Potato Makmora, my style

Lamb shanks were a revelation the first time I tried them. Believe it or not  that was only 5 years or so ago. 

In Syria we don't cook Lamb shanks the way God intended. Instead we take the meat off the bone cut it into cubes and use it to cook stews. The cut is called Mozat (موزات). I assume it is from the Arabic word Mozeh which means banana. I assume because the the shape of the muscle resembles a tiny banana. (The last three sentences are completely made up. Most likely it has nothing to do with Banana)

I never tasted Mozat until I cooked that lamb shank for the first time.

My mum, bless her, hates meat. She would have been a vegetarian without a doubt if vegetarians were invented at that time. She can't touch raw meat of any form. My dad does all the meat handling and prep at our house. My mum would just push the stuff into the pan with spoon. Once cooked it doesn't get any better. She would only eat red meat if it is in its purest form without any sinew or any trace of fat, preferably without meat flavour or texture! 

I don't know if you have seen a boiled lamb shank. It has a gelatinous connective tissue that holds the muscle together. If my mum ever see this on her plate she wouldn't eat for a week. So needless to say we never ever had lamb shanks in our house.

Enough about that and back to the recipe. This is a simple dish of lamb, potato and onion. I add carrots for extra sweetness. Cooked nice and slow in a clay pot with salt, pepper and allspice. Melting in your mouth tender. It is by far my favourite lamb dish and a stable on my dinner party menu.

Here is my recipe for four:

Four lamb shanks

Two potatoes

One onion

Four carrots

Chicken stock 150 mls

Salt and pepper to taste

Allspice  1tsp

Start by roughly chopping the onion. Peel carrots and potatoes and cut into one inch cubes. Then into the clay pot. Onions at the bottom, lamb shanks, carrots and potato. Pour the chicken stock season generously with freshly ground black pepper and rock salt. Generously sprinkle the allspice over the meat and potatoes. Cover and into a cold oven.

I start the oven on 200c. After twenty minutes I turn in down to 165c and cook for three and a half hours. 

If you want to follow standard culinary procedure then brown the meat before adding to the pot. However I don't bother when I am cooking in a clay pot. The meat browns nicely as you can see in the picture.

Freekeh with Slow Roasted Lamb Shanks

Freekeh (فريكة roughly translated, Rubbed) is a type of wheat grain common in the Levant, Egypt, Turkey and parts of North Africa. Freekeh grains have a distinct nutty smokey flavour due to the preparation method. Traditionally freekeh is cooked as pilaf or soup but it is a versatile ingredients and can be utilised in numerous ways from salads to cereal bars.

To make freekeh, wheat is harvested green. This is then arranged in piles and set on fire. This is a tightly controlled process and only the straw and chaff burns while the high water content in the green grains prevents them from burning. This process gives freekeh its distinct smokiness. The grains are then thrashed and rubbed by hand (hence the name) to separate the chaff. The final step is drying the grains in the sun.

In Syria, freekeh is cooked as a pilaf with cooked chicken or lamb. Shanks (or Mozat as called in Syria) is a favourite cut to serve with freekeh. However Mozat is of-the-bone cut and it is served braised rather than roasted.

You can buy freekeh in London from Middle Easter supermarkets. Try Green Valley in Edgware Road or Damas Gate in Shepherds Bush.

Today's recipe is my take on the traditional Freekeh with Mozat. I cooked freekeh the traditional way but I roasted the lamb shanks in the oven with Arabic style flavours. I also like to raost some vegetables with the meat; potato, caroot... anything you like really.

Here is my Freekeh with lamb shanks recipe:

4 Lamb shanks
One potato
Two Carrots
Mushrooms 200g
Olive oil 2-3 tbsp
Black pepper 1tsp
Salt 2tsp
Paprika 2tsp
Chilli powder 1tsp
Allspice 2tsp
Juice of half a lemon

For the freekeh:
Freekeh 2 cups
Chicken stock 2 cups (stock cube are a good alternative)
Boiling water 2 cups
Green peas 200g
Pine nuts 30g
Ghee clarified butter 2-3 tbs (leave out for a healthy version, it adds a great flavour though!)
Salt
Pepper

Heat the oven to 200C.

Mix the oil, lemon juice and all the spices to make a spicy rub with Arabic flavours. Rub the mixture into the shanks to cover completely and get some of the mix into the muscle fibres. Arrange the shanks in a deep roasting tin bone side up. Cut the potato and carrots into chunky cubes and add with the mushrooms to the tin around the shanks. If you have any spice mix left drizzle over the vegetable. Otherwise season with salt and pepper. Add a little water to the tin to prevent the spice mix from burning.

Cover the tin with foil and roast on the high heat for 30 minutes. Turn the oven down to 170C and continue cooking for another 120 - 150 minutes. Take the foil off for the last 45 minutes. After you take the foil off paste the meat with juices from the tin every 15 minuets or so to stop it drying.

Wash the freekeh in a large bowl. The burnt grains and any residual chaff will float on top. Pour away with the water. You don't need to get rid of every floating grain. You need the smokey flavour they give. Soak the freekeh in cold water for 30 minutes.

In a heavy bottom pan add the freekeh, water and stock. Bring to hard boil then turn the heat to medium and cook for around 30 - 45 minutes. Taste the freekeh to make sure it is fully cooked. The texture should be a bit al dente. If the pot is getting too dry add a little bit of boiling water. Add the peas 5 - 10 minutes from the end (I cooked them for longer than I should in the picture above).

While the freekeh is cooking fry the pine nuts (and some almonds if you wish) in the Ghee butt till golden brown. Remove the nuts quickly before they burn. Preserve the butter for later.

Once you are ready to serve heat the butter until smoking hot. Pour very carefully over the freekeh put and mix through.

Serve the shank on a bed of freekeh with the vegetable on the side. Sprinkle the pine nuts on top.

Serve with some yogurt or Syrian style Tzatziki.

One Hundred and One Mezze: 27. Musakhan

Palestinian food shares most of its dishes with the surrounding Levantine countries. Few "national" dishes of Palestine like Maqluba (upside down rice dish) and Mahashi (stuffed vegetables) are common all through the Levant with, sometimes very distinct, local variations. Today's dish, Musakhan is on the contrary a true uniquely Palestinian dish. Musakhan in it is original format is a very rustic dish of layered bread, sumac and onion mixture and roasted chicken.

In Syria, Musakhan is fairly well known and frequently eaten dish although the Syrian version varies a lot from the Palestinian ancestor. The flavours remained the same but the cooking, ingredients and presentation has been refined in keeping with Syrian fondness with food finesse. Here goes thick Taboon bread and comes in paper-thin Saj bread. Chicken is shredded and Musakhan is served in individual portions.

Musakhan is hardly ever eaten as a main dish in Syria. It is usually served as a side dish or part of a large spread in dinner parties and big family occasions. In coffee shops and restaurants Musakhan is usually served as a small snack dish you can munch on in the few hours you spending there smoking Argeeleh. Another very popular version of Musakhan is tiny small pastries stuffed with the chicken and sumac mixture and served as part of finger food buffet in parties.

For this recipe I use Saj bread, a very thin Syrian bread that can be bought from large Middle Eastern supermarkets. Alternatively you can use Lavash bread which is a similar bread native to Iran, Armenia and Turkey. If you live in an area where you can have access to Turkish shops then you can use Yufka pastry. Finally if you are getting desperate use filo pastry.


Here is my Syrian style Musakhan recipe:

Cooked chicken 500g (boiled or roasted)
Three onions
Olive oil 1/2 cup
Sumac 4 tbsp
Pomegranate Molasses 1 tbsp (my own addition, optional)
Pine nuts 30g
Saj bread
Salt

Heat the oven to 200 degrees.

Start by frying the pine nuts until golden in the olive oil. Be very careful as pine nuts burn very quickly. Remove from the oil when ready.

Slice the onions thinly and fry on medium heat until they go translucent. Shred the chicken and add with the sumac, pomegranate molasses and the rest of the olive oil (keep some to brush the bread with at the end) to the pot. Taste and add salt as required. Remove from the heat.

Cut the saj bread into 20cm (8inch) squares. Spoon 3-4spoonfuls of the chicken mixture into the centre of the bread. Fold three corners in and roll the bread into a spring roll shaped pies (see below).

Arrange the rolls in a roasting tin. Brush generously with olive oil and back until golden brown.

Syrian Fajitas(ish)

I was never a fan of fusion cuisine. I am still to try a fusion dish that tastes better or even comparable to its ancestors. Usually it is the flavour combinations that ruins the experience for me.

Personally I always found that fusion between two geographically close cuisines works better than two wide apart. May be because neighboring countries use similar ingredients so when you fuse the two cuisine, flavours don't come out of place.

So for somebody with such views to post a fusion recipe is a bit hypocritical, but I really love this dish and felt obliged to share it with you.

The recipe is definitely more Syrian than it is Mexican. The flavours and ingredients combinations is Syrian while the style and cooking methods is Mexican. I am not sure if that qualifies as fusion cuisine strictly speaking. See and judge by yourself.


Here is my Syrian Fajitas recipe:
Beef steak 500g (I use Sirloin steak)
One red pepper
One yellow pepper
Large onion
Salt
Pepper 1/2tsp
Paprika 1tsp
Chilli powder 1/2tsp
Allspice 1/2tsp
Dijon mustard 1tsp
Vegetable oil

Parsley and Onion Salad
One red onion
Parsley 70g
Juice of half a lemon

Tahini Sauce
Tahini 4tbsp
Juice of half a lemon
Salt
Water

Two large tomatoes

8 Tortillas


Start by slicing the steak into this strips. Marinade for an hour if you have time in all the spices, salt and a little olive oil. Slice the onion and peppers into similar size strips. Heat a large frying pan or wok until very hot. Start by frying the onion in a small amount of vegetable oil for a couple of minutes. Don't over cook as the vegetables need to be a bit crunchy. Add the meat and continue to cook then add the peppers and cook for another couple of minutes.

While waiting for the meat to marinade prepare the sides.

Chop the parsley and slice the red onion very thinly. Mix together with the lemon juice.

Add the tahini, lemon juice to a bowl and start mixing with a spoon. The mixture will become stiff and light in colour. Add a little water and mix again. Add the water small amount at a time until the mixture loosens to the consistency you want. It needs to be fairly loose but not water-runny. Add salt to taste.

Thinly slice the tomatoes. Warm the tortillas.

Serve the meat and all the side dishes and the warm tortillas. Guests can make their own wraps on the table. This recipe is enough for four people.

Mufaraket Batata

Mufarakeh is another one of these generic names of various vegetable dishes. They share very little between them some are vegetarian like Mufaraket Kusa (courgettes mufarakeh), some use eggs, and some are cooked with ground meat like today's dish Mufaraket Batata (Potato Mufarakeh). The only common factor I could think of is the simplicity of these dishes. They are usually easy to make, quick, simple and filling making them a perfect students and single men food.

The word Mufarakeh could be roughly translated to Rubbed or Massaged. Like Mnazaleh, the name doesn't make much sense especially non of the dishes called mufarakeh I could think of contains any rubbing or massaging of the ingredients.

Mufarakeh is not a modern Syrian word. Muhammad bin Hasan Al-Baghdadi described a dish called Mufarakeh in his book Kitab Al-Tabeikh (The Book of Cooking) in 1226. The dish he described is a scrambled egg-like dish made from chopped chicken livers, egg yolks and spices.

Potato Mufarakeh is a simple dish of potatoes, onions and minced meat. Traditionally the potato is cut into small cubes, fried and cooked with the meat in a pot. The result is a yummy dish but not great looking. I made some adjustment to the recipe mainly to make it more presentable. It is in a way a deconstructed version of the original dish.


Here is my Mufaraket Batata recipe:
Potatoes 800g
Minced lamb 400g
One large onion
Ghee clarified butter 1tbs
Vegetable oil
Chicken stock 250ml
Pine nuts 50g (optional)
Salt
Pepper

Pre-heat the oven to 200 C.

Start by preparing the meat mixture. Finely chop the onion and fry in the Ghee butter on medium heat till soft. Add the meat and continue to cook till fully cooked. Season with salt and pepper and add the pine nuts towards the end when all the water has evaporated from the meat mixture. The meat need to be well seasoned as it is the main flavouring ingredient.

Peel and slice the potatoes into 5 mm thick slices. Fry in vegetable oil till almost done. Drain on a kitchen towel.

In a deep roasting dish, arrange a layer of the potato slices and sprinkle some salt. Spoon the meat mixture into a thick layer. Arrange the rest of the potato slices on the top. Pour the chicken stock carefully. Sprinkle with salt and freshly ground black pepper and bake in the oven for 30 - 40 minutes till the surface is golden crisp.

Serve with a generous squeeze of lemon, Arabic bread and salad on the side.

One Hundred and One Mezze: 15. Beetroot Mutabal

This dish is not a traditional Syrian mezze. It made its way onto the menu of few Damascene restaurants in the last few years. Travel guides favourite, Lailas, serves a version of this dish that was much appreciated by ABC reporter on her visit to Syria.

I will have to admit that I never tried this dish in a restaurant so I don't have a reference point. I just made up this recipe the way I like it. It is essentially the same recipe I use for Mutabal but I use beetroot instead of aubergine. The combination of the sweet taste of the beetroot, sour yoghurt and the earthy flavour of tahini works surprisingly well together. This dish works very well served next to lamb kebabs.

Here is my Beetroot Mutabal recipe:
Cooked Beetroot 250g
Tahini 2tbsp
Yoghurt 2tbsp
Lemon
Salt

In a food processor start add the beet root tahini and yoghurt. Process till fine and well mixed. Add a squeeze of lemon and salt to taste.

Spread in a plate. Decorate with pine nuts and a drizzle of olive oil. Serve with Arabic flat bread.

One Hundred and One Mezze: 12. Pomegranate Molasses Hummus

As I mentioned on this blog before, Pomegranate molasses is really fashionable these days. Not only here in England but in Syria as well. People are discovering more ways to use it and they are adding it to more and more dishes. The molasses add a nice sweet and sour flavours to dishes and adds an extra depth and warmth of flavours.

Pomegranate Molasses Hummus was introduced, as far as I know, into the culinary scene of Syria few years ago. A small humus shop in Jisr Al-Abyad area of Damascus lays claim to the invention. As always, it is impossible to verify such claims but I thought I should mention it. The trend caught on and more hummus shops around the city are selling it these days.

I tried this version of hummus on my last holiday in Syria. At first I thought it was a gimmick and I wasn't too keen on the flavours. Few bites later and I discovered how addictive it is. I will have to say this is no replacement of hummus but it makes a nice change every once in a while.

Hummus traditionally is served with pickles and raw white onions on the side. Pomegranate molasses version on the other hand, works very well with fresh mint leaves.

Here is my recipe: (the recipe is my wife's hummus with an added molasses)

Chickpeas 1 can

Tahini 75mls

Garlic one clove

Lemon

Pomegranate molasses 1-2 tbsp (to taste)

Salt

Olive oil

Mint leaves

Toasted pine nuts

In a food processor put the drained chickpeas, tahini, molasses, crushed garlic and a squeeze of lemon. Process on high speed for about five minutes till you get smooth texture. Add salt to taste and if the hummus is too thick you can loosen with some water.

Leave the hummus in the fridge over night if you can for the flavours to develop.

Spread in a plate. Decorate with mint and pine nuts and drizzle with olive oil.

Toshka

If you were intrigued with my sujuk recipe, but didn't know what to do with it, I will tell you my favourite way to use it.

Toshka is originally an Aleppian recipe. It is made with Arabic flat bread stuffed with kebab meat and de-salted white cheese. These loafs are then baked over the charcoal grill or on a flat griddle.

In Damascus, as with sujuk, we took the name and a broad outline of the dish and re-created it. Toshka in Damascus is a type of sandwiches made with sujuk meat and Kashkawan cheese (Kashkaval as it is more widely known) then grilled in a sandwich maker for the cheese to melt.

In my version of this recipe I use Pita bread. This is the only recipe that I think Pita bread works better than Arabic flat bread (khobez). If you don't have Kashkawan cheese (it is not always easy to find in London) you can use mild Gouda.

Here is my recipe:

Pita bread

Sujuk meat (Damascene style)

Kashkawan cheese sliced

Cucumber pickle

Open the Pita bread into a pocket shape. Fill with a layer of sujuk and a slice of cheese. Grill in a sandwich maker or on flat griddle.

You can brush the bread with melted butter if you want it to crisp like in my second photo.

Serve with cucumber pickle on the side.

Simple as that!

Sujuk, Damascene take on an Armenian sausage

Sujuk is another type of sausage introduced to the Syrian cuisine through the Armenian community. It is a strong tasting spicy sausage made usually from fatty beef mince or mixed beef and lamb. Similar versions with similar names are common in Turkey, Greece, Balkans, Bulgaria, Romania and all the way to Russia.

Sujuk is usually a cooking sausage used in different types of stews and dishes. One of the most classic ways to eat it is fried with eggs for a hearty breakfast. I personally like to use it in a similar manner to Chorizo to make pasta or even paella. I find it works very well with sea food and white fish especially monkfish.

In the Levant this Armenian version of Sujuk is widely available in Lebanon and in Aleppo in northern Syria where a large Armenian community lives.

In Damascus we use the word Sujuk to refer to a completely different type of spicy semi-cured meat. The spices used are similar to the ones used in the original Armenian sujuk but instead of making the meat into a sausage, "Damascene sujuk" is mince fried in its own fat till all the water evaporate and the meat starts to crisp. This process will allow the meat to last much longer. In fact, the flavours will develop nicely and the sujuk will taste much better after a couple of days in the fridge.

This Sujuk meat is used in a variety of ways. The most common of these is sujuk fatayer, the most flavoursome and one of the most popular fatayer (Fatayer is an oven baked pastries with different stuffing sold in communal ovens all around Damascus, check my post to know more).

The other very popular use is a sandwich filling with few slices of cucumber pickle. Although it is one of the most delicious yet it is one of the cheapest sandwiches you can eat, hence it sells around university, student halls of residents and in bus depot.

Finally before the recipe, in Narenj restaurant they serve sujuk as a hummus topping as in my photo above.

Here is my "Damascene Sujuk" recipe:

Mince lamb 500g (or half beef, half lamb)
Ghee clarified butter 1tbsp
Paprika 2tsp
Dry chilli flakes 2tsp
Allspice 1tsp
Garlic powder 1tsp
Fenugreek 1tsp
Salt 1tsp

Start by frying the mince in the ghee in a heavy bottom pan till it start to brown. Add the salt and all the spices and keep cooking till all the water evaporates. Turn the heat down and cook for about 30 minutes. Stir the meat every few minutes so it doesn't catch. The sujuk is ready when all the fat has melted and the meat is starting to crisp.

Transfer to a bowl and let cool down. Cover in cling film tightly and leave in the fridge for a day or two for the flavours to develop.

You have a very versatile "sausage". Use in sandwiches, pastries, pasta sauce, pizza or as a hummus topping. You can keep the sujuk in the fridge for over a week as it is almost cured with the salt and spices or you can even freeze it for a couple of months.

Syrian Cheese Cake

Thia is my first crack on making sweets for the blog. I am not a desert kind of cook. And I am not a good baker even. This partly because I have some kind of mental illness preventing me from following recipes. I just can't help to change any recipe I am attempting I add stuff, change things around and I don't do measuring cups. This could be detrimental to some delicate dough recipes. But hey what can I do, it is an illness after all!!

So, if you come from such poor abilities like myself you would attempt something safe first. NO! Not me unfortunately. I decided to create something totally from my imagination. I wanted to make cheese cake but I wanted to make it as Syrian as I can which was a challenge.

To make it Syrian I looked for inspiration from our sweets. There is very few cheese based Syrian sweets: Kenafeh Nabulsiyeh (Cheese Kenafeh), Katyef Be Jebneh (Cheese stuffed pan cakes , fried and dipped in sugar syrup) and Halwet Jeben. The first two didn't offer me any ideas but the third gave me some hope.

Halawet Jeben is a specialty sweet of Hama, a small city in central Syria. It is a sweet dough made from sugar, cheese and semolina. This is stuffed with cream, rolled and cut into bite size pieces. The dough is stiffer than what you would expect is cheese cake but that can be adapted.

Biscuit base was my next challenge as I decided against using the traditional base. Instead I thought Filo pastry is the perfect replacement. It can't get more Syrian than that. Almost 90% of Syrian sweets are made of it.

Choosing cheese was not a problem. Akawi was the obvious and only option. This cheese is used for all the above mentioned sweets. Akawi is a white cheese with low salt content, melts very well and doesn't have a strong flavour which makes it ideal for sweets making. The nearest tasting cheese is the dry mozzarella that you use for pizza. Although Akawi has a low salt content it still need to be de-salted before use in sweets.

Finally for the dish to receive the Syrian seal of authenticity, I added a splash of orange blossom water (Ma' Zahher is Arabic).

Here is my recipe:

Milk 500ml

Double Cream 200ml

Sugar 175g

Semolina 150g

Orange Blossom Water 2tbs

Akawi Cheese 500g

Butter

Filo Pastry 6 large sheets

Icing sugar

If you are using frozen pastry make sure it is defrosted in advance.

Slice the cheese into 5mm thick slices. Put in a big bowl and under running water for 30 minutes to wash the salt away. Change the water completely every few minutes. The cheese should lose most of its saltiness. Drain.

Heat the oven to 160c.

In a pot add the milk, cream and sugar stir while heating till all the sugar has melted. Add the semolina and orange blossom water. Before boiling point add all the cheese and whisk till all the melted cheese is mixed in. Take of the heat and keep whisking for few minutes till it is smooth and well mixed.

Melt the butter and brush the base and edges of a 24cm (9inch) springform cake tin. Arrange your Filo pastry sheets so half of it is inside the tin and the rest out side to be fold on top. Make sure the pastry covers the whole tin(photo above right). You need to brush every layer with butter to stick in place.

Tip the cheese mixture. Wrap the Filo sheets on top in a random wrinkled pattern (photo). Again brush with butter.

Bake in the oven for one hour till nice and golden. Let cool down for few hours then put in the fridge over night.

Dust with icing sugar and enjoy.