The Dough Stripped Bare

Last week I attended the launch of N_K_D Pizza (alias for Naked - oooh, far too naughty for the Middle East!) with a bunch of my famished foodie friends, including Ms Custard Pie, The Spontaneous Euphoric, The Scribblelishesse, Dubai Biter, and Mezzaloonie (she's not really a loonie). They already wrote pieces on the opening, and rightly beat me to it, because I have been languishing in bed since with the Flu (real influenza, not just the man-flu variety).

So in the interest of differentiated information, I am going to discuss the best part of Naked Pizza, the thing that differentiates them from all other pizza companies - their dough. This is of particular interest to me, because though (disgustingly) I am an avid fan of fast food, I am also hypoglycemic, and have a wheat-intolerant husband. Bread is not our friend - for me, it results in an immediate large insulin response then drop, causing tiredness. crankiness (WHAT!) and intense sweet cravings. For Hambone it means bloating of the stomach, pain, heartburn, and lots and lots of farting (lucky me).

So back to Naked Pizza's dough:



"Our crust is made from an Ancestral Blend® of 10 grains plus prebiotic agave fiber and probiotics (healthful bacteria like the ones found in yogurt for balance and digestive health) bound by water and made by hand. The grains we use include oats, brown rice, buckwheat, quinoa, amaranth, teff, spelt, tapioca, and two kinds of wheat. This diversity of grains, fiber and probiotics are the main reason for that satisfying feeling after eating Naked Pizza, contributing a slow, sustained release of energy without the crash from eating other single grain, highly processed pizzas."

These grains are my friends, and they should be yours too. I'm going to ignore the two strains of wheat, assuming they are common wheat (bread wheat) and Durum wheat (semolina). Both of those are naughty grains, and although I know they probably make up half the blend, maybe if I don't talk about them it will be as if they're not there. Brown rice and oats are easy peasy - so lets look at the other stuff:

Spelt Muesli

Firstly, Spelt because it is closely related to wheat - they are two different species in the same genus, but it has lower carbohydrate and higher protein, and the greater solubility of the particular protein in spelt makes it both easier to digest, and gives it a lower glycemic load. It also has slightly less gluten than common wheat. It is a good wheat replacement for some wheat intolerant, but definitely not for coeliacs.

Teff (a strain of lovegrass - how sweet) is in another genus, but still a cereal - it is however completely gluten free. Like spelt, it is higher in protein than common wheat, and, in fact includes all 8 essential amino acids for humans - making it a good wheat substitute for vegetarians. It is also particularly high in minerals such as phosphorus, magnesium, iron, copper, zinc, boron, barium, and thiamin.

Buckwheat, and all the othes following, are not cereals, but a psuedocereals. Buckwheat is a remarkably pretty flowered plant that produces seeds and more closely related to the sunflower, a fellow Achene, than it is to wheat. Like teff, it is gluten free, high in protein, has all eight amino acids. It is also particularly rich in selenium, zinc and iron. Foodies would be no strangers to buckwheat - it can be found in Japanese soba noodles, galettes in France, and blinis in Russia. It can also make a decent gluten-free beer. The added benefit of buckwheat is that it contains D-chiro-inositol, which is useful for insulin signal transduction for those with type-II diabetes and polycystic ovary syndrome.

Amaranth is a herb, and also has no gluten. It has been declared "a food of the future" due to it's ability to be easily cultivated even in arid environments, it's grow-anywhere giant-beanstalk nature (9 varieties are considered noxious weeds in North America), it's excellent nutritional profile (protein 30% higher than cereals like wheat, amino acids etc), and it's overall eatability. It is one of the only agricultural crops (like some other herbs), where, depending on the variety, the entire plant is used in cooking - leaves, seeds, stems and root. Along with also being great for vegetarians, it has also been found useful in reducing blood pressure and cholesterol.

Quinoa grains

Quinoa - pronounced "kinwah" is a chenopod. Closely related to species such as beets and spinach, it's leaves can also be eaten. Like amaranth and buckwheat it is not a grass, is gluten free, and is chock-full of protein, with that lovely vegetarian-friendly amino acid profile. It was embraced by hippies and health food store owners over a decade ago as a "superfood", and now is being considered by NASA as a possible crop for future long-duration manned spaceflights. I buy it as a grain, and cook it and serve it like rice.

Tapioca, Sago and Cassava refer to the same plant, in different stages of the processing process.The root is most commonly used, although the bitter leaves are appreciated by some cuisines. It unfortunately requires quite a bit of treatment to get to our table as it contains toxic amounts of cyanide in it's raw form. Cassava is the raw plant, and one of the largest source of carbohydrates for meals in the world. The cassava plant provides more food energy per square metre of cultivation than any other crop besides sugarcane. It is particularly  important in Africa (e.g. in Ghana, it makes up 30% of daily caloric intake) it is the fifth largest crop in china, and is an excellent source of GDP for Thailand. It is also looking to be a useful ingredient in biofuels. Nutritionally, it is gluten free, but unfortunately lacks the healthy properties of the other ingredients listed above - it's benefits are in its ability to be digested easily, and it's caloric intake for famine-prone nations.

If you want to try out some of these ingredients for yourself, you can find most of them in their seed or flour form at the Organic Foods Cafe at the Dubai Mall. Park'n Shop in Jumeira sell a great spelt loaf, and quinoa and tapioca can be found in almost any supermarket. Both Choithrams and Galeries Lafayette sell some great spelt pasta, and I even spotted an amaranth/corn blend fusilli at the Umm Suqeim Choithrams last week. Or of course, you can do your fast-food-loving body a favor and try them all together in the N_K_D Pizza dough (Dubai marina)




Ps. I haven't forgotten about my recycling mission - it's on for next week when I am over the flu.

Despicable Me

Happy egg after an overseas trip

Don't let anybody tell you it started with the chicken. It was most definitely the egg. In fact, it was several of them, half a dozen to be exact. This was the first time in Dubai that I had to sell my earth-mother soul.

It's quite the conundrum, because despite the fact that there are often fluffy fat chickens strutting around my suburban street, it is impossible to buy a local free range egg at the shop. And on that one pivotal day, I found myself locked in dilemma before the egg fridge.

Choice one: local eggs, in white or brown, added lutein or not. Large, small, in packs from 6 to 30, ranging from about 30 fils/egg to 1 dirham.

Choice two: organic local eggs, in white or brown, dozens or halves, about 1.50 dirhams each.

Choice 3: English or French free range eggs, half dozens, organic or not, mostly brown, vegetarian fed or not, starting at (gasp!) 3.40 dirhams an egg.



So....Do I save money, the chicken, our bodies, or the planet? Because realistically, I am not going to carbon-offset every box of eggs I buy. In the end, the chicken lost out - I cannot bring myself to eat eggs that have sprouted jetpacks and flown five and a half thousand kilometers to my frypan. And I am most certainly not going to pay 3.40 an egg to do that, so Hambone is relieved - the money is saved too. The poor old chicken lucked out, but I've gone organic ("organic fed" - I assume this means they are still allowed to inject them with non-organic matter), so possibly this means I am doing our bodies a favour.

crazy egg on drugs

Edwina from mezzaluna shared a similar experience, and actually found herself in tears at the fridge. But she's a more gentle soul than me - I just got annoyed. She was also telling me that she had found a more reasonably priced Turkish brand free-range egg. I found the brand she meant, but could only see the organic fed option or selenium enriched. Which adds another question: how do they "enrich" an egg? Methinks poor chooky is getting more shots rather than the egg being injected.

This is only the start of the list of evil things I now freely participate in. The love of photolysis-resistant, virtually non-biodegradable polystyrene trays is uncanny. They use them for anything in the supermarket that does not already come wrapped in plastic, and often you might even come across things wrapped in plastic, then popped on a polystyrene tray, and then wrapped in plastic again. I'm sure one day I will see plastic bags wrapped in plastic, placed on a polystyrene tray and cling-wrapped.

I resisted for over a year, stopping the servers at the deli or butcher and asking them for a plastic bag instead (no such thing as paper here), always selecting fruit and veggies of the bulk pile and taking them in a plastic bag to be weighed and priced. But one day I was in a hurry and picked up the pre-packed broccoli, and i eventually got tired of the people behind the counters gaping at me like I'd lost my marbles. I still avoid them where I can, and I have a stack of them washed and saved in my cupboard for use as paint palettes for Goldilocks. But theres no excuse - they are in my home, and eroding the conscience of my former green self.

sad egg out of a sad chook

My fight with the eggs was not my only carbon footprint episode. Every day I have to buy fruits and vegetables that have been shipped in from all over the world. The UAE do produce a few things - tomatoes, zucchini, potatoes, dates. But all are watered with either desalinated water (the de-sal plants are powered by burning oil), or by rapidly depleting groundwater. My soul is sold either way.

Then of course there is summer. Our A/C unit runs 24/7 for 6 months of the year, with only one or two months where it is off completely. There is no rain, so our garden requires hosing daily, twice in summer. And we have a gardener who loves to water our driveway despite my continual protests and ranting at him. Now he just waits till the crazy woman leaves and then comes and has his naughty way with our hose, leaving enormous wet expanses on the concrete that evaporate into the air only ever to be seen again as cursed summer humidity.

Oh, and I drive a V8 4X4 because the roads are crazy and I need something with a high outlook that moves me quickly out of danger from passing idiocy, or if it doesn't, then at least protects me with layers of steel and airbags. Plus it makes me feel tall.

And don't get me started on recycling. In fact do. Next post, recycling in Dubai - does it actually happen?

Slap-Dash Biryani in the rice cooker

I have always loved Biryani. I suppose it comes from all my childhood memories of cinnamon, and of course where it was used - apple pie, with sugar on pancakes, mixed into Mum's banana custard - all wonderfully sweet and heart-warming dishes. So now the use of it is always associated with comforting, warm moments - and I am doing my best to add it to my own children's sensory memories.

True Biryani is made by pan-frying a spice, onion and meat mix, then adding to par-cooked rice and finally baking the lot in an oven. All this takes about 2 1/2 hours. In these days of gadgets, I make mine in (gasp!) a rice cooker. I cook the meat seperately, because I like to keep it browned and crispy, and although you could serve this spiced rice with anything, from barbecued lamb kebabs to garlic tiger prawns or even on it's own, I like it with chicken.

Ingredients:

For the Chicken:

• 1kg Chicken Drumsticks
• a big pinch of saffron - soaked in warm water for a minute or two
• a big pinch of salt
• a glug of honey
• a glug of oil
• a little pinch of white pepper

For the Rice:

• two cups of basmati rice
• two medium carrots - julienne
• two celery stalks, fine dice
• frozen green peas - about 1 cup
• two onions (I like the red - they are sweeter), sliced finely
• crushed garlic (to taste - I like 2 cloves)
• 1 cinnamon quill
• 5 cardamom pods (split)
• a little pinch of clove powder
• 1 chicken stock cube
• water 
• oil for pan-frying

Instructions:

1. for the chicken - mix ingredients, then roll drumsticks in the liquid. Place on an oven tray, sprinkle a little more salt, and then bake at 180ºC for about 45 minutes
2. For the rice - pan-fry onions and garlic until they are deep dark brown, then add carrots and celery, stock cube and a small amount of water and cook for about 5 minutes
3. Put this mix, and the rest of the ingredients in the rice cooker with the appropriate amount of cold water for your cooker (in mine, this is another 2 cups). 

Serves 4

I like to serve with a yogurt and chilli sauce - but you could also make a gravy with the scrapings of the baking pan, some extra salt, pepper and honey, and flour and water if you like it thick, or water and lemon juice if you like it thin.

You will notice that the onions will lose their colour. The reasons for browning are two-fold. One, the colour is absorbed by the rice, and two, the flavour of caramelized onions lends a more appropriate flavour.

Don't mention the war

I managed to get myself a gig on the radio. This articulated (and yet surprisingly deluded) fellow by the name of Alexander McNabb thought I might have some worthwhile information to share both about and to, the blogging sphere of Dubai.

Alexander has a lovely blog about Dubai, and it contains both valuable information and witty rants, and I have come to know him a little over blog comments and twitter (I only properly joined the birdy world just over a week ago - find me @dementedbird). He also does a techie talk show on Dubai Eye once a week, and this week decided to talk about blogs. He invited a very popular and seasoned Dubai blogger, an ex-journalist with an exotic and exciting past that includes Palestine, Lebanon and the UK, a Jordanian who's blog managed to single-handedly close down a public hospital with the blessing of the king, an incredible volunteer teacher in Palestine, another Jordanian with an ancient (six year) old blog and a position as head if marketinghubME and input in bayt.com, and a professional (yes, full time job) fashion blogger.... And me.


Blogging only since October 2010, aproaching middle-aged non-working housewife, no blogging direction, unskilled (except in wine), non-political, cake gobbling, latte lapping me.

The first thought lasted only a moment - "do I agree to do it?" I am petrified of public speaking (even though I have had plenty of practice) and started blogging partially because I can be much more intelligent and articulate when I have time to think about it. Setting my mouth as the speed regulator in a conversation rather than my fingers, and having no "delete" feature is of marked concern. However, to pass up an opportunity like this would be crazy, for the sake of learning, the experience and the fun.

Next question was "what the freak am I going to wear?". I know, radio is supposed to be the refuge of the ugly and ill-garbed, but i was going to be sitting with a fashion blogger, and obviously a good one, because she gets paid to do this.  And I wanted her to like me because I had about a million questions for her, and I didnt want to look like a tramp, or a dowd, or a nerd, or an aproaching middle-aged non-working housewife, with no blogging direction, unskilled (except in wine), non-political, cake gobbling, latte lapping overweight geek....[deep breath Sarah]... or an insane person. So I stayed up all night thinking about it.

Thirdly: how on earth was I going to be able to keep my foot out of my mouth? I am notoriously politically incorrect verbally, but only those who know and love me understand that I only mean about half of what comes out of my big wide gob. I was called by a different radio station a couple of weeks ago (not my fault, I did not ask to be called - they obviously got my number from a rude SMS I sent previously), and they said if I named five songs by The Cure in ten seconds, then I could have three tickets to Wild Wadi. What do you think was the first song I thought of?..... Remember I live in Arabia... That's right, "Killing an Arab". Seriously. Seriously. Dumb.

I was also wide awake wondering what they would talk about. I lay in the dark at 2am posing questions to myself: "And Sarah, why did you start blogging?" "oh, well, that's easy. I started doing a photography class and wanted to share my experiences." nb, don't mention Julie and Julia....but by 5am I had run out of questions, and so I woke my husband up to tell him that he would be getting the kids ready for school because I hadn't had a moment of sleep, and the alarm was set for 6am.

I think I did finally get some sleep in there, because I remember waking up in a frenzy for nursery drop-off, washing my hair and not blowdrying it, throwing any old thing on and then shuffling Goldilocks out the door thirty minutes late. I had forgotten I would not have time to go back home, because I was picking up Micheline (Mich Cafe) on the way. Thankfully I had a spare handbag in the car, and so I didn't have to subject Bebhinn (Hellwafashion) to visions of Karama fakes (which of course I don't own because that would be immoral, unfashionable and illegal).

When we got to the studio, I was put at ease by the friendly and approachable demeanors of all the other bloggers. (Bebhinn from hellwa is about ten feet tall and dresses impeccably, but didn't seem to notice my five-year-old stretchy wrap dress, or the three-year-old's breakfast on the sash). When we entered Alexander and Suzanne welcomed us warmly, and said "let's not talk about Tunisia". And so the evil mouse in my head started chanting "Tunisia, Tunisia, Tunisia."

I think I managed to get through it without mentioning Tunisia, The Cure, Israel, sex outside if marriage in the UAE, or even any profanity. I think I did rattle on at one point about Palestine, which of course I know nothing about, and I also shamelessly pimped my relationship with UAE foodie group Famished in Arabia. But I will have to listen to the podcast to know for sure what damage was done. As will you: find it here

Luckily, I don't think it went anything like this:

shukran 'ala 'wnak lii fiil'arabiyya

She's Dressed in a fitted deep purple shirt with matching lilac eyeshadow and 4 inch cork wedges. She's got the ripe figure I expect on a female chef. I know now why they call her the Nigella Lawson of the Arab world. But would she be flattered or offended? She's definitely got enough personality not to be compared with others, but Nigella Lawson's not exactly chopped liver - maybe she's OK with it.

I'm at the Dubai Ladies Club at a cooking demo with Suzanne Husseini. Lesieur are sponsoring the event, and I'm looking forward to the goodie bag at the end, but Suzanne also promises to make us leave with a word or two in Arabic. She speaks with a perfect Canadian accent, then prattles in French to Marianne from Leisieur. And as she welcomes us she chips into Arabic then chops back to English, sometimes so seamlessly it takes a moment to realise that she's speaking a different language. And when the women in abayas giggle, I do too, because her body language is so descriptive that I can understand. I think I could learn a language quickly if it was entirely taught to me thus.


Her first recipe is introduced with the phrase "I don't work with recipes". And she tells us to put things in or not put them in. I feel more comfortable when she chops a green apple like I do - not like a ninja chef, and mixes the salad (salata) with her bare hands. For a moment I'm in my own kitchen. And when she asks if anyone would like to try the dressing straight out of the mortar, I find myself jumping to my feet and yelling "Me, me!". The dressing is jeyyid - good. Garlic, lemon juice, lemon and orange rind, other bits and pieces, and bips roman - pomegranate molasses. She scatters pomegranate seeds over the salad at the end, saying they are the "jewlery" - but when we taste the salad, it's more than that - their fragrant sweetness is integral to the mix.

Couza is next - Courgette fritters. She chops the courgette rather than grating it, because she doesn't want to release too much moisture. She asks how much chilli we want in the mix, but then ignores the requests of "More, more!", knowing that the lowest common threshold must be served, because we all taste every dish.  She says "Let's start with 4 eggs, and see how that goes. We can add more later." I like her style - she is texturally in touch with her recipe, and encourages us to be too. To me the mix looks quite dry, but she assures us it's perfect. And when she tastes the finished product she smiles triumphantly and says "No comment!" She serves them with nah nah - mint, and labneh - yoghurt, which she has mixed with Labni - a thick yoghurt achieved by straining the moisture out through cheesecloth.

Next is tarragon (tarrahon, with a guttural 'h') chicken salad. She breaks apart pieces of roasted chicken breasts and reminisces about her old kitchen and the stories shared with her friends. "Yalla yalla!" she says, I think it means go, or let's move on. She mixes mayonnaise and yoghurt together for the dressing, and adds conversation about the confusing and different dialects of Arabic. Laban in Egypt is milk, here it is haleeb. Two Egyptian ladies are now standing at the back, nodding and smiling, and everybody else is leaning forward in their chairs. "Nobody's bored?" she checks - we are running overtime, but nobody seems to notice. We are all entranced and inspired. Some chatter, but it is all about food. Filfil she says, pepper. a'assal is honey, and crumbling a little flaked sea salt, she states in staccato, nitfi a pinch.

She finishes with pistachio and rosewater crepes stuffed with a ricotta mix and glossy ripe strawberries. She flips the crepe like a pro, and then apologises; she regrets she had to prepare some earlier, we are too many and she has only one pan. And so before we leave they are given to us, drizzled with rose syrup and bescattered with pretty green pistachios. I didn't realise it was on a paper plate until there was nothing left on it - such a grand little treat it was.

We parted after everyone posed for photos with her, taking with us our fat full bellies, a goody bag of ingredients, a burning desire to buy her new book, and at least seven new words in Arabic.

Halas!




Find more information about Suzanne Husseini here. There are recipies on the site, but you should buy her book - it's international food with a nitfi of Arabia in every recipe. I dare you to dislike it.

Round and round the rollercoaster rails

This is my first blue blog. And before you get all excited about THAT kind of blue, let me tell you I'm talking about feeling a little low.

Another friend gone.

It's one of the worst components of expat life - the friend cycle. Firstly, we are forced to leave all our friends back home. These are people we have had sandpit brawls with, gossiped about our first kisses with, cried drunkenly with, stood at the alter next to, had holding our hands while we gave birth or received typhoid vaccinations. Friendships that have been built slowly and surely over our lifetimes. It's not appropriate to complain though - the choice to leave was ours. And pointedly we must not complain in their presence because we forsook them in exchange for worldly experience - understandably they have no compassion. Fortunately for us, commonly they have loyalty.


When we arrive in the new world we do it alone. Some have partners and children, some are lucky enough to have a contact on the ground. Many have simply their employers and new colleagues. So the second part of the cycle begins. Those of us with offspring watch our children throw themselves into new schools with either loathing or desperation. Regardless, they make friends before we do. For the first-time expat, it's hard making the first steps. Initially we keep to our home-clique's rules, but that's not the way to meet new people. Before long we realise that more intensity is required. It's almost like dating, and soon we are nodding and smiling, commenting on clothing, and asking new acquaintances out for coffee. We talk the talk as much as we can, and talking and walking thus, eventually we have new friends.

The third cycle is where I find myself now. They leave. All that work, and they become another "friend" on Facebook that you can only have virtual dates with. they go back home into the warm waiting arms of their own lifelong friends and forget about their Dubai friend who suddenly has nobody to go to the movies with on a Tuesday night. And the witty banter and twitter quips don't cut it. What is missed is the plain old ordinary chitchat, standing around in their kitchen sipping coffee while your children happily hurl Lego at each other in the lounge, chewing the fat while burning the calories on side-by-side treadmills, gossiping while imbibing tremendously over weekend lunches. The kids cry openly, missing their buddies as they would a vital appendage, but we harden ourselves, saying inwardly "that's how it goes...". But as it happens time and time again, it becomes more wearying, and that inner voice starts to yell "how many bloody more!!!"

But a cycle by it's very nature, repeats itself, and we do find new friends. Some even firmer than before. We hope that this time though the rollercoaster will slow on its ascent and linger at the peak before the next decline. Because too much of this alters the way we throw ourselves into friendship. We don't want to fall too hard, so keep the package light. Some give up completely, but this is not healthy - we are communal beings in a foreign place. We need support and an outlet for ranting.

The only way to avoid all the ups and downs is to get off the ride, go home to our old loyal mates. And we hope that this time away has neither soured the long-standing bond we have shared, nor changed the way in which we treat our friends. But I'm not so scarred just yet, for the sake of my own selfish growth and my love of this crazy city, maybe just a few more times around...

Green means hot

I am a very fortunate lady. Not only have I got a husband who very cleverly got us an expat stint in the centre of the world, but I also have Mary in our household. The title of "housemaid" does not fully describe her position or influence. Some days she is Maid, others Nanny, but my favorite is Chef. Mary is Tamil Sri Lankan, and so much of her food is in that vein, but she is also an exceptional study and has a remarkably good palate, so anything she finds lying in the bottom of a fridge drawer or at the back of a pantry can be added to other flavours to make something wonderful. The only underlying theme - chilli, and boy oh boy, she does like it hot!

The other week she made what she calls "herb relish". It has leafy herbs and onion and green chili, and is amazing next to her curried eggplant. It inspired me to make the sauce below - I love the fresh flavours, and imagined it without the rice, but with cucumber in it to cool that chili a little. So here we have my spicy green salad:

Ingredients:

For the dressing:

• fresh coriander - about 10 sprigs
• fresh mint - about 7 sprigs - remove stems
• fresh green chilli - seeds and all, as many as you like - I like 2
• garlic cloves - peeled, ditto above
• one lebanese cucumber (the little ones)
• 1 tbsp caster sugar (or palm sugar if you have it)
• 1 tbsp lemon juice
• small tub of natural low fat yoghurt.

For the salad:

• mesculin mix
• green peas, cooked and cooled,
• avocado - sliced

Instructions:

1. Combine all dressing ingredients in a blender and whiz to a thin paste
2. dress with salad ingredients

Serve with Mogul Chicken, as a side dish to any curry, or with sashimi sliced salmon. The sauce is so delicious I can drink it straight out of the bowl. It would also make a great dipping sauce for prawns, or even just served with some rice and papadams and other condiments. Mary's recipe skips the cucumber and yoghurt, but adds onion that has been lightly fried before mixing, and it is thicker in texture. And of course she adds about 6 more chillies.

Cooking with Sunrise

Living in the Middle East does wonderful things to ones spice cabinet. Where we might suffer from a dearth of fresh local meat and vegetables , it is made up for in spades by what can be bought not only at the spice souq, but even out of sacks at the local Carrefour (we get plenty of imports, so don't think for a moment that I'm starving over here - it's quite to the contrary). My favorite of all is saffron - the gold of spices. Back in Melbourne, it's actually costlier than gold and here only a little less, so yes, it's a guilty pleasure. However only a few strands will do the trick, making the investment worth it.

Saffron is the stamens of the crocus  flower, and carries with it the aroma of sweet nectar and floral plains of Iran. When used in cooking it lends a flavor of honey on toast, and the color of sunrise to the sauce. It is used extensively in Persian, Arabic and North African cooking, but also anywhere the spice routes delivered it across Asia, and for so long, that many cultures argue they were the original producers - although it does appear it was actually Greece.

When buying Saffron, ensure you are buying the genuine article - there are many poor substitutes, including safflower, which looks almost identical - ensure that the colour is vibrant crimson, with hints of deep yellow-orange. The strands should be slightly moist and surprisingly strong. When moistened, they will leech bright yellow - the colour of tumeric, but never substitute turmeric in a recipe - the flavours are not the same.

Ingredients:

• 2 tsp Coriander powder
• 1.5 tsp Cumin Powder
• 1 tsp Cinnamon powder
• 1/2 tsp Cardamom powder
• 1/4 tsp Clove powder
• 1/2 tsp Chilli powder
• 1/2 tsp Saffron
• 1 tbsp oil (I use canola, but anything flavourless is good)
• 2 tsp warm water
• 100ml low fat yoghurt

(these make the curry paste)

• 600g Chicken breast fillets, sliced into egg-sized chunks

Instructions:

1. combine all the curry paste ingredients, starting with the Saffron and warm water, letting it soak for a minute before stirring the rest in. Then marinate the chicken in this for about 30 minutes or more.
2. Brown the chicken in a medium-hot oiled pan
3. Transfer to a covered oven dish (preferably a tagine) and cook in a 120ºC oven for 1 hour

Serve with couscous, rice or the salad in my next post.

Notes on the curry paste: If you want to save time, you could simply use your favourite curry powder and mix it with the oil and yoghurt to save the trouble, or use a paste without the added oil, then adding Saffron if the flavours combine well. If you want to get better flavour, theoretically, you could use the raw forms of the spices (eg. seeds and pods), dry-fry them and then grind them into a paste. If you don't like chilli, leave it out - the flavours work well without the heat too. These measurements are only a guideline - the balance of flavours is up to you, but my advice, take it easy on the cardamom and cloves - they can overwhelm almost anything if you go over the top. Once made, a curry powder can go in a jar in the spice cabinet, and a paste in a jar in the fridge to be used later - so feel free to multiply the quantities.

If you can't be bothered with the oven, slice the chicken smaller and pan-fry the lot, but make sure you switch the exhaust fan on, because those spices will smoke you out of your kitchen.

Bananaberry muffins

I'm not much of a baker. As you might be able to tell from the blog description, I abhor measuring and weighing and being pedantic - it's just not me. Added to that, in Dubai, bread is cheap. I can buy 10 perfect little iced cupcakes from Spinneys for 10 Dirhams - that's less than $3US. I couldn't even do shake and bake for that price. Added to that, I'm overweight and my husband is wheat intolerant, so even if I make something gorgeous, only the kids eat it - and they would prefer the Spinneys cupcakes. Why would I want to bake?

Two reasons - the first is that it makes us feel good. Baking is an old school activity, from way back in the day when Mother didn't work, because Mothers were mothers. They had time to bake, and their families expected it because there weren't any such things as Spinneys cupcakes. And when kids came home from school on the local horse and cart, they would run inside and eat Mother's delicious baked thingies and think she was the most wonderful thing in the world. Then they would eat liver and brussel sprouts for dinner. Baking makes us feel like accomplished domestic goddesses - we can do everything Granny did, and we can "Facebook"...


The second reason is that when we cook it ourselves, we know exactly what goes into it. And after working at restaurants for many years, I would say you definitely want to know. It's not necessarily the artificial flavours and preservatives I'm referring to, but the levels of fat, salt and sugar that are required to prepare a restaurant quality dish. Or for that matter, Spinneys quality cupcakes.

So here is my easiest baking recipe ever. Sorry, measuring is involved, but only because if you don't get close to correct, it doesn't rise, and then you end up with bananaberry cookies. But please don't get out the spatula to flatten the tops of cups - it only needs to be close.

Ingredients:

• 2 and 1/2 cups flour (if you use self raising, skip the baking powder below)
• 5 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 125g butter (melted)
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 banana (the riper the better)
• 1 punnet of raspberries

Instructions:

1. sift all the dry ingredients into a big bowl, and blend the other ingredients in a blender
2. stir wet mix into dry lightly in a figure 8 motion (basically, don't beat the stuff up - you want to keep the air in)
3. place in greased mini-muffin tins (mine are about 3cm in diameter) and cook for 15 minutes in a 200ºC oven (may take longer depending on the size of your muffin tins)

 

Remember it's best to preheat your oven, and once you put the muffins in, don't open the door unless the muffins are pretty close to cooked - it won't kill them, but too much change in temperature can affect the rising. These are muffins and so don't need to be iced, but if you must, use a butter frosting like you would on a carrot cake. But really, they're best still warm with some butter in the middle - mmmmmm butterlicious.

PS - the whole self raising V plain flour thing? Personally, I think this recipe is better with Self Raising - it's less likely to get that squeaky tooth-coating texture. But if you want to use a different flour, eg. Gluten Free, Spelt or Wholemeal (I've tried the first two and they work fine - the Spelt much better), then this is your only option. You can also reduce the mix, just remember that 1 cup of flour needs about 2 teaspoons of baking powder to rise like the picture above - a bit less will work, but your muffins will be denser.

Rainbow Stir-fried Vegetables

Stir-fries didn't exist when I was a child in Australia. My vegetables were served up in steamed to the devil gray mounds in unidentifiable varieties - probably a good thing, because quite often they contained broad beans, cabbage and brussel sprouts. I remember rejoicing when my Mother took a six week Thai Cookery course, and she came home at the end of it with stuff like coconut milk, ginger, lemongrass and chili. Until then curry had meant a bechamel sauce with Keens Curry powder stirred into it.

The wok became the most desired piece of kitchen equipment. Not only did it make a wonderful hat, shield or striking implement in war games with my younger brother, but it also meant that if Mum got it out of the cupboard it meant we were eating colour for dinner.

Tips with cooking veggies in the wok. Cut all the vegetables into slices that will cook in the same amount of time. Snow peas only take two minutes, so make sure you cut the carrot thin enough so it's not raw when you take it out. Secondly, you want cooked, but crisp - otherwise the colour and moisture leaves the vegetable and ends up in the bottom of the wok.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 a small purple cabbage, shredded
• two handfulls of snow-peas
• one carrot sliced thinly (julienne)
• a small head of broccoli, in small flowerettes
• 1 red capsicum, julienne
• 1 large onion, Thai slice (lengthways, not rings)
• 2 cloves of garlic (or more if you like it!)
• 1 nut of ginger (again, to taste - I like about the size of my thumb)
• Half a small packet of cooked Chana Dhal (an Indian snack - if you can't get it, use anything salty and crunchy, eg crispy noodles or roasted cashews)
• 1 glug of Teriyaki sauce (this is Japanese soy - use dark soy and a little honey if you can't find it)
• 1 smaller glug of sweet chili sauce (I like a really spicy one)
• Peanut oil for frying.

Instructions

1. On a hot, fast stovetop fry off the onions, garlic and ginger until nearly soft - try not to brown too much.
2. Add all the veggies and stir a lot - add a tiny dash of water if they start to stick.
3. One minute later add the sauces, fry for one minute more and then take out of the pan immediately. Scatter with the crispy Chana dhal

This recipe can also be served as a salad - simply cook beforehand without adding the sauces and crispy topping. Chill, and add them just before serving.

Barbecued Pork Tenderloin

five spice

You know that smell when you walk down a Chinatown strip - sort of sweet and gamey - honey and spice and smoke and roasting meat? Part of it is Peking Duck, and the other part is Barbecued Pork. It's one of ten key smells in the world that makes me hungry, even if I'm so full I can barely waddle (along with things like Sri Lankan curried eggplant, fresh bread etc, etc.)

Now the real stuff has things like maltose and shaoxing wine in it, involves cooking a caramel sauce, then marinating overnight and then cooking pork belly for about 45 minutes. Funnily enough, it doesn't even involve a "barbecue"...

My version has umpteen less ingredients, uses a very lean cut of meat, and cooks in 10-15 minutes.

Ingredients:

• 2 tsp Chinese Five-Spice (or four-spice if you can't get five, and add black pepper)
• 2 big glugs of Hoi Sin sauce (I mean the red-brown one. If you can only find the thick black one, use Chinese plum sauce instead. )
• 1 glug of Light Soy sauce
• 1 big pork tenderloin (will probably be around 600g and should feed three provided you serve with something else)

Instructions

1. Mix all ingredients, and rub into pork. I like to slice a tenderloin into three big rolls, but you can also slice into bite-sized pieces. Leave for minimum 30 minutes, but can go overnight.
2. Heat a BBQ or Wok, oil surface and cook on high heat. 3cm diameter tenderloin on the barbecue will take about 10 minutes, turned four times. If sliced and in a wok, it will only take about 5 minutes.
3. Add a little water to the marinade left in the bowl, and pour on top for the last minute (If you are using a grill, you might want to cook this down in a saucepan a little instead)

Serve with steamed jasmine rice or egg noodles. Mmm and snow-peas stir-fried in sesame oil and garlic...

Note on cooking meat on the barbecue:
It's best not to slice into meat to see how cooked it is, particularly a relatively fat-free piece like tenderloin, because the moisture is lost quickly and you will end up with a dried up old boot. Use the back of your tongs and press. Then use the tongs and press the fleshy part of the side of your palm under the thumb. If it has the same amount of give, it's rare. If you touch your thumb to your tall-man finger and try again, and the tenderloin feels like that, then it's medium. Please don't cook too much over that, because the meat will continue to cook even once you take it off the hotplate, and will lose all it's juices. I'm just trying to help - I really don't want you wasting good quality meat. Don't worry, if you get to medium, there shouldn't be any blood. Have a look here, there's pretty picture to help.

Smoked tuna spaghetti

When I was single, this dish kept me alive. If I had not found this combination, I would have existed entirely on toast and red wine, so we can thank it for my healthy heart and buttocks today. Back then it was far less gourmet - simply "tuna spaghetti", but now in the modern era, we can get lots of lovely little gourmet things in tins, and smoked tuna is one of my favourites.

Ingredients:

• 1 zucchini (courgette) coarsely grated
• 1 garlic clove (peeled and smashed once with the back of the knife)
• 1 tin of smoked tuna (220g), drained
• 1 lemon, finely grated rind and flesh then juiced.
• 250g spaghetti
• Parmesan, good olive oil, salt and pepper to taste.

Instructions:

1. Put the water on to boil and add the garlic and salt. When boiling add the spaghetti (for the lowest common denominator - you have to stir it every now and then or it will stick together)
2. When cooked, drain, remove garlic clove and stir through the grated zucchini, flaked smoked tuna and lemon rind.
3. Drizzle with olive oil, lemon juice, and crack pepper over the top then garnish with parmesan.

Serves two hearty eaters, or three or four waifs.

That's right - you don't need to cook anything but the pasta. A couple of notes for the more adventurous; anything that will flavour soup will flavour the pasta as it cooks - chili, rosemary, stock cubes, etc. It's an easy way to flavour plain spaghetti - or any pasta you favour. This is just one flavour combination. You could substitute the smoked tuna for sweet chili tuna in a tin, or try it with rosemary, chilli, chopped tomato and black olives. Or maybe smoked salmon, capers, lemon and chives...

Love a little one-pot wonder!

Renewed Croissants

As my first lazy post, I would like to talk about my favourite pastry treats from the Boulangerie. We have escaped the Dubai heat during summer for the last few years by going to a cottage in the French provincial countryside so we can eat the real thing (I know, it's a bloody expensive bit of pastry). We travel with a couple of Melbournites who love their pastry a little too much, and when they arrive at the boulangerie, their stomachs take over their mouths, and instead of asking for "seess cwahsons" (6), they ask for "sayz cwahsons" (16). Result? Ploo cwahsons kay nessessaire. (more croissants than necessary).

Croissants have this habit of petrifying overnight, and there is nothing to be done about this - they are basically made of butter and air, with a little flour thrown in, and oxidation and time are not a croissant's best friends. 

Ingredients:

• 10 x 1 day-old croissants
• Condiments
  

Instructions

1. Stop Jimny and Lou-lou from going back to the boulangerie. This may involve ropes and a dungeon.
2. Brush croissants with milk, concentrating on the rocky ends. Top and bottom
3. Place in a warm oven (that's a medium-low temp - eg 150ºC) for about ten minutes

Serve in a gorgeous basket lined with linen purchased from provincial markets the day before. Present with chipped china and jars of jam and nuttela with the labels removed and antique silver spoons thrust in the top. Très français!

PS. They re-petrify in half the time of the previous day, so eat quickly, and discard any leftovers - the miracle cannot be repeated.

Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmare

more about the show here

I love the food channel. Back in Melbourne, before my kids grew up and commandeered the television, Saturday mornings would provide 4 hours of back-to-back entertainment by the way of Masterchef and Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares. It's the perfect way to clear the hungover brain - watching people cook and get insulted by experts, snickering to yourself just knowing you would do better. Masterchef will be for another discussion, because the other night I went to Gordon Ramsay's Dubai restaurant, Verre.

If you haven't seen the show, Kitchen Nightmares is about Ramsay finding a restaurant that has, or deserves to have been, thrown on the culinary trash-heap. It will be a quaint pub in an ideal location but run by drunken slobs, or a boutique seafood parlour above a shonky chip shop that nobody can find. He comes in, throws profanity around like life-giving rain and slaps the management into his chosen mould. Voila! Successful restaurant. If only he came back to Dubai, because there is a little gourmet restaurant on the wrong side of the creek that desperately needs his attention.


It's been around for about nine years, and when it arrived, it landed into a very respected five-star hotel and was probably the first serious celebrity restaurant in Dubai, and in fact the first International jaunt for Ramsay himself. The decor was slick and modern, the chef edgy, and the vibe in the city guaranteed immersion into the bosom of chic society, because back then Dubai was loaded, and we all know how much this city loves a label. The restaurant was expensive and busy, and the city loved it because it was expensive and busy. The celebrity chef moved on to other ventures, confident that this little baby was all grown up and able to fend for itself.

The city grew. It became shinier and bigger. New celebrities came, and they set up their newer restaurants in newer hotels and resorts in "New Dubai", which was settling itself along the beach to the south rather than inland along the creek.

Then the financial markets imploded, and half the population of Dubai found they had half the discretionary income they had before. The other half were even worse off, so they went back home with their tails between their legs, happy they had not accidentally found themselves in a Dubai jail. Regardless, restaurants that charged more than 25 Dirhams for a main course were empty. The strong ones survived, and this celebrity restaurant did too. But after just blowing 1400 Dirhams (about $400) between two of us, I've no idea how.

Don't get me wrong - the food is good, great even. A juicy slab of mildly smoked salmon with creme fraiche and caviar was soft, creamy, delicate, peeling off in perfect medium rare flakes. The plaice with scallops was fresh and flavorsome - the scallops perfect white pillows, and the watercress snappy and peppery just like the farmers market sells back home. The capers were sweet and sour, not vicious little monsters like I buy in jars. Hambone's veal was declared the "best in my life!", and was perfectly cooked so the little nuts graduated from deep brown to red like meaty rainbows. Dessert was peaky salty caramel soufflé for him and gooey fondant for me, which arrived wrapped in a honeycomb tube and standing to brave attention in the face of certain slaughter.

But it's not just food that makes people go to restaurants. It was Thursday night, and I'd only booked the night before. There were five other tables occupied, none of them above four pax. The place was creepy-quiet. Our first glasses of champagne dribbled into our flutes like still wine, a sign that nobody has had a glass for at least one night, maybe two. They were whipped away and replaced with apologies and absolutely no fight. The service is good, but a sommelier happy in his job wouldn't let the flat stuff get as far as two glasses in the first place. The Staff were friendly, but when they thought nobody was paying attention their boredom showed, and so it should - they are great staff, but are faced with no challenge and absolutely nothing to do.

If the decor has changed since opening, I can't tell. It's not that it looks old, there are no rips or chips or stains. But there is no "je ne sais pas...", no X factor. It's tired. Maybe it would look better if it was in another hotel - the Hilton is cool for seven years ago, but lacks the grandeur of all the beach hotels in new Dubai. There is no sweeping foyer, elegant and exotic lobby lounge, grand pianos or Islamic star-shaped water features. It's a business hotel in the business district. Smooth, shiny, totally devoid of personality. And when I pay 700 dirhams for a feed I want to be delivered into a fantasy world - otherwise I would just buy a lobster and a bottle of Mersault and do it myself.

So Mr Ramsay, please pop back to the desert and do your patriarchal duty. I want more of your food, but I expect more than just food if I return.

My recommendation? Replace the current Verre with a good mid-priced Italian bistro. Then take up residence in the JBR Hilton, which although is also a little tired, has two completely ordinary restaurants in grand locations overlooking beach or tropical gardens. And please work on the winelist - those prices are simply unforgivable.

Thank you Verrey much.

Where the weather weathers one.

Australia is in the news in a big way, and for the first time in ages, it's not because a sports star or politician has accidentally touched someone inappropriately with their hand or ill-advised wisdom. It's raining cats and dogs and cows and chooks. The entire state of Queensland is pretty much underwater - we're talking about a piece of land around 5 times the size of Japan or 3 1/2 times the size of California. Not only is it under water, it's under torrents. People are dying, animals perishing in thousands, houses are being swept off their foundations and arriving in towns 20km down the road 20 minutes later. It's a debacle, and it's facing tens of thousands of Australians with something that people of the developed world are not used to - genuine hardship. At the same time 130,000 people are displaced and 13 are dead due to floods in Sri Lanka, but it's only made a paragraph at the bottom of the page-spread on Oz in the local paper.

But in Dubai It hasn't rained since March 2010. It's tried a couple of times, fat angry clouds roll over the Burj Khalifa and sit there ominously for a few hours and then roll away, as if the place just isn't worth it. It's infuriating. The smell is what gets you - for just a little while it smells like our back yard in Melbourne in spring, and then like a rainy afternoon on our Samoan honeymoon, and then like Mothers' Day in drizzle between the vines in the Yarra Valley. And then it just smells like Dubai again. Dust, petrol, frangipanis and wet concrete.


When we first arrived in Dubai in 2008 it was April, about that time of year when everything is perfect. It's maximum 32 every day. It cools at night, just in time for sun-downers. The breezes come across the gulf with the scent of warm sea, and it's sunny. Every. Day. Hambone would arise each morning and part the curtains with unnecessary drama, stating proudly "beautiful day!" as if he were responsible for the clear skies and powerful rays, not just the job he cleverly nabbed. And for months he did this. Every. Day.

This is me on April 18 2008: ->

But even perfect starts to grate after a while...

May 18

June 1

June 27

And by the time we got to June 27, I looked like this


Why? Because Yahoo weather is a dirty filthy liar that is in cahoots with the middle eastern expat recruitment board. Because the real average daily maximum graph does not look as advertised on their website. I demonstrate below:

The true recorded Dubai Temperature

Temperature actually feels like

And if you take into account the humidity that hits in mid July, then it actually feels like the latest graph, so here is a picture of me on July 27:

I'm on a European holiday with the rest of the middle class of Dubai.

The temperature does drop a little in September, but the humidity rises to steamy shower level. The mugginess is so intense that even sound travels slower. And so although the western expat community has returned, they don't do so in spirit until October, when they finally edge their pasty vitamin D-deficient bodies outside, but only between the hours of 4pm and 9am.

Then we re-enter the perfection zone, where every day looks like the April 18 pic, until December, when it cools to 18 degrees overnight, and we all start praying for rain. Usually it comes by early January, over the space of one week, in spasmodic one-hour almighty bucketty bursts. Then, despite our anticipation of it's arrival over the last months, the entire city sweeps into insane panic.

There is no drainage system so to speak, so the water accumulates in football-field puddles, waiting for men in orange to bring their trucks and pump it out. Half the driving population press their 'stupid' buttons and Porches swimming solo down Sheikh Zayed Rd become a common sight, along with Toyota Yarises at peculiar angles in the right lanes and bewildered passengers with their sarees knee deep in the murk trying to push their husbands out. I need to learn how to say "I told you so!" in another 25 languages so I can join the conversations.

Children bring out their wellies and jump like possessed kangaroos in water we know has all kinds of bad things washed into it, but we don't stop them. We're all busy wearing deranged smiles and performing show tunes with our brollies in the middle of the roads.

But this year its raining everywhere else but here, so I can't imagine this post will invoke much sympathy in the international reader. Its 12:30pm, 26 degrees, the sky is cloudless and blue (again). But I'm ready for winter goddamn it! Although the pool is heated to thirty I can't make myself get in. The women of Dubai are wearing boots and velvet. The winter sales have started, and changing rooms have a set temp of 19 degrees to make us buy winter clothes. We're trying so hard, but the rain and the cold have been stolen from us.

Breaking news, Brazil is in even more trouble than Sri Lanka and Australia put together. El nino and La Nina be damned. If you want to help go here, or here, or here or google how to help. But don't help me, my life is paradise. Shutting up now...