4. To make the curry sauce: Heat the oil in a pot over medium heat. Ad the onions and when they start sizzling, reduce the heat to low and sauté until golden brown, about 10 minutes. Add the ginger, garlic, and spices and stir for a minute or so. Add the pureed tomatoes and let bubble for about 10 minutes, or until you see the oil rise to the surface. Add the ground nuts and a little water if the sauce is too thick and salt to taste. Stir for a couple of minutes.
5. Set a wire rack in a rimmed baking sheet. Pour 2½ inches (6 cm) vegetable oil into a deep skillet and heat over medium heat until very hot (if you drop a piece of bread in the oil, the oil should immediately bubble around it). Working in batches of 1 or 2, drop the kebabs into the oil and fry for 2 to 3 minutes, turning them so that they crisp up and color evenly. Remove with a slotted spoon to the rack to drain the excess oil. At this point you can either serve them plain, or with the curry sauce on the side, or you can drop them into the sauce and let them cook in the sauce for a couple of minutes before serving them garnished with the chopped cilantro.
Chicken Mishkaki
MISHKAKI DEJAJ
OMAN | ZANZIBAR
Mishkaki (mishkak in Oman) are the quintessential street food in Oman as well as in Zanzibar, once part of the Sultanate of Oman. They are basically grilled kebabs sold from stalls by the roadside or in the famous Forodhani Gardens in Stone Town, Zanzibar. You can identify the stalls from far away by the smoke rising over the charcoal grills, and as you get closer, by the smell of the grilling meat. Mishkaki make a great snack eaten on their own or a lovely quick meal wrapped in warm flatbread, garnished with herbs and sliced tomatoes and onions. You can use chicken as below, or meat or even shrimp. The marinade and sauce remain the same.
SERVES 4 TO 6
FOR THE MARINADE
1 medium tomato (about 3½ ounces/100 g), cut into quarters
1 inch (2.5 cm) fresh ginger, peeled
4 cloves garlic, peeled
½ cup (125 g) labneh
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon Aleppo pepper
½ teaspoon ground turmeric
½ teaspoon finely ground black pepper
Sea salt
FOR THE CHICKEN
2¼ pounds (1 kg) boneless chicken meat, both dark and white, cut into bite-size pieces
FOR THE ZANZIBARI SAUCE
1 tablespoon unbleached all-purpose flour
¼ teaspoon ground turmeric
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
Juice of 1 lemon, or to taste
Sea salt
1. To make the marinade: Put the tomato, ginger, and garlic in a food processor and process until completely pureed. Transfer to a bowl and add the labneh, oil, spices, and salt to taste. Mix well.
2. To prepare the chicken: Add the chicken to the marinade and mix to coat well. Let marinate for at least 2 hours in a cool place, preferably longer in the refrigerator.
3. Prepare a charcoal fire in an outdoor grill or preheat the broiler to high. Soak 8 medium bamboo skewers for 30 minutes in cold water.
4. Thread the chicken pieces onto the skewers and grill or broil for 5 minutes on each side, or until the meat is crisp on the outside, and cooked through but still juicy on the inside.
5. Meanwhile, to make the Zanzibari sauce: Put 2 cups (500 ml) water in a small saucepan. Add the flour, turmeric, and cayenne and whisk until completely blended. Bring to a boil over medium heat, whisking all the time. Let simmer for a few minutes, or until the sauce has thickened. Add the lemon juice and salt to taste and take off the heat.
6. Serve the chicken mishkaki with the sauce.
Kashgar Kebabs
KASHGAR KAWAP
CHINA
I was given this recipe, which comes from Kashgar, an oasis city in Xinjiang, by Fuchsia Dunlop, one of the foremost experts and writers on Chinese cuisine. Kashgar is the westernmost Chinese city, located near the border with Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kyrgystan, and Tajikistan in Muslim China. The marinade is interesting in that it is almost like a batter, made with potato starch and egg, which makes for a different texture compared with other kebabs, such as those from Turkey or Lebanon.
SERVES 4
1 pound (450 g) boneless lamb shoulder, cut into 1-inch (2.5 cm) chunks
1 organic egg, beaten
3 tablespoons potato starch
Sea salt and finely ground black pepper
Ground cumin
Red pepper flakes
Uzbek Flatbread, for serving
1. Put the lamb in a bowl. Combine the beaten egg with the potato starch in a small bowl and add to the lamb. Season with salt and pepper to taste and mix well. Let sit for 30 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, prepare a charcoal fire in an outdoor grill or preheat the broiler to high.
3. Thread the lamb chunks onto 4 metal skewers (preferably flat) or 8 presoaked bamboo skewers. Grill or broil the kebabs for 2 to 3 minutes on each side, or until done to your liking. I like to keep my kebabs pink in the middle, so I grill them for just under 2 minutes on each side. As the kebabs are grilling, season them with a little more salt, cumin, and pepper flakes. Serve hot on flatbread, either on or off the skewers.
Afghani Sikh Kebabs
SIKH KABAB
AFGHANISTAN
Unlike the Iranians who always serve their kebabs with rice, in Afghanistan kebabs are always served with flatbread with a garnish of fresh vegetables and herbs. They are typical restaurant or street food fare and the meat is either lamb or chicken. The marinade here is made with yogurt and a little oil, which would be replaced with melted lamb tail fat in Afghanistan. Small pieces of tail fat would also be used on the skewers alternating with the meat to provide extra moisture. Although it is nearly impossible to get tail fat outside the Middle East, both marinade and kebabs will still be good and moist without.
SERVES 4 TO 6
FOR THE MARINADE
⅔ cup (180 g) whole-milk yogurt
4 cloves garlic, minced to a fine paste
Juice of 1 lemon, or to taste
1 teaspoon ground coriander
Sea salt and finely ground black pepper
FOR THE KEBABS
2¼ pounds (1 kg) boneless lean lamb from the leg or the fillet, cut into 1-inch (2.5 cm) cubes
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
4 small onions (13 ounces/400 g total), quartered (optional)
FOR SERVING
Flatbread
Quartered raw onions
Tomato slices
Lemon wedges
Aleppo pepper
1. To make the marinade: Put the yogurt in a large bowl. Stir in the garlic and lemon juice. Stir in the coriander and salt and pepper to taste and mix well. Taste and adjust the salt and spices if necessary.
2. To prepare the kebabs: Add the lamb and oil to the marinade and mix well. Let marinate for at least 2 hours, preferably overnight in the refrigerator.
3. Prepare a charcoal fire in an outdoor grill or preheat the broiler to high.
4. Thread the cubes of lamb onto 8 or 12 flat metal skewers, depending on how many you want to serve. You could alternate quartered onions in between the meat. Grill or broil for 3 to 5 minutes on each side, or until done to your liking. Serve immediately, on or off the skewers, on flatbread with raw onions, tomatoes, and lemon wedges. Have Aleppo pepper available for those who want to lightly spice up their kebabs.
Iranian Ground Meat Kebabs
KABAB KOOBIDEH
The texture of the ground meat for these kebabs needs to be very fine. You can achieve this by first grinding it twice through the fine disk of a meat grinder and then kneading it with the seasonings. Or you can skip the kneading and pulse the ground meat in a food processor a few times.
To form the kebabs, be sure to use flat skewers, otherwise the meat will spin around as it shrinks away from the skewer during grilling. In Iran, people who are serious about their kebabs—like my friend Feridoonjan, who taught me how to make these
—carry their own set of skewers inside a metal cylindrical case that is like a fishing rod case.
Kabab koobideh are absolutely delicious and probably the best known Iranian kebabs. They are served on flatbread with pickles (torshi), fresh herbs, and sumac, the latter an essential seasoning for grilled meat in Iran. You can also serve the kebabs on Plain Iranian Rice instead of bread together with the yogurt and cucumber.
SERVES 4
1 pound 2 ounces (500 g) boneless lamb shoulder, trimmed of some of the fat, finely minced
1 medium onion (5 ounces/150 g), finely grated
1 teaspoon fine breadcrumbs
¼ teaspoon ground turmeric
Sea salt and finely ground black pepper
Flatbread, for serving
1. Put the minced meat in a bowl. Add the onion, breadcrumbs, turmeric, and salt and pepper to taste and knead, dipping your hand in a bowl of lightly salted cold water every now and then until you have a homogenous paste.
2. Prepare a charcoal fire in an outdoor grill or preheat the broiler to high.
3. Divide the meat into 8 equal portions. Wrap each portion around a flat skewer, pressing the meat up and down the skewer and making indentations with your thumb and index finger every inch or so until you end up with a kind of wavy flat sausage. Grill or broil for a couple of minutes on each side, or until done to your liking. Serve hot with flatbread.
Chicken Kebabs
JOOJEH KABAB
IRAN
There are different marinades for chicken kebabs. The joojeh kebab is made with a simple marinade but there are other yogurt-based variations that are similar to the Afghani Sikh Kebabs. When I was in my friend Feridoonjan’s village, watching him cook a veritable feast for us, he used pieces of chicken breast, but I like using poussin joints for a prettier presentation. Serve with Plain Iranian Rice or flatbread, together with the Iranian Pickled Eggplant, fresh herbs, and sumac.
SERVES 4
1 small onion (3½ ounces/100 g), finely grated
Juice of ½ lemon, or to taste
Sea salt and finely ground black pepper
2 poussins or Cornish hens, each jointed into 8 pieces
Pinch of saffron threads
1. Mix the onion, lemon juice, and salt and pepper to taste in a container big enough to hold the poussin pieces. Add the chicken and mix well. Let marinate for at least 2 hours.
2. Prepare a charcoal fire in an outdoor grill or preheat the broiler to high.
3. Steep the saffron in 1 tablespoon water.
4. Thread the poussin pieces onto 4 long, flat metal skewers. Mix the saffron water with what is left of the marinade in the bowl. Grill or broil the poussin for about 10 minutes on each side, or until the pieces are crisp on the outside and cooked through but still juicy on the inside. While the poussin is cooking, baste it with the saffron-marinade mixture. Serve hot.
Lamb Shawarma Sandwich
SHAWARMA LAHMEH
LEBANON | SYRIA | JORDAN | PALESTINE
Before Syria descended into the tragic situation in which it has been since shortly after the uprising, I visited often, and when I went to Damascus, I never failed to go to Siddiq, a restaurant specializing in shawarma grilled over charcoal, no easy feat given that the shawarma grill is vertical. They had that on the menu, plus a few select mezze items. You just sat down and waited for the mezze plates to be served, before the sensational shawarma was brought to the table, very thinly sliced, with some bits crisp and others very moist, depending on whether they were sliced from the first layer or the second inner one, all piled on pita bread and covered with more pita to keep the meat warm. Siddiq’s was and still is the best shawarma I have ever had. I suspect the restaurant is still there as Damascus has been untouched by the civil war, and hopefully it will still be there once the war is over and I can return to visit.
The word shawarma comes from the Turkish çevirme, which means “to turn or rotate,” describing how it cooks, slowly rotating in front of a fire. Shawarma is basically a very large, fat “kebab” that can be made with lamb or chicken. The meat is sliced into wide, thin pieces, marinated overnight, and threaded onto a long skewer. Lamb shawarma has slices of tail fat in between every few layers of meat to keep the meat moist during grilling. For chicken shawarma, the skin is kept on the meat to keep it moist and tender. The skewer is fixed in front of a vertical grill and left to rotate over a moderate heat for 2 to 3 hours, or until the meat is cooked through. Even before the meat is cooked through, the shawarma vendor starts slicing the outer, cooked layer to order, piling the thin slivers of meat onto pita bread to make a sandwich with tomatoes, onions, pickles, herbs, and tahini sauce if it is lamb shawarma or garlic sauce (toum) if it is chicken. Shawarma is basically street food and it is not usually prepared at home, but here is a great adaptation I learned from my Lebanese butcher in London. You can substitute chicken, both dark and white meat, for the lamb, and use toum (see Note) instead of the tahini sauce.
SERVES 4 TO 6
FOR THE LAMB
1¾ pounds (800 g) boneless lamb shoulder, thinly sliced
Juice of 1 lemon, or to taste
¼ cup (60 ml) extra-virgin olive oil
½ teaspoon ground allspice
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon Lebanese 7-Spice Mixture
A few sprigs fresh thyme, leaves only
Sea salt and finely ground black pepper
FOR THE TAHINI SAUCE
½ cup (125 ml) tahini
Juice of 1 lemon, or to taste
2 cloves garlic, minced to a fine paste
Sea salt
FOR THE SANDWICHES
2 to 3 round pita breads (about 8 inches/20 cm in diameter) or 4 to 6 oval ones
4 to 6 small firm-ripe tomatoes, thinly sliced
1 small red onion, halved and cut into very thin wedges
4 to 6 gherkins, thinly sliced lengthwise
Handful of mint leaves
A few sprigs flat-leaf parsley, leaves only
1. To prepare the lamb: Put the meat in a large bowl and add the onions, lemon juice, olive oil, spices, thyme, and salt and pepper to taste and mix well. Let marinate in the refrigerator for 2 to 4 hours, stirring occasionally.
2. Meanwhile, make the tahini sauce: Put the tahini in a bowl. Alternating between the lemon juice and 6 tablespoons (90 ml) water, gradually whisk in the liquids—this is to make sure that you get the right balance of tartness while keeping the consistency of the sauce like that of creamy yogurt. The tahini will first thicken to a puree-like consistency before starting to loosen up again. If you decide to use less lemon juice, make up for the loss of liquid by adding a little more water or vice versa. Add the garlic and salt to taste. Taste and adjust the seasoning if necessary.
3. When the meat is ready, place a large sauté pan over medium-high heat. When the pan is very hot, add the meat and sauté for a couple of minutes, or until the meat is done to your liking.
4. To make the sandwiches: You can make 4 or 6 sandwiches depending on how generously filled you want them to be.
IF YOU ARE USING ROUND PITA BREADS: Tear them open at the seam to split them into separate disks—you can also use markouk or handkerchief bread like in the photo. Arrange equal quantities of meat down the middle of each disk. Garnish with equal quantities of tomato, onion, gherkins, and herbs and drizzle as much tahini sauce as you like, bearing in mind it will sog up the bread if you go heavy. Roll each sandwich tightly. Wrap the bottom half with a paper napkin and serve immediately.
IF YOU ARE USING OVAL PITA BREADS: Open them at one wide end to create a large pocket. Drizzle tahini sauce inside the bread, then fill with equal amounts of sandwich ingredients. Drizzle with more tahini if you want—oval pita is a lot thicker and can take it. Serve immediately.
NOTE: For an alternative to the tahini sauce, make toum by mincing 3 cloves garlic and grinding them to a fine paste with a little salt. T
hen drizzle in ⅓ cup (80 ml) extra-virgin olive oil the way you would with mayonnaise. To make this pungent dip a little milder, add 2 tablespoons labneh.
Baked Kibbeh
KIBBEH BIL-SANIYEH
LEBANON | SYRIA
Kibbeh in Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, and Palestine, and kofte in Turkey, is a mixture of ground lamb and bulgur that can be shaped as a pie, balls, or disks and cooked in endless variations. The recipe below is for kibbeh bil-saniyeh, which is meat, onion, and nut stuffing spread in between two layers of kibbeh to make a pie. It is one of Lebanon’s grandest dishes, almost always present at special-occasion meals and big family reunions; and it is my go-to dish when I have friends coming over for a Lebanese meal. It is also one of the dishes that I like to demonstrate when I am teaching Lebanese cuisine. The last time I was teaching at Central Market, in Texas, together with Karen who runs the schools, we decided to do supper-club nights rather than straightforward cooking classes. We settled on a Lebanese menu with mezze to start, then kibbeh bil-saniyeh for the main course. I sent my recipes and arrived on the day to the usual warm welcome from everyone. But as I went through the ingredients for the dinner, I found they had purchased store-bought ground lamb for the kibbeh, which was far too fatty. So, when you make kibbeh, be sure not to buy preground meat! Ask your butcher to grind the lamb from the leg for you, or if you have a meat grinder, grind the meat yourself, after trimming it. Traditionally this kibbeh is made in a round baking dish, but my instructions are for a rectangular one as I am assuming that more cooks will have that shape than the more traditional round one. Sprinkle with rose petals and serve with the Yogurt and Cucumber Dip.
SERVES 6 TO 8
FOR THE STUFFING
Heaping ¼ cup (60 g) pine nuts
5 tablespoons (75 g) unsalted butter