eG Foodblog: arbuclo - Dubai is a long way from Montana, baby!

[M. Lucia]

Thanks for the further info on dates (as I put my Saudi dates into the freezer).

The safflower actually has very little taste from what I've noticed. Interestingly, it is the same plant safflower oil comes from.

Camel milk- learn something new every day!

Haloumi is great grilled, and I also love the really salty feta cheese.

I've never heard of dried pomegranate seeds, they would probably be quite hard. Barberries are an excellent guess, they are frequently used in Iranian cooking under the name zereshk, and they are small and dark and color.

Coincidentally, I just picked up some sweetened dried barberries from Aji Ichiban, the japanese munchie store, they are very good but bear little resemblance to their natural source.

[Lone Star]

Lone Star, have you been reading my mind and peeking into my fridge?  I've been wanting to try haloumi for quite some time so I bought some a week ago.  I figured I might be able to have it for a meal some time this week, but if not, it has the shelf life perfect for (refrigerated) bomb shelters!  You'll see pictures if I get to it this week!

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Oh my! I don't know the extent of my powers

I hope you can try it with some nice melon for the sweet/salty combo.

Once you start working, perhaps you will meet some co-workers who can guide you to where the "Old Souk" type areas are.

[andiesenji]

I found the recipe for the chicken dish with barberries (zereshk)

It is very good.

Zereshk Polow

[jamiemaw]

Thank you for these fascinating insights and cooking. The larder of ingredients is extraordinary in its profusion and diversity, but are there any things you're missing, either from the States or your lengthy sojourn in Australia?

Looking forward to some restaurant meals too--once your husband is on the mend. I don't know if the Fairmont Dubai is on your itinerary, but FYI a very talented young Canadian chef named Scott Baechler is cooking there, likely at the Spectrum on One restaurant or The Exchange Grill. He was formerly executive chef at The Metropolitan Hotel here in Vancouver and oversaw its signature restaurant called Diva at the Met. He was well known for his use of local ingredients here and it would be interesting to see what he has found in translation.

Thanks again for your wonderful journal,

Jamie

[Abra]

The pictures are wonderful! I'm dying to go to that date shop.

About your flat bread recipe - you can post the list of ingredients straight from the recipe, and then you need to re-word the directions. Then it's ok to post, and I also beg you to do it. I was planning to make a focaccia with dukkah on it this weekend, but your flatbread would likely be a better match.

[arbuclo]

Thanks all for the haloumi ideas and andiesenji that chicken barberry dish looks divine.

jamiemaw thanks for the recommendation re your Canadian chef. I’ll definitely be checking that out, though not sure about this week. Hubby says he's feeling better so I'm hoping we'll soon be taking you someplace other than my house!

Oooh, goodie , I can post my flat bread recipe. Here ya go.

It's from The Australian Women's Weekly Middle Eastern cooking class cookbook. They call it pita but it's not what I'd call pita.

1 tablespoon dried yeast

1 tablespoon honey

3 cups (450g) plain all purpose flour

1.5 cups (240g) wholemeal plain flour

2 teaspoons salt

2.5 cups (625ml) water

2 tablespoons olive oil

Most of the time I don't soak the yeast in water before adding it to the dry ingredients, but feel free to do so, of course. I put all the ingredients in my Kitchenaide where I knead it for 10 minutes to make it elastic. Then put it aside in an oiled bowl and covered to let it rise for an hour (until about doubled).. Divide into 12 balls, place on a floured surface to rise again for 30 minutes (until about doubled).

Pat each ball into 16cm width, or so. Cook in a medium hot skillet on the stove, putting a little oil in the pan before putting each round into it. The recipe says to do this in a super hot skillet but my bread just burns. So I cook it a bit slower on a lower temp. I turn it several times to get even browning. Of course the recipe says you'll only need to turn it once.

Let me know if you give this a try and whether you can see any improvements I could make.

[arbuclo]

Thank you for these fascinating insights and cooking. The larder of ingredients is extraordinary in its profusion and diversity, but are there any things you're missing, either from the States or your lengthy sojourn in Australia?

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The 2 things that I'm disappointed I can't find are vanilla extract and stock. There is no vanilla extract, except maybe the imitation stuff which I don't like at all. There is vanilla powder but I've never really used it. Any of you think its a good substitute for vanilla extract? I've been thinking of making my own by steeping vanilla beans in alcohol. I have some vanilla paste at the moment that I'm using in the mean time.

As for stock, I used to buy UHT packaged liquid stock in Australia that I thought was pretty good since I couldn't be bothered to make my own most of the time. However here you can only buy stock cubes or powdered bullion. I may find the time to make some stock of my own now.

[arbuclo]

Here's a link to some information about Australian bush tucker foods. I've used a few bush tucker items at home, quite a few purchased from this company. I went to this shop when I lived in Melbourne and they were really nice people. Of course I then proceeded to buy some great stuff to try!

[Rehovot]

Yay! A blog from the Middle East! Great pics and stories. I can't remember if you covered this, arbuclo, but one of my questions was: do you speak and/or read Arabic? How does this affect what you buy, foodwise? It looks like you have such a variety of choices that you couldn't go wrong.....

Great blog!

[touaregsand]

I wouldn't recommend using Vanilla powder. Even though Dubai is an International city I guess it sort of makes sense that you're having a hard time finding vanilla. I don't recall ever having an Arab or Middle Eastern sweet that contained it. It's usually rosewater or orangewater. Someone else can expound on this better than I.

[bleudauvergne]

Thank you for these fascinating insights and cooking. The larder of ingredients is extraordinary in its profusion and diversity, but are there any things you're missing, either from the States or your lengthy sojourn in Australia?

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The 2 things that I'm disappointed I can't find are vanilla extract and stock. There is no vanilla extract, except maybe the imitation stuff which I don't like at all. There is vanilla powder but I've never really used it. Any of you think its a good substitute for vanilla extract? I've been thinking of making my own by steeping vanilla beans in alcohol. I have some vanilla paste at the moment that I'm using in the mean time.

As for stock, I used to buy UHT packaged liquid stock in Australia that I thought was pretty good since I couldn't be bothered to make my own most of the time. However here you can only buy stock cubes or powdered bullion. I may find the time to make some stock of my own now.

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Hi, I've been following your fascinating food blog with interest!

I could not believe the price of French potatoes in your grocery store, in comparison to the others. They must be some pretty great potatoes!

I completely understand your frustration in not finding the same products being abroad. Through my own trial and error in the various countries I've lived and cooked in, I find that any product containing real extract or real vanilla can be just as good as the extract I find at home. Check to make sure it's real and not an artificial flavoring and you won't be too far off. I've found that the packets of ground vanilla with sugar sold here in France do well in my baking products. I was actually grating a vanilla bean for awhile there until I finally tried the product. The other thing is to make your own extract as you mention above by steeping the bean in alcohol or bourbon, which I did one year.

Stock is another story. Making your own stock is the best thing to do, in the end, really. It's a very good sign that you have started off on the right foot with your housekeeper, who can help source things on the local market. Perhaps you can instruct your housekeeper on how you like to do your stock if you aren't able to invest the time and she's willing to check the simmer from time to time.

[arbuclo]

Yay! A blog from the Middle East! Great pics and stories.    I can't remember if you covered this, arbuclo, but one of my questions was: do you speak and/or read Arabic? How does this affect what you buy, foodwise?  It looks like you have such a variety of choices that you couldn't go wrong.....

Great blog!

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Why thanks! I don't speak Arabic or read it yet. My husband loves languages and we're gonna try to learn a bit of it together. Most of the food seems to be labelled in English as well as Arabic so I haven't had try and read a new alphabet yet. However, as you'd imagine, some things are called a different word than I'm used to so there's still plenty of interpretation!

[arbuclo]

Thanks for your thoughts on vanilla, touaregsand and bleudauvergne. My other option is to bring some back with me when I travel, which I may do. I'll check out the vanilla powder a bit more thoroughly. Another reason I thought they might not sell vanilla extract in the grocery is that it has alcohol in it but I think there were other extracts there so that's probably not the reason. I'm surprised I can't even find it in the shops that service mostly expats. Hmmm...such a mystery!

bleudauvergne, I hadn't thought about asking my house keeper if she'd be happy to stir stock for me! Actually, I've been thinking more about making stock which would give me the opportunity to buy big boxes of veg at the open air market one of these days. Otherwise it doesn't seem to make a lot of sense for me to shop there as I don't normally use mass quantities of the same type of fruit or veg.

Would be fun to give it a go; bargaining to come up with an exceptable price. I found it interesting that there are "helpers" that "greet" you as you get out of your car and ask if they can follow you around the market to carry your stuff, for a price, of course (they have carts and boxes).

[arbuclo]

Well, I'm still having problems posting pictures without help so I'll just post the pictures later.

Last night our dessert was Ben and Jerry’s which I’ve not seen since leaving the US. (Don’t ask how much it cost here! Some times you just have to treat yourself.) Flavours: Batter (oooh, my goodness it’s soooo chocolaty!) and Coffee. We also had three little bites of nougats that I got at Goodies on Saturday. Firstly, there was plain pistachio. It was very light and fluffy, not sticky and not really really sweet. It also had some other rather floral flavour to it; I don’t think it was orange blossom or rose water. The second one had apricot paste on the top and bottom and the nougat in the middle was pistachio. The last one was so pretty...it had dried rose petals covering the top! I decided that I liked to look at them a lot more than I liked to eat them.

I also had to have a couple more items that I got from the date shop.

[arbuclo]

This morning I had a smoothie to use up my last banana/plantain. I used cows milk and date milk in it as well as some wattleseed. Have you see wattleseed before? Australian bush tucker, it is. It’s got a mocha flavour to it. I use it in baked goods or ice cream but it can be used in savoury dishes too. Here's the recipe page from that company I linked to up topic.

And I also had some of that cinnamon covered date paste. Definitely my favourite!

[edited to fix typo]

Edited February 22, 2005 by arbuclo (log)

[daniellewiley]

Oooh, goodie , I can post my flat bread recipe.  Here ya go.

It's from The Australian Women's Weekly Middle Eastern cooking class cookbook.  They call it pita but it's not what I'd call pita.

1 tablespoon dried yeast

1 tablespoon honey

3 cups (450g) plain all purpose flour

1.5 cups (240g) wholemeal plain flour

2 teaspoons salt

2.5 cups (625ml) water

2 tablespoons olive oil

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Thanks for posting this - I'm excited to try it!

Is wholemeal plain flour the same as whole wheat flour??

(I guess I could just google, , but I'll ask anyway.)

[arbuclo]

Is wholemeal plain flour the same as whole wheat flour??

yes it is. Your brain musta googled for you!

[arbuclo]

Lunch! Hubby thought he felt good enough to go out for lunch so we headed to a cafe everyone raves about called The Lime Tree Cafe. Just wait til you see the colour of this place. If there are limes that colour I'd hate to eat 'em! It's easy to spot their little vans driving around town.

It was a nice day and the cafe has both an outdoor balcony and a courtyard. The balcony was full so we sat in their lovely courtyard. This cafe serves frittatas, paninis, salads, all day breakfasts, and some amazing cakes.

I had a panini with eggplant, tomato and haloumi, since we've been talking about it here. Husband had a meat and Mediterranean vegetable foccacia roll. Both were toasted and they were pretty good. However I thought my panini should have had more haloumi especially since the taste was so wonderful. Can't wait to use the haloumi I have at home!

I've been in the mood to order fresh fruit juices lately because most places do them so deliciously. This place had a new one on me: lime and mint soda. I've had mint lemonade so why not mint limeade? It came with a little jug of sugar water. I love that since I like my drinks on the more tart side. My dining partner had a latte.

This cafe is down near one of the prettiest mosques around. In fact it's the "open mosque" because non muslims can go in twice a week. This program is an effort to help people understand Islam. We haven't gotten there yet but it's something we are really looking forward to doing.

[arbuclo]

Tonight for dinner I thought I'd try a recipe from another of my ME cookbooks. It's one I wouldn't normally make but I figured, why not? It's orange chicken and, according to the book, is Afghani. Now orange chicken doesn't sound that different, why would I not normally make that?

Well, it's because the orange in the recipe is actually orange peel that you candy! You add the syrup to the dish before baking it and put some peel on the top. I'm not a huge fan of sweet and savoury together, thus the hesitation with the recipe.

The dish technique is to candy the peel, parboil some rice, pour the syrup from the peel over the rice, brown the chicken, remove it and slow cook some onions. Put half the rice in a pan, top with some toasted almonds, some of the peel, put in chicken and onions and top with rest of rice. Bake it and when ready to serve put some saffron steeped water over the top with more toasted almonds, the rest of the peel and some pistachios. I'll post a picture when I can. Very interesting! Anyone do this sort of thing before?

[Swisskaese]

Tonight for dinner I thought I'd try a recipe from another of my ME cookbooks.  It's one I wouldn't normally make but I figured, why not?  It's orange chicken and, according to the book, is Afghani.  Now orange chicken doesn't sound that different, why would I not normally make that?

Well, it's because the orange in the recipe is actually orange peel that you candy!  You add the syrup to the dish before baking it and put some peel on the top.  I'm not a huge fan of sweet and savoury together, thus the hesitation with the recipe. 

The dish technique is to candy the peel, parboil some rice, pour the syrup from the peel over the rice, brown the chicken, remove it and slow cook some onions.  Put half the rice in a pan, top with some toasted almonds, some of the peel, put in chicken and onions and top with rest of rice.  Bake it and when ready to serve put some saffron steeped water over the top with more toasted almonds, the rest of the peel and some pistachios.  I'll post a picture when I can.  Very interesting!  Anyone do this sort of thing before?

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Please post a recipe. That sounds amazing!

[iguana]

I want to find some raw milk or unhomogenised milk here so that I can try some rennet based cheeses (which I believe don't work as well if milk is homogenised).  As yet I'm not sure where to find something like that.  Certainly not in any supermarket I've been to.  I was also surprised that I can't find goats milk; I'd really like to use that to make cheese.  I'll give the camel milk a try, though I've heard that it doesn't curd up very well.

Hooray for cheesemaking! I think most rennet-based cheeses work okay with regular pasteurized, homogenized milk-- the exception to that seems to be feta. It's the ultrapasteurized milk that you must avoid for cheese-- the extra heat messes up the protein structure enough that it doesn't give a good set. Your Milk May Vary!

P.S. Great Blog-- I'm enjoying the vicarious travel!

[CaliPoutine]

Ok, forgive my cluelessness, but how would I go about making ricotta. That sounds interesting.

[andiesenji]

Ok, forgive my cluelessness, but how would I go about making ricotta.  That sounds interesting.

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Here is all you need to know about making ricotta.

These recipes are easy and turn out perfect every time.

[arbuclo]

Excellent! Thanks for the link to the cheesemaking info.

[arbuclo]

Last night our dessert was Ben and Jerry’s which I’ve not seen since leaving the US.  (Don’t ask how much it cost here!  Some times you just have to treat yourself.)  Flavours: Batter (oooh, my goodness it’s soooo chocolaty!) and Coffee.  We also had three little bites of nougats that I got at Goodies on Saturday.  Firstly, there was plain pistachio.  It was very light and fluffy, not sticky and not really really sweet.  It also had some other rather floral flavour to it; I don’t think it was orange blossom or rose water.  The second one had apricot paste on the top and bottom and the nougat in the middle was pistachio.  The last one was so pretty...it had dried rose petals covering the top!  I decided that I liked to look at them a lot more than I liked to eat them.

I also had to have a couple more items that I got from the date shop.

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And here's the picture:

I love the little bowl with the dragon flies. And isn't that rose petal covered nougat pretty?