Hassouni

Oh I forgot to say that Iraqis typically drink this hot. It is nice iced though.

Family biases aside, I do think they have the best bagged teas. Unfortunately they seem to be phasing out their conventional loose tea in favor of various flavored pu-erhs.

The concept is similar to gaz but it's a LOT chewier and the taste is very different (better!) This looks like all the minn al-sima I've seen, though I've usually seen it in the big box full of flour (or is it powdered sugar? it's been a while...) You traditionally are presented with the box and take a little piece out of it. The taste is indescribable and amazing. Behemoth is sort of right, imagine cardamom and mastic had a child that was more than the sum of its parts. There's nothing like it.

I'm not sure who calls them Loomi, but in Iraqi Arabic they're called Numi Basra (lime of Basra), and in Iran (where they're also used a lot) they're called Limu Omani (Omani lime). Iraqis and Iranians use them a lot for cooking as well as drinking. You can find them in any Persian store under the latter name and "dried lime" in English (you can buy them online here, among many other places). The drink, in Iraq known as Chai numi Basra, is made either by steeping the whole limes as you would any other tea, or by crushing the limes to remove the seeds (which make it very bitter). For a smallish teapot I'd say about 2 limes should do. I tend to prefer the crush-and-remove seeds approach. It's very, very nice, with a unique flavor not found in anything else, sour, slightly astringent, and, for lack of a better word, "exotic." It definitely needs sugar to balance the sourness, but this is one of my favorite tisanes. Incidentally, the Numi Tea company, (full disclosure, started and run by my cousins) was named after this drink. To my knowledge they produce the only bagged version of this, which they call Dry Desert Lime. I use that when I'm feeling lazy, though making it from scratch produces a more complex tea.

I'd like to add another type of coffee here, which I've only seen in Lebanon and is called "Arabic coffee" (the other kind is called Turkish even in Arabic), but it's very different from Bedouin/Gulf style "Arabic coffee". A very dark roast is coarsely ground, and then brewed in a tall pot (in Arabic: "dalla"). I asked a street vendor how he made it and essentially the formula is this: take 100g of coffee grounds per litre of water. Put 50g in the pot along with all the water, and simmer for an hour. Add the remaining 50g in and keep simmering for another hour. At this point, strain into another container and keep warm on the heat. Served in shots of about an ounce, with or without sugar, added at serving time. Since 1L of this coffee is a lot, I typically do this in quantities of 100-250mL. the 100g to 1L ratio may be slightly inaccurate, since he told me he uses something like 3.5 kilos of coffee beans for 12 pots, each of which I eyeballed at maybe holding 3L. So, 3500g or 36 L yields a shade under 100g per L. I think I've come pretty close when I've made it. This stuff is STRONG.....if you can't handle Turkish then stay away. But if espressos don't do it for you anymore, give this a try.

Many years later.... There are only two kubba that spring to mind as being made out of rice. The first, as Scubadoo says, is Kubbat Halab (Aleppo Kubba), which, despite the name, is a uniquely Iraqi dish, made by Arabs if not others as well. Instead of the shell being made from burghul, it's made from pounded rice and I suppose turmeric, and then deep fried. The shell should be a deep golden yellow color, and quite crispy. The other, also mentioned above, is a spherical kubba called kubbat hamudh (sour kubba), also made by Arabs. In Baghdadi Arab cuisine at least, these are usually served in a very hearty soup called Shorbat Hamudh Shalgham (Sour Turnip Soup), which also contains chick peas and swiss chard. I'm not sure what the shell is made out of, but the soup itself is thickened with soaked and pounded rice.

Pacha (with a p and a ch, as those sounds exists in Iraqi Arabic) is an Iraqi dish with origins in Iran (the Persian dish Kaleh Pacheh), and also exists in Turkey as Kelle Paça, and is also found among the Persian community in Bahrain. It is indeed sheep head and feet (kaleh and pacheh, respectively, in Farsi). In Turkey at least it's one of those 5am I've-been-out-on-the-lash foods. Guss is simply the Iraqi word for shawarma/döner kebap, and it comes from the Arabic word for cutting (قصّ)

Better late than never, but I must highly recommend Delights from the Garden of Eden: A Cookbook and a History of the Iraqi Cuisine by Nawal Nasrallah. There isn't a single Iraqi dish I grew up eating that isn't listed in this book, and my mother and other relatives often refer to it to make some dish that they remember from their childhood in Iraq but were never quite sure how to make. There are books on Iraqi Kurdish food, Iraqi Jewish food, or even food from Mosul, but this is the only book that I know covering the archetype of the cuisine - that of the Arabs of Baghdad, as well as a few recipes dating from the Sumerian to the Medieval Islamic periods that the author unearthed in her research. I may be biased because of my background, but I honestly think Iraqi (Baghdadi) is one of the most interesting cuisines in the region, as it's sort of a greatest hits - 2000 years of Persian cultural influence, 400 years of Ottoman rule, influences of the Indian chefs who worked in Iraq, and of course much food very similar to that of Iraq's neighbors in Syria. If you think of it sort of like spicier Persian food (several of the dishes are identical) with Turkish and Levantine influences, that's the right ballpark.

Found a small canister in my cupboard labelled Tieguanyin...opened up...and it looks like it's the real thing. Drinking it now, brewed it in a gaiwan with 6 oz water, 1g tea per ounce. Second infusion, water just a few seconds off the boil, infused for 30 seconds. In a clear glass cup, it's the same color as aged spirits like whisky or rum, with a sort of malty taste.

That's what's nice about the Lebanese ones, they're VERY firm

I like the idea of the Duralex Picardie glasses...they just come in so many size, it's hard to pick!

No idea what they're called, but the olives that can be found all over Lebanon and in Lebanese stores, especially the slightly bitter, smallish green ones cured with what I think is thyme and some other things.

What's the fruit in the last picture? Papaya?

This great Mexican bar in DC does a chile and ginger infused simple syrup, which they use for one of their signature drinks, the Red & Smokey - mezcal, syrup, hibiscus water, and muddled lime. This is a superb drink and if you can be bothered to make the syrup, it's worth it. They also use the syrup for a "Mexican mojito" in which rum is replaced by tequila. Not sure if they use jalapenos or dried chiles though...

In Mexico don't they add a dash of "chicken powder" to EVERYTHING? I would imagine that would umami-up some foot-stock. By the way, if you ask the butcher at Whole Foods for chicken feet, will he have them? I try to only eat free range organic chicken, and that's one of my only sources. I don't really want to get battery chickens from the Chinese supermarket, but I do want some feet for the next time I make stock.

No pictures, but man I made a knockout last night, a hatch pepper and pork stew, sort of a chile verde: Seared about a pound of cubed pork butt (on sale at Whole Foods, almost 3 lbs for $10), then sweated some onion and garlic, deglazed with beer and chicken stock, then added about 9 or 10 Hatch chiles that I had roasted and frozen a month or two ago, and subsequently skinned and chopped into a mash. Threw in a splash of vinegar, and let it braise in the oven at about 275º for 2-3 hours (can't remember). Served with sliced radish, diced onion and coriander (cilantro), some very ripe avocado, and corn tortillas. The two bits of bone that were in the pork came out spectacularly: the tendon, cartilage, or whatever was attached to the bone softened beautifully, in a way I've only seen in Chinese or Vietnamese dishes with beef tendon. Delicious! I'll definitely make this again as the weather gets colder, and I'll be sure to put pics up then.

I've seen a lot of videos of Indian mothers and aunties cooking, and a lot seem to use the small knife/hold everything against the thumb approach...

Can you explain more about how cafecito can go on for 12 hours? Is that normal?

Hmmmmm. I made some grenadine yesterday, about 10-2 oz (volume) dissolved over heat with about 8 oz POM, then cooled, another 8 oz POM added, and shaken with another few oz of sugar. I wanted to try it out, so I found DrinkBoy's recipe for the Canton: 1.5 oz Jamaica rum (1 oz Appleton Extra, .5 oz Smith & Cross) .25 oz Maraschino (Luxardo) .25 oz orange Curaçao (or in my case Cointreau) dash of grenadine. Mixed it up, and I dunno. I think the S&C has overpowered the whole drink. Luxardo normally dominates whatever it's put in, but I can barely taste it, which is more than I can say for the Cointreau. As for the grenadine, I only taste it in the finish. Anyone else make one of these before, and if so, how did it turn out? What else is a good showcase for homemade grenadine?

3 years too late, but I thought I'd show some kabab I've done in the past. As part of my Middle Eastern heritage, kabab is one of my favorite things to cook in barbecue season. Here are some lamb cubes (in Iraq known as tikka, in Turkey "kuzu şiş" and in Iran as "barreh") The lamb there was marinated most likely in a mix of grated onion, olive oil, lime juice, sumac, and some za'tar. Served with grilled peppers and onions, onion-and-sumac salad, and a grilled eggplant salad. I also often make what in Iraq would be called chicken tikka, or in Arab countries shish tawouq, but with a bit of a Persian twist - marinated in yogurt, saffron, lime, grated onion, and za'tar. I also do ground meat kabab (in Iraq just known as "kabab"), which I make as a sort of cross between Iranian koobideh and spicy Turkish Adana kebabı. Sadly no pictures of this.

Made a Sazerac for the first time in what feels like forever. Teaspoon simple, 3 dashes Peychaud's, and Bulleit rye, with a Lucid swirl. Lemon twist of course. What a perfect drink....

I've found that shank-like meat tends to get get more soft after initial toughness if it's cooked longer

What cut is it?

A generous finger of Barbancourt 5 Star. It's been a few months since I've had any. Gosh, it's nice.

Pineapples in October? Somewhere warm...