quickie links and thoughts
I want to go out and buy beetroot now after watching Mark Bittman make his goat-free beetroot salad. The dressing is made by softening a lot of garlic (8 plump cloves) in an ample amount of olive oil, throwing in some walnuts and blending with just a dash of fresh orange juice. Long live the beetroot and goats cheese divorce!
Garlic in such quantities would likely give Khaled Sherbini, chocolate maker extraordinaire and founder of Coco Loco, conniptions. This interesting little den of cacao worship is never open when I am wandering around High Street Northcote in need of reviving. However one fine afternoon, the tables on the footpath were set up and the door open, though the establishment was actually closed, Khaled welcomed us in, put aside his half eaten lunch and filled us up with chocolaty goodness. While lovingly making our iced chocolates he shared his revulsion of garlic reeked patrons, his passion for chocolate and his obvious pride at our admiration of his unique, dairy-free delicacies. His secret ingredient is cashew milk (kashew mylk), so much nicer than soy. I’ve never spent $10 on a non-alcoholic beverage before (it was still a little early in the day to go for the liqueur spiked versions) but it was worth every, rich drop.
Just try not to drop in after eating garlic prawns!
Or Simon’s (“The Cook and the Chef”) dahl. But it looks delicious and simple. Though I tend to go for a less soupy dahl, this recipe is easy and delightfully vegan.
Breakfast today – eggs gently scrambled with butter, homemade semi dried tomatoes, a little smoked salmon and basil. Heaven!
Does anyone have favourite fish or vegan tajine recipes? The very late Christmas present has finally arrived via the Oxfam shop. The lovely big Moroccan Tajine is awaiting a good soaking and some long, slow cooking action.
Garlic in such quantities would likely give Khaled Sherbini, chocolate maker extraordinaire and founder of Coco Loco, conniptions. This interesting little den of cacao worship is never open when I am wandering around High Street Northcote in need of reviving. However one fine afternoon, the tables on the footpath were set up and the door open, though the establishment was actually closed, Khaled welcomed us in, put aside his half eaten lunch and filled us up with chocolaty goodness. While lovingly making our iced chocolates he shared his revulsion of garlic reeked patrons, his passion for chocolate and his obvious pride at our admiration of his unique, dairy-free delicacies. His secret ingredient is cashew milk (kashew mylk), so much nicer than soy. I’ve never spent $10 on a non-alcoholic beverage before (it was still a little early in the day to go for the liqueur spiked versions) but it was worth every, rich drop.
Just try not to drop in after eating garlic prawns!
Or Simon’s (“The Cook and the Chef”) dahl. But it looks delicious and simple. Though I tend to go for a less soupy dahl, this recipe is easy and delightfully vegan.
Breakfast today – eggs gently scrambled with butter, homemade semi dried tomatoes, a little smoked salmon and basil. Heaven!
Does anyone have favourite fish or vegan tajine recipes? The very late Christmas present has finally arrived via the Oxfam shop. The lovely big Moroccan Tajine is awaiting a good soaking and some long, slow cooking action.
posted by GS at 1:28 pm
10 Comments:
I remember there was a great SBS Food Safari episode about moroccan food. I think it was season one, that had some really great tajine inspired ideas.
Favourite Essaouirian fish tagine: large chunks of onion, capsicum and tomato in tagine with good slug of olive oil. Toss.
Firm white fish coated with sweet paprika, crushed fennel and cumin seeds placed on top of vegies. Dash of water or stock. Cook for ages, don’t stir as the bottom is meant to get all sticky and awesome. Scatter olives and warm through before serving with bread and eaten with hands. Bread is used to scrub the onion off the bottom of the tagine. YUM.
Thanks for the tips. Moroccan food was indeed the first episode in the first series of Food Safari. Some good tips on using Tajines.
Anon that sounds good. From reading lots of recipes I'm getting a hang of the general flavourings and methods. I like the idea of the olives in yours. Oxfam advised me to start the tajine in a cold oven, then cook it long and low. Any idea how long it took your fish to cook?
Ours was cooked on a gas cooktop.
It was for over an hour, which concerned me at the time! Who cooks fish for an hour? But it worked.
The tricky thing is not being able to check what is going on inside without ruining the whole steam effect.
now I've enjoyed all the Comment, I've forgotten the Post - did it start with non-dairy goodness?
If so, I can be On Topic with my SOY discovery of yesterday:
while scouring newspapers of 1942
(Ballarat Courier, January to June) in a Reference Library, I was floored to discover this 'snippet'-
and now they're telling us the soy bean is human food
besides being available for plastics paint and synthetic clothing.
The 1956 Olympics in Melbourne really did open-up the Australian Diet.
Yes, Maggie! That SBS episode featured my fav veg author, Nadine Abensur and it was her eggplant and pumpkin tagine. AOF, it's farking brilliant and if you can't find it, let me know. Heavy on the olive oil, but then I know you're with me on that.
Hooray, also, for liberating beetroot. Garlic in huge quantity is never a bad thing. Almost never.
Perhaps this is the recipe Lucy's referring to? I was just about to recommend it anyway - Michael, I and numerous guests have thoroughly enjoyed it. :-)
Does anyone know where Khaled is actually from? Someone asked me the other day, and I had to confess that I didn't know.
But I DO know how good his chocolate is.
Which is surprising, considering how much garlic i eat.
I see Lucy's with me...
Shula - Egypt via Syria I think.
I once lived with osteopaths who imposed a rule of no more than three cloves of garlic in a meal the nights before work. It was in London and it transpires some English patients got a bit distressed about the whole head of garlic creations that we were want to create.
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