To think if Yotam Ottolenghi is going to complain about authenticity of olive oil in hummus, he shouldn't put out nonsense like Thai lentil soup

[AgaPanthers]

Seriously mate, if Mary Berry wants olive oil in her hummus it's up to her.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2789159/yotam-ottolenghi-attacks-great-british-bake-star-s-mary-berry-s-recipe-hummus-inclusion-olive-oil.html

You won't find any lentils in Thailand either.
www.westernlivingmagazine.com/2014/10/08/thai-red-lentil-soup/

But no tahini! She's lost it.

Authenticity is bollocks.

Say that one kind of olive oil is nicer than another, fine.

But "authentic" food is not necessarily nicer than food that is not authentic.

Just because 16th century Italian peasants didn't have access to this ingredient, doesn't mean that it won't make my pasta nicer.

Dear God no! What an earth is the world coming tooooooo!

What a knob, it's her version she can do it how she wants!

The existence of "Thai Lentil Soup" doesn't imply that lentils are native to Thailand or that people in Thailand eat that dish. Thai in thus case just means "Thai style" or "with Thai spices".

I kind of get where he's coming from. Mary berry and delis smith do tend to simplify and blandify most things in their published recipes, so it's good to have a warning about that.
Authenticity is a fraught concept in an age of speeded up diaspora though.

I do like ottolenghi-style cooking. But it's often way too complex for the stuff I will throw at the children. That's where berry et al come in.
That said, I do think nigella is the perfect intersection of family, functionality and fantasy. And maybe Jamie Oliver on a good day.

I think this may be the most middle class thread title I have ever read

I love it!

Oh, you really haven't put the hours in if you think that.

Well, this is a change of pace from the typical AIBU threads.

The thing is he messes with every country's food, which is his choice, but then he can't really complain about the wrong kind of hummus.

Like his 'pulled pork' is cooked in an oven, not on a BBQ, and contains Szechuan pepper and pomegranate molasses. They'd hang you in Texas for that.

Likewise he claims a a Malay duck and mango curry, but since when was mango curry a thing in Malaysia, and as for the use of duck breasts rather than flavoursome bone-in, it's a crime against proper home cooking.

E.g., this is not a fucking risotto www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2010/jul/10/barley-tomato-garlic-risotto-ottolenghi

Hmmm. Methinks someone is jealous of the fact that lovely Mary Berry is still on prime time telly at the age of about 146, whereas most people have never heard of him. Self-publicity alert.

Anyway, Nigel Slater said the other day that a recipe is just a guideline, you don't have to stick to it religiously, it's open to interpretation.

Why does everything have to be "authentic" anyway, why can't it just taste nice?

And who knew you could buy chickpeas that aren't in a tin?? Why would you? (Not that I buy them anyway, life's too short to make humous from scratch IMO).

Ibs I get that I reassign too he wanted a bit of publicity.
He's a snob not everyone can afford the finest ingredients or cares to be 'authentic' Mary Berry is giving those people another option.

" Just because 16th century Italian peasants didn't have access to this ingredient, doesn't mean that it won't make my pasta nicer."
So true :o

WTF am I on about I meant: I get that too he wanted free publicity.

Can I quote this for Highgate Mums?

Well the great Claudia Roden says 2floz olive oil so that's good enough for me. She also has a recipe with and without tahina, I prefer it without.

Am sure tinned chickpeas are not perfect but I'd make hummus twice in a lifetime without :)

I did think the original article was a bit tongue in cheek!

I rarely use tinned chickpeas or pulses, lbs.

I usually buy a 500gm packet of dried chickpeas (or whichever pulses) and cook them all in one go, then bag them up into 4 lots, and freeze them.

And why would you not make homous from scratch. Life's too short? It takes about 3 minutes!

Put a drained tin (or equivalent) of chickpeas in a food processor or blender with juice of a lemon, a clove of garlic (I just chop it a bit, as it's going to get blended) a couple of spoons of tahini (I use almond butter, as DH has an intolerance to sesame) a couple of tablespoons of olive oil, some ground cumin and salt. Process it together, then add some water to get the right consistency.

Is your life really too short to do that?

team yotam on this, he is Israeli and they LOVE hummous- its like how we feel about..queues, M&S and how to make tea! let him be

Hummus is variations on a theme. It's common all round the Med and ME, and is subtly different in most places. So Yotam is right, and Mary is right, and Claudia is right. But only Yotam is rude.

Absolutely, Six. My cottage pie is probably different to yours. But it's a traditional British food. There is no one definitive recipe.

YANBU OP. As previous posters has said this smacks of publicity seeking and Mary can do what she likes.

Mind you, although I haven't seen her recipe, I suspect that it is a little bland and anglicised. Imo, if you fancy a decent cake, or a meat pie, then Mary's your woman. But if you're looking for some tasty middle eastern fare, then she's unlikely to be the top of the pile.

Olive oil is optional but tahini is an essential ingredient in hummus and there is no excuse for tinned ingredients.

Surely you read the recipe to learn how to make a dish from scratch, not be told to open a can.

It was very tongue in cheek. I heard him on the radio talking about hummus, and he will say he likes it a certain way, but accepts other regions make it coarser, with less tahini etc. I can imagine his reaction to an English woman making 'hummus' with no tahini at all, replacing it with olive oil would be an alien concept. But he has to accept, these are the ingredients at hand to us, and this is our culture. I shall be making hummus the Mary Berry way.

However, Mary Berry is not the person to point at if you want to find someone free of hypocrisy. She is very particular about how certain things must be done, and what she terms as success or failure. Not just on a technical level, a lot of what she sets as exacting standards are based on her opinion. She has plenty of her own pet recipies which must be 'just so' and she won't accept any alternatives, as if only she had ever baked a cake 'to perfection', and only 'perfection' would do. This is what she has been known for, for decades! This is what TGBBO is founded on, and how it sets the tension and builds in drama.

So I think this is what Yotam was playing with. Yes, it is a big joke that he can play with any recipe but not hummus. He can't change that aspect of his palate, it is tied up too much with history. He is a very different type of person, very different chef, with different attitude and relationship to food to Mary Berry. The comparison itself is a bit of a joke.

I'm biased because I love the way Ottolenghi has transformed vegetarian food in this country and how I immediately dislike anyone labelled a "national treasure".