It's been a busy couple of months without a lot of time to write up things I've been working on. My biggest project was heading up day board for a great local A&S focused event: Spring's Inspirations. The only criteria I was given is that all recipes should be within SCA period limits. I know many in our province have quite a few dietary restrictions, so I picked one dish to build around that contained no allergens I was aware of: mujadara.
Mujadara is one of my favorite meals to cook for a crowd because it is filling and flavorful. It is a pottage of lentils and rice, seasoned with cinnamon, cumin, cayenne pepper, and topped with caramelized onions. I started preparing this for my camp family at Pennsic when I had to feed someone with Celiac and a vegan. This meal worked for everybody and no one felt like they were cheated because ingredients had to be substituted at all. It became a tradition and we have since added a sides of roast leg of lamb and hummus.
My typical approach to cooking for a crowd has 2 principles: 1) if you let me know you have an allergy, or even strong preference against an ingredient, I will make sure you can eat with us; and 2) I like to find recipes that never had those ingredients so substitutions don't need to happen. I know I've said it before, but I have such a broad repertoire of recipes to pull from that restrictions are actually really helpful to me!
I also wanted to build around a new spice blend for me: za'atar. It is a spice blend from the Middle East that can be traced back to at least the 12th century in Palestine. I was intrigued by the idea of sumac, which is supposed to have a bright, citrusy flavor. I did a bit of digging and found the 4 primary ingredients were sumac, oregano, sesame seeds, and salt. The ratios vary and some recipes call for marjoram, toasted sesame seeds, or black sesame seeds. I decided to use what I had and came up with this blend:
2 tsp ground sumac
2 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp salt
It was absolutely delicious on the chicken and garnishing the hummus and I'm looking forward to using it in more recipes.
Here is the menu I prepared and recipes for the dishes will follow in separate entries so you don't have to read through the whole list every time:
Lydia’s Hummus with garlic and lemon (served with crudite and pitas)
Za’atar chicken skewers (chicken thighs grilled with za’atar and olive oil)
Jeweled rice (saffron infused basmati rice with dried fruits and nuts on the side)
Mujadara (Lebanese lentils and rice with caramelized onions and spices)
Saag (greens sauteed with fennel and spices)
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