Arabic home cooking for iftar

Gulf News

Arabic home cooking for iftar. Try out these three tasty traditional Arabic recipes for iftar, prepared exclusively for tabloid! by food writer and blogger Dalia Dogmoch Soubra. We start off with an apricot Qamarudeen smoothie, followed by a lentil soup and finally a chicken fatte. See more at: http://gulfnews.com/gntv

Transcript

00:00For the month of Ramadan, there are particular traditional dishes that people do, and in

00:11my case, there are dishes that remind me of my mom, and one of them is a lentil soup,

00:17which a lot of people break their fast with.

00:21The main course is a chicken fete, which is a traditional Syrian dish, and then we have

00:28the kamaradeen drink, which is a dried apricot smoothie with rose water, again, traditional

00:35ingredients in the Middle East, and particularly during Ramadan.

00:41We're going to start off with the kamaradeen drink. Soak the apricots in boiling water.

00:46Let them soak for about 10-15 minutes, then use a hand blender and puree the apricots

00:53to a smooth consistency. Add some rose water, as much as you'd like. Continue pureeing until

01:00you have a smoothie. Depending on how people like it lighter or thicker, they can add more

01:08water.

01:08The drink is sweet enough on its own, so it doesn't need any sugar, and it's perfect if

01:14you refrigerate it for half an hour, say, before serving it, and it lasts for a couple

01:19of days in the fridge, so it's a perfect drink to break the fast with.

01:22We are going to do a traditional lentil soup, so for that you will need one and a half cups

01:27of lentils, one large or two medium-sized chopped onions, two chopped carrots, or one

01:35large one. We will need vegetable stock, about six cups. Someone can add more or less, depending

01:43on how liquidy they like their soup. Then the seasoning is white pepper, salt, and cumin.

01:50I love cumin, so I put quite a bit in it, but you can put as much as you'd like. Heat

01:55a little bit of olive oil in a sauce pot, and sauté the onions for a couple of minutes.

02:01Once they're slightly browned, you can add the carrots and sauté them together. This

02:07enables the juices to flow of the vegetables, which adds a lot of flavor to the soup. We

02:13then want to add the lentils and sauté them all together. Add the cumin to toast the spice

02:19a little bit, a little pinch of salt, a little pinch of white pepper, and once you've sautéed

02:26all the ingredients for a few minutes, you can add the vegetable stock. Let everything

02:32come to a boil. Once it comes to a boil, bring it down to a simmer and cover the pot, letting

02:40it cook for 30 to 40 minutes, just until the lentils are done. You do not want the lentils

02:46to be overcooked, because once they're overcooked, they will not have as much flavor. Once the

02:53lentils are ready, take a hand blender and puree the soup to a smooth consistency. You

02:59can season with salt and pepper, and add a little bit more cumin if you'd like, and garnish

03:05with fresh chopped parsley leaves, and you're ready to serve your soup. We're going to do

03:13a chicken fete next, which requires two whole chickens cut into pieces. Keep the bones and

03:20the skins on the pieces, because it adds a lot of flavor to the stock. We will need two

03:26cinnamon sticks, a tablespoon or two of cardamom seeds, and a few bay leaves, salt and pepper

03:33for seasoning, Arabic toasted bread, chopped parsley, one fourth of a cup, half a cup of

03:41toasted pine nuts, and toasted almonds actually, so mix them together. Then we will need two

03:47tablespoons of tahini, which is sesame paste, some reduced stock, the stock that you will

03:54be using, cooking the chickens with, a little bit of water, a kilo and a half of low fat

04:00yogurt, and two cloves of finely minced or crushed garlic. Those are the ingredients

04:07you'll need. Bring a large pot of water to a boil, adding the chicken pieces with bones

04:13and skin, cardamom, bay leaves, salt and pepper, and cinnamon. These ingredients will actually

04:22cut the chicken grease, or the zanjha as we call it in Arabic. It will also flavor the

04:29stock and therefore flavor the chicken pieces. Bring everything to a boil, cover the lid

04:36and let it simmer for about an hour. You'll notice when the chicken pieces are done because

04:40once you poke them they will be nice and soft. Remove the chicken pieces, let them cool a

04:45little bit, and then start removing the meat from the chicken, discarding bones and skin.

04:52For the yogurt, you will whisk together the low fat yogurt with some water to lighten

04:58the mixture. Add pepper for seasoning, raw garlic, the sesame paste, and whisk until

05:06you get a nice and smooth consistency. We will then take a baking dish and layer the

05:12yogurt on the bottom of the dish. Add the chicken pieces, add some of the reduced chicken

05:19stock, as much or as little as you'd like, then add some more yogurt, some of the chicken

05:26stock, then top off with the toasted bread, toasted pine nuts, almonds, and the chopped

05:33parsley. You can add some salt or pepper on the top and you are ready to serve.

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