My favorite salad of the moment

There is nothing I like more than what the French call a “salade composee”, or in other words a salad you could have for dinner without leaving the table hungry. Over the years, my husband and I have been quite fond of eating salad for dinner and depending on the country or region or season, we have our favorites.
In France, we were big fans of “salade perigourdine” that we discovered in the many bistros of Paris. In Nice, we loved having tomatoes, mozzarella and parma ham salad platters. In Canada, I used to love eating a good chicken Ceasar salad. Here in Dubai, we have actually made one up using some of our favorite local ingredients.

For 2-3 people
Ingredients:

A bunch of rocca leaves (resembles arugula), cleaned
1-2 bunches of your favorite lettuce/leaves, cleaned
(I often take mesclun and add a bit of raddichio or some shredded red cabbage)
2-3 small lebanese cucumbers in thin slice
1 cup of cherry tomatoes
1 avocado cubed or sliced
3/4 cup of feta, crumbled (try to get a creamy variety, in Dubai, I ask for the Danish one, which I suspect is not Danish…)
1 red bell pepper, cut up in bite size pieces
Croutons (try frying some pita chips…)

Dressing
1/3 cup of olive oil
3 tbsp of balsamic or cider vinegar
salt + pepper
3-4 tbsp of FRESH herbs: parsley, wild thyme, basil. mint

2-3 Chicken breasts (I usually marinate chicken with olive oil, lemon, thyme/rosemary, salt & pepper for a few hours and grill on bbq – I suggest you do the same)

1 cup of hummous (in Dubai, I get this at the store, because they make it better than I could)

Make the dressing and let it sit for 30 minutes or so.
Grill chicken on the bbq if possible. Slice and set aside. You can actually do this part way ahead of time and just warm it up before using.
Toss all the salad ingredients except the croutons and toss in the dressing until everything is well coated.
Arrange the salad on each plate, add the sliced grilled chicken and croutons or pita chips.

Accompany this with pita and a bowl of hummous that you can dollop on the side of your plate….

Thai vegetable & prawn stir fry

I never considered posting this recipe because it feels like something that is almost too easy to have to explain. It is just something I cook up when I’m in a hurry but want something nice. Perfect if you have unexpected guests for dinner or if you just want to change from the usual pasta dish.

Kaffir lime leaves are quite easy to find in Dubai in most supermarkets. In North America and Europe, you would need to get them at an Asian store. The good news is that they freeze quite well. They are extremely fragrant and the taste is much like that of lemongrass.

If you have no time to make the sauce, you can substitute with a ready made stir-fry sauce. You could also skip the marinating, but it would be a shame (and prep only takes 10 minutes). As for the vegetables, feel free to add any that you have in your fridge that can be sauteed (cauliflower, chop suey, shredded carrots or cabbage, etc).

Serves 2-3

Ingredients

For marinade:

1/4 cup vegetable oil
juice of 2 limes
2 tbsp of sesame oil
2 tbsp grated ginger
1 tbsp of fish sauce
1 tsp of soy sauce
5-6 kaffir lime leaves or 1 stalk of chopped up lemon grass

For the sauce:

1/4 cup of vegetable oil
2-3 tbsp of sesame oil
1-2 tbsp of peanut butter
Asian hot sauce
Juice of 1 lime
2 tbsp soy sauce

2 tbsp of ginger

2 chicken breasts cut up into strips/or 10 tiger prawns

300 grams of rice vermicelli

3 cloves of garlic, chopped fine
1 small onion, cut into slivers
1 red pepper
1 yellow pepper
1/2 cup snow peas
1 bunch of pack choi
1/2 cup of broccoli (I have a penchant for broccolini)

Garnish:

Cashews and loads of chopped coriander

Instructions:

Mix all the marinade ingredients in a large bowl and put the chicken or prawns to marinate for 30 minutes.

Just a picture so you can see what the kaffir lime leaves look like

Meanwhile, using a wok, saute the garlic on medium heat in a tpsb of vegetable oil and then add the onions. Don’t let them brown. I usually saute them for about 2 minutes total, you may want to reduce the heat if they start browning or increase the heat if onion still looks raw.

Using the same wok, fry up the chicken/prawns with a few tbsp of the marinade (include a few of the kaffir lime leaves + some of the garlic) on medium heat for about 7 minutes or until cooked through. Prawns might take a little less time.

Add all the other vegetables and saute for about 4 minutes or so and take off the heat.

Mix all the sauce ingredients until the peanut butter is well emulsified.

Bring to boil a big pot of water and add vermicelli until cooked, around 4 minutes. Strain and add to the wok along with the sauce. Toss everything on medium/high heat for about 3 minutes.  Garnish with  coriander and cashews.

Tada!

Shanti makes byriani

Shanti is our maid and she comes to the house a few times a week. The other day, she saw all the spices in the cupboard and I guess must have seen my propensity to buy, prepare and eat food so she suggested she make us a byriani.
She is from Sri Lanka and has spent years in Dubai as a housemaid with various families from all origins so I figured it would be a nice idea. She came by this morning and once in action in the kitchen, slicing onions faster than a blender and smashing garlic cloves , ginger and spices more efficiently than I could ever dream of, I knew she could teach me a thing or two….

I have slightly adjusted the recipe by deboning the chicken because I dislike having chicken bones in my plate and it is more pleasant when you are having people over. As well, Shanti fries the chicken once it has been cooked. I have completely skipped that step because it can slightly dry out the chicken. Of course, you can substitue lamb or fish for this recipe. When I served this, I put some thick yogurt on the table for those of us who wanted to cool down the spicy taste.

What you will need :

– 3 onions
– 5 garlic cloves
– 4 tomatoes, diced
– a bunch of fresh coriander and mint
– fresh ginger – 5 cm piece

– vegetable oil

– ghee or butter

– 1 chicken, skinned and cut up

– curry powder
– turmeric
– cumin powder
– cardamom pods
– chilli powder
– salt, pepper
– 1  cinnamon stick
– cumin seeds
– anis seeds

– basmati rice (around 3 cups)

Preparing the chicken, tomatoe and spice mixture:

Add oil to a pot and saute the chicken on medium-high heat for 2 minutes.

Add 2 onions, 2 cloves of garlic, 2 chopped tomatoes,   2 tbsp of powdered cumin, 2 tbsp of turmeric and 2 tsp of curry powder and 2 or 3 tbsp water, cover and let it cook on medium hear for 20 minutes, adding extra water to prevent the chicken from sticking to the pan sticking. The chicken should be properly cooked through once you are finished with this step and you should have a few tbsps of cooking liquid.  Let the chicken cool down, debone it and return the chicken pieces to the pot with its cooking liquid. Set aside.

Meanwhile, using a mortar and pestle, chop and and make a paste out of the remaining garlic, the chiles, ginger and around 2 tbsp of cumin.

Grind all the remaining dry spices into a powder. You can leave a few cumin seeds and bay leaves whole.

Fry the remaining onions and garlic with some oil in a pan on medium heat until it becomes golden. Then add the remaining chopped tomatoes, the dry spice mixture, whole bay leaves and cumin seeds and let simmer until it becomes a thick sauce, about 10 minutes.  Once this is finished, you add this mixture to the chicken, add the chopped herbs and set aside. It should look like the pic below.

Directions for making the rice :

Put the rice in a big bowl full of lukewarm water and rinse it thoroughly. Repeat 2 or 3 times or until water is clear.
Cook rice in lots salted boiling water for about 5-7 minutes. The rice should be slightly undercooked. Strain it.
Separately, take your saffron strands and reduce to a powder in a mortar. Add this powder to a cup of hot slightly salted water.

Assembling your byriani :

Take a big pot and put 2 tablespoons of butter or ghee. Add a layer of rice, 1/3 cup of saffron water, the chicken mixture, and repeat until there is no more rice.
Cover and put it on low heat for about 30 minutes or until the rice is tender.
To serve, I mix it up a little, add some ghee or butter to it and then pour on a large platter. Use coriander and mint for decoration and if desired some toasted cashew nuts.