An Israeli Feast

So I made it through three weeks of regular weekly posts, and am already finding it hard to set aside an hour to write a thoughtful and descriptive account of the many things that happen each week. I have been making little notes of stories to share, and plan to write a bullet point post with many of these incredible learning moments, encounters with Israeli culture and personal growth experiences.

I've decided that rather than let it go another week, I will write a short post about this fabulous Israeli feast I had last Shabbat lunch. Now calling it a feast implies that I labored for hours and ate at a huge table full of people, but this feast was a quiet meal with my lovely cousin Rina. Now in addition to being a great tour guide and gracious host, Rina is a phenomenal cook. She taught me how to make her tahina salad, which I am now officially announcing as Rina's Famous Tahina Salad.

This dish I actually "made" with her, which really means watched her in awe. She began by roasting an eggplant. She then carefully filleted the eggplant open as if performing surgery. She mixed tahina, olive oil, freshly grated ginger, lemon juice, salt and garlic. This mixture is poured over the eggplant which is then decorated with chopped red pepper, tomato and parsley, and normally red onion, but she left that out since I'm not a fan. Then a dash of olive oil, za'atar, sesame seeds and black pepper.

Ah-mazing flavor. Although wonderful served alone, we ate it with some pumpkin seed bread. Yummy!

We also made chicken, called schnitzels here, basically small boneless, skinless breasts pieces. We brushed them with egg then coated them in a mixture of bread crumbs, sesame seeds and za'atar. We, I mean she, then lightly fried them in a cast iron pan, which made me feel very homesick... my kitchen has pretty basic cookware, which often makes me miss cast iron pans from home. By the way if you don't know what za'atar is be sure to click the above link!

Disclaimer:
I was not present for the cooking of these beautiful stuffed artichokes... but I did get to eat them! Filled with ground beef, celeriac, cilantro, many spices and other things I can't remember. And served with a side of plain rice.

We also made a salad of baby greens which reminded me of home, and made me miss the Farmer's Market. It was a wonderful meal.