This is one of my all-time favorite savory breakfast items. I created this recipe for a client’s child—a picky eater who wouldn’t touch any vegetables. I took some popular kid foods—potatoes, eggs, cheese, and milk—mixed them with some colorful veggies, then baked the mixture on a sheet pan. Cut into palm-sized rectangles, the resulting savory “pancakes” were a hit. They taste as good as they look and are filled with gut-friendly nutrients, including fiber and prebiotics. I like to use a box grater, but if you prefer a food processor or mandoline, that’s fine. Make sure not to overblend with the food processor.
If ever there was a weekend Shabbat cult food, jachnun—deep golden coils of buttery dough baked low and slow—fits the bill. As is the case with yeasty, brioche-like kubaneh bread, jachnun, which contains only baking powder, is traditionally placed in the oven or on a hot plate before Shabbat on Friday, then devoured the following morning after synagogue prayers. It’s sold in almost every makolet (mini-market) and from food trucks and carts all over the country, and in the neighborhood where I live (Tel Aviv’s Yemenite Quarter), tiny jachnun joints (usually open only on Friday and Saturday) sell it by the piece with its traditional accompaniments: resek (grated tomato), schug (hot sauce), and hard-cooked eggs.
There is something about making a salsa in a molcajete that makes it taste better. I swear that something magical happens when you crush chiles between two pieces of stone that no blender will ever replicate. We like to bust out the molcajete to make a salsa as regularly as we can to remind us of this magic and continue this ancient tradition with my children.
I’ll never get tired of eating this salad for lunch— lemony lentils and crisp veggies doused in a creamy green dressing. But I don’t make it the exact same way every time. Instead, I play around with the herbs in the dressing. I might use parsley instead of cilantro or experiment with adding tarragon, dill, or chives. I love that it’s a little bit different each time I eat it!
Serves 2 to 4 as a side dish
Char siu, the strips of barbecued roast pork with their signature crimson exterior, is a treasured Cantonese meat, and the most popular siu mei dish. Siu mei is a term that refers to the roasted meats popular in Hong Kong, but also commonly found in Chinatown windows around the world. Most city-dwelling Cantonese kids grew up eating siu mei—during my carnivorous youth, as my mother arrived home from the store, I would sidle up with my best good-daughter-face and charm a few slices of warm, juicy char siu and crispy pork crackling before dinnertime. In this recipe, eggplant is marinated, char siu style, in a fragrant, fruity barbecue sauce. Eggplant, a renowned carrier of flavor, greedily absorbs the sauce before it is roasted at high heat, emerging sweet and silky, imbued with lots of dark, caramelized notes. A note for gluten intolerant cooks: make sure your hoisin sauce is gluten-free or use the homemade version on page 151. This marinade is incredibly versatile and can be used to marinate and roast firm tofu and other vegetables in the exact same way. This is best eaten with rice, of course, but it’s also good stuffed into a crusty roll with cilantro, mint and salad greens, or used to make eggplant char siu bao (there’s a bao recipe in To Asia, With Love).
Of all the various vinaigrettes and dressings in this book, this is probably the one my husband, Joe, and I make the most. It’s Caesar-ish, thanks to garlic and anchovy, while lots of lemon juice makes it bright and bracing. Dijon gives it a bit of creaminess without actual cream or cheese, and it comes together in a mortar and pestle, which gives it a rustic, extra-homemade quality. We’re anchovy enthusiasts, and if I had a soapbox to stand on to profess my zeal for the tiny fish, I would. I know they’re not for everyone, but if you like the savory bite of Caesar dressing, you’ll absolutely love this.
Tamarind chutney is one of the best uses of tamarind on the planet! A favorite condiment for Indian snacks and street food, this chutney showcases the fruit’s date-like depth and tangy acidity, and balances them with brown sugar sweetness and the woody flavors of ginger and cumin. For all that complex flavor, it’s actually very easy to make and it keeps a long time. It’s a fantastic accompaniment to crispy fried food, but it’s also terrific drizzled over roasted vegetables.
While carrots are available 365 days a year, they especially shine in the spring, at their peak season. This recipe brings them to the center of your plate. Carrots are roasted in a brown butter sauce enhanced with floral saffron and piled atop creamy, soft, and tangy labneh, a Middle Eastern yogurt cheese. A handful of chopped fresh parsley and sweet toasted hazelnuts tie it all together. Definitely serve this platter with crusty bread or pillowy pita so you can swipe it clean.
Labneh is made by straining whole-milk plain yogurt until it’s even thicker than Greek yogurt and closer to the consistency of cream cheese. While it was once hard to find outside of Middle Eastern markets, you’ll now find it at some Whole Foods and other well-stocked grocery stores. Otherwise, you can make it quite easily yourself by simply straining Greek yogurt.
Some of my most memorable recipe breakthroughs are a result of error, mistakes, and happenstance. I try to reframe even the most upsetting accidents as a potential victory or chance for growth: Does it help me examine a recipe or dish from another angle? Is there something I can learn from my failure? Can I repurpose my mistake in some way? The answer is yes!
In the process of revising my favorite biscotti recipe, I accidentally doubled the amount of butter and sugar. Butter isn’t even a traditional ingredient in biscotti, so what happens when you add twice as much? In the oven, the log spreads like inching lava, finally settling into a flat, bronzed disc. Once the disk is cooled, sliced into thin spears, and baked again, the result is a super-crisp cookie, studded with toasted fennel seeds, dark chocolate, and whole hazelnuts.
A small tumbler of vin santo or espresso for dunking would be a heavenly accompaniment. Cheers to happy accidents and faux biscotti.