Recent Posts
Ingredient: Olives
By Maureen Abood |
One thing I love about being in the first year of this blog is that we get to cover so many essentials of the Lebanese way of eating. Olives rank right up there with flatbread and labne when it comes to staples in the fridge and on the table. Or on the kitchen counter, since…
Read More Postcard from Up North
By Maureen Abood |
When summer opens, I see how fast it matures, and fear it will be short; but after the heats of July and August, I am reconciled, like one who has had his swing, to the cool of autumn. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson (Pumpkin explosion…it’s been some time since I’ve experienced fall up north. The colors,…
Read More Fried Cauliflower, and this time last year
By Maureen Abood |
I’m thinking a lot about culinary school this week, because it was exactly one year ago that I entered the professional program at Tante Marie’s Cooking School in San Francisco. I had just left my job of many years in Chicago and felt the exhilaration of starting something new, and hard won. The house I…
Read More Ingredient: Cauliflower
By Maureen Abood |
You knew I had to come out with a vegetable this week after all of that meat. Does it surprise you that cauliflower turns up in Lebanese cuisine? It’s there, in virtually every Lebanese cookbook I own, as well as on our table in a few simple, but delicious, dishes. There is nothing more mouth-watering…
Read More Postcard from Up North
By Maureen Abood |
If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people together to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea. -Antoine de Saint-Exupery, author and aviator (The Pointer boat at The Pier, Harbor Springs.)
Read More Baked Kibbeh: You say meatloaf, I say meatlove
By Maureen Abood |
Baked Kibbeh is a Lebanese tradition and a favorite way to make kibbeh. This savory dish fills the kitchen with an unforgettably delicious aroma while it’s baking. We like to eat kibbeh raw (kibbeh nayeh) the first day it’s made, then bake it in a sahnieh the next day. We aren’t the only ones making…
Read More Kibbeh Nayeh, the raw truth
By Maureen Abood |
Kibbeh Nayeh, tartare of Lebanon, is specially prepared spiced raw meat with bulgur. Try this beloved Lebanese dish and see how simple and delicious it is! I never knew I was eating raw meat. Or maybe it was just that I didn’t think that “raw” was something worth noting. I simply knew it was good,…
Read More How to select and prepare meat for Lebanese Kibbeh
By Maureen Abood |
I don’t want to give you the wrong impression. I notice that many—ok, all—of the main course dishes I’ve served up here have involved red meat. It’s not that the Lebanese can’t make a meal without including beef or lamb…Lebanese and other Middle Eastern cuisines are considered so healthy, in fact, because of our extensive…
Read More Postcard from Up North
By Maureen Abood |
This grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor is ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming, on sea and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls. ~ John Muir, naturalist, explorer,…
Read More Fried Eggs with Za’atar, and lessons from a restaurant kitchen
By Maureen Abood |
One of the benefits of going to culinary school is that you have an opportunity to work as an apprentice when you complete your program. Doing back-breaking work for free may not seem like much of an ‘opportunity’—as I was often reminded by my brothers—but having the chance to put all that I had just…
Read More I'm so glad you're here! You'll find among these pages the fresh and classic Lebanese recipes we can't get enough of! My mission is to share my tried + true recipes -- and to help our Lebanese food-loving community keep these culinary traditions alive and on the table. What recipes are you looking for? Let me know!