mild white cheddar
salt and pepper to taste

Moderately heat a lightly oiled pan and add the onions. Add some salt and pepper and stir occassionally until they begin to soften. This should take around 3 to 5 minutes. Sprinkle the chicken with some salt and pepper and add it to the pan to toss with the onions. Remove from the heat.

On a stable surface, place one flour tortilla at a time and spread the onion-chicken mixture over half of the tortilla. Sprinkle liberally with grated cheese and fold the other half over to form a semi-circle and press firmly on the seam to seal it. Assemble as many quesadillas as needed in the same manner.

Heat a lightly oiled pan over high heat until it begins to smoke. Once it begins smoking, reduce the heat to moderate and grill your quesadillas on one side until nicely colored. Turn over the quesadillas and continue to cook until the cheese has melted completely. This whole process should take about 4 minutes per quesadillas. Transfer with a spatula to a cutting board and cut in half. Serve hot.

A letter to Karkadeh, my sweet hibiscus tea.

Dear Karkadeh,

Did you know that they call you Bunga Raya in Malaysia and that you're their national flower? I think it's a different kind of hibiscus flower though. Still, it sounds a little obscene to me but then again, karkadeh might sound just as indecent to them. Your street name, as you know, is Roselle while your birth name is Hibiscus Sabdariffa. Sorry to break it to you this way. Regardless, I'm glad that the Egyptian you decided to travel all the way from Egypt this year to spend the holy month of Ramadan with us. I know we're a lot quieter than what you're used to - what with the entertainment-driven Cairene Ramadan tents where you get to spend night after night in the hands of beautiful and not so beautiful ladies equally preening and ready to be as unholy in a holy month as possible. If you're being naughty and I suspect that you will be (be naughty for me - since I'll be fasting and won't be as naughty), you'll spill some of your self to stain them forever with your sweet purple dye. I know that you've been subjected to humiliation before in Malaysia when you were asked to be diluted - they didn't mean it, they're just not used to how sweet you can be and sometimes that intimidates them. I'm sorry that I offered you to them - they did not appreciate you for the shining star that you are. This year, I promise to use you in more than one way. I shall not only drink you for you are worthy of more attention than what you are given. And best of all, you will not have to share our home with Amar-el-din, that orange-spray-tan-like apricot juicy tart. I'm sorry I said tart. I'll be trying to curb my tongue from now on. Anyway, I'm glad you're visiting. I'm excited to be spending a lot of time with you. Until you meet my lips again, good night. 

Warm fuzzy feelings your way,

Sarah 

P.S. I painted that swirly designed stool in the last photo. 

Egyptian Karkadeh (Sweet Hibiscus Tea):

You'll need: 

2 scant cups of dry hibiscus flowers 

10 cups of water

3/4 to 1 cup of sugar (depending on your preferred sweetness)

Rinse the dry hibiscus flowers lightly and place in a large pot over high heat. Pour the water, stir, and allow to boil for 5-7 minutes. Lower the heat, add the sugar and stir until it has dissolved. Allow it to simmer for 40-45 minutes, stirring every now and then. Give it time to cool when you're done then strain it three times to get it as clear as possible. Place in your bottle or jug of choice and refrigerate. 

Serve with or without ice. Drink. Get a sugar rush.

Roasted pepper dip for the pepper-averse

I have a penchant for bell peppers. Eagerly consuming them in all colors and shapes, I cannot begin to comprehend why someone could be averse to their sweet tanginess. After marrying one of those pepper-averse people we were just talking about, it became clear that I would have to do everything in my power to get him to switch to the other side, my side, the sexy peppery side. I have tried calling it "capsicum" the way my mom taught me to sway him. I have disguised it in a plethora of chopped bird's eye chili.  So far, I have succeeded on two counts: 

1. Adding it to prawn will lead to consumption.

2. Roasting and puréeing it will befuddle then befriend my husband's taste buds.  

Below is my column featuring this recipe in The Daily News Egypt dated Saturday, October 22nd, 2011.

I love the sweetness of the humble bell pepper, or as I called it growing up, capsicum. I search for it when tasting new dishes and try to incorporate it into lots of meals. Raised in a home of pepper-loving parents, they would invite the many colored peppers to many of our lunches – red ones peeping out of a corn salad and green ones generously spread on a pizza. We'd have shrimp baked with peppers and onions after school; at night, they would come out, freshly sliced, to bring up a grilled cheese sandwich. I've been programmed for years to love these things and needless to say, I'll fall for most recipes that use bell peppers, especially roasted, to accent a dish.

When I got married, I rushed excitedly to the grocery store, picking up ingredients I was already familiar with and came to a screeching halt in front of the peppers. Look ma! They have all kinds of colored peppers including purple peppers, black peppers and even baby colored peppers!

“This is going to be so much fun. I'm going to make chicken fajitas and it'll be great,” giddy me thought.

The giddiness didn't last long. A few polite lunches later, my husband decided to break the horrible news. He didn't like peppers – not on pizzas, not in salads, not stuffed. No way, no how.

And then I started roasting them, featuring them in tarts, pizza sauce and tangy eggplant salads, luring him into believing how magical these sweet fleshy fruits are. After two years of tirelessly experimenting to allow him to enjoy peppers, he found a midway love for them and has even promoted them at the table when we're hosting a dinner party.

There are a number of ingredients that may not sit well with the people you love. It is said that it takes 15 to 20 times of eating something to get used to the taste. Instead of deliberately avoiding these ingredients, gather the courage to serve these individual items in different ways, sometimes disguised and at other times as a side, until you find some acceptance from the disbeliever.

This recipe - served alone as a dip, used as a sandwich spread or an addition to a sauce – has worked to my benefit. It makes way for the sweetness of the peppers and adds punches of flavor to whatever you're working with. If you're not keen on serving it alone, stir it into some freshly cooked pasta or under a layer bubbling melted cheese sitting unsuspectingly on a slice of toast.

Successfully overcoming the minor problems peppers brought to our home, I've now moved onto battling with cardamom, that little pungent pod that imparts much flavor to a dish. Still in the phase of disguising it, I'll let you all know when it shines as the star of a dish in our home.

Roasted Pepper Dip

You'll need:

2 red bell peppers

2 yellow bell peppers

3 garlic cloves

1-2 bird's eye chili, sliced (optional)

2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil

2 teaspoons of white wine vinegar or apple cider vinegar

salt and freshly cracked black pepper

Roast your peppers according to The Wednesday Chef's instructions. I find that this method yields the best results. Once they're roasted, de-seeded, peeled and ready, place them in a food processor along with the garlic and chili.  Pulse until chunky then pour in the olive oil and vinegar. Continue to purée until smooth. Refrigerate. Keeps for 3-4 days.  

We used papadums this time but you can use anything - from crusty bread to crudités.