May Cookery Book Club - Middle Eastern month

[HuevosRancheros]

This month we are having a vague Middle Eastern theme - Jerusalem (Ottolenghi) and Persiana (Sabrina Ghayour) have grabbed our imagination, but other books can definitely be shared - let us know what you like cooking
give us more books to buy

Yes exactly I thought a perfect vehicle for introducing smoky aubergine (they have it in tomato type sauces but not like this). I ate them all even though I didn't like them much either!

I had the baked eggs from Persiana for lunch today and it was really good. I think it'll become a favourite here.

I know flavoured hummus seems to be a no no on here but I really like the roasted red pepper hummus you can buy in supermarkets. So I bought some chickpeas and peppers and I am going to attempt to make my own.

I haven't got persiana, as looking on eat your books it looks quite meat-heavy, and the veggie stuff looks quite similar to Jerusalem.

But the Persiana baked eggs sounded interesting, so I googled them... not only does it sound really good, but I found the whole book for free on google books!! Here

I like the sound of the baked eggs and will make them next week - shakshuka-ish, but without the peppers which is fine by me! :)

I made the burnt aubergine and mograbieh soup from Jerusalem yesterday. Sounds daft, but I'm not really sure how I felt about it, I'm having leftovers for lunch so will make a judgement today
What I do know is that I hate the process of burning aubergines, it stinks! Do you all do it over a gas hob?

My mistake, it's not the whole book on there :(
But the naan barbari that I wanted is in there :)

I don't have a gas hob so I avoid all the burnt aubergine recipes. I'm too scared to try to do it in the grill. Maybe I will give it a go when the weather is nicer on the bbq. I dint fancy a stinky house.

I've got the ingredients for baklava. So will give that a go tomorrow I think.

I do the smoky aubergines in the oven. Line a baking tine, stab the aubergine a few times and slam in a hot oven for 25- 45 minutes (depending on the size of the aubergine) until it's completely collapsed (Ottolenghi suggestion if you don't have gas). The flesh isn't quite the same flavour - but good enough and you can always add a pinch of smoked paprika - and it's no effort.

mistymeanour I will try it in the slow cooker. Why didn't I think about that?

That's good thinking Two and Misty - you wouldn't get the smoky flavour but they would cook beautifully. And yes, some mild smoked paprika would add the smokiness - that is the conclusion I came to with the soup.

It was a lot of effort and smoky stinking out the kitchen for remarkably little smoky flavour. As I was eating it, it occurred to me that I could have just used smoked paprika and saved myself the hassle.

I have never had mograbieh before; I didn't think I would like it, so have never bought it before, but got it specially for this recipe.
I should have listened to my instinct, I didn't like it! It was a bit chewy, but the overwhelming texture was slime, really unpleasant.

Overall, the flavours of the soup were nice enough, the chunks of fried aubergine were tasty, but I didn't like the mograbieh and smoking the aubergine wasn't worth the hassle. Won't be making again :(

I agree Huevos, mograbieh is a bit slimy - basically balls of pasta. To use it up I have cooked a bit and mixed it in with cousous - the contrast in textures is good.

I cook the Chermoula Aubergine with bulghar quite often for lunch - it's really nice and easy. The recipe calls for "fine" bulghar (that only needs a few minutes to cook) but I have never seen this - has anyone? would it not really be couscous then. My supermarket bulghar takes about 20 minutes to cook which foxed me the first time I followed the recipe.

Ooh, I love the chermoula aubergine with bulghar!! Haven't made it for a while, must have it again soon.
I have "normal" bulghar from Waitrose, I think I just microwave it for a bit to cook it, I think, in the amount of water he says :)

misty Middle Eastern, greek and Turkish shops sell both fine and coarse bulgar, not the same as couscous.

Thanks Pantah. No ME/Greek shops near here - will look out next time I'm in the big city.

Did someone mention the roasted cauliflower and hazelnut salad from Jerusalem? It's lovely. Really like the pomegranate seeds and the dressing.

Here is a copy of the recipe
www.ottolenghi.co.uk/roasted-cauliflower-hazelnut-salad-shop

Love that salad Two
I even put the celery in and liked it, despite not really liking celery!

I made hummus yesterday. It was quite nice. I've got a big bag of dried chickpeas so I'm going to try it again at some point. I might just buy Persiana.

Does anyone have cookbooks on a kindle or other ebook reader? I'm just wondering how easy it is to follow recipes using my kindle.

If you have dried chickpeas going spare, you could always make falafel? :)

No help on the kindle front, I'm afraid - I've only ever bought one on kindle (Jerusalem, as it happens), and couldn't get on with it. I like to flick through and take it all in, didn't like it on the kindle :(
But there are people on here who do like using ebooks, so wait for them to come along! :)

I have overflowing shelves full of cookbooks so would like to save some space!

I will have a go at falafel, thanks!

I have a Kindle fire but hate cookbooks on it - whereas I love novels on it. I prefer the paper versions to cook from...

Hello all, just back from holidays. I have some cookbooks on my kindle just to reduce the number of paper books but I don't like it much as it's hard to flick through and the pictures are rubbish (it's a paperwhite). But I do use it.

I've got Persiana on the kindle for about half the price of the book. So will see how I get on.

I always buy the kindle version if it's available. Just don't have the space for more books at home. I have no problem cooking from my iPad. I either cook from the iPad kindle app directly. Or for recipes in my rotation, I cut and paste info pepperplate and cook from there. I like to use pepperplate for the shopping list feature. It makes meal planning much faster.

Hi all, did we plan something for June? If not we could revisit and old favourite perhaps.

Or maybe one of these www.mumsnet.com/Talk/_chat/2376378-If-you-could-only-keep-one-cookbook-in-your-house-which-would-it-be

I've been really remiss this last month but have made a few ME things and will continue with this month. MiI keralan fish curry seems to be a weekly visitor in this house still, I may have to revisit the rest of the book again too.