Recipe Ramblings
Last week Little Frumhouse on the Prairie (isn’t that a great name?) posted that she is hosting the next Kosher Cooking Carnival. So my mind starts churning…maybe a post on food photography?
I photographed one of the dishes I made for dinner one night. Because it was pretty. And it looks nice against the blue background. Food often looks good against blue, because there really isn’t any true blue in food. Even blueberries are really purple.
Later, I go visit my neighbor, arguably one of the best cooks in Highland Park. Last erev Yom Kippur she gave some of her Gondi, a Persian specialty of ground chicken, chickpea flour and spices rolled into balls and cooked in a sauce. Wish I had a photo of that! Are you making anything special for Purim, I ask. She said always makes something different for the Purim seudah (feast). I could tell her mind wasn’t yet on Purim.
On Friday night my husband came home from shul and said our rabbi spoke about the times one can have the Purim seudah (feast) this year. Purim falls on a Friday, not my favorite timing. Batya doesn’t have this problem. We can have the seudah at a choice of three times: in the morning, after noon, or at the end of the day, right before Shabbat starts. One then says Friday night kiddush in the middle and continues one’s meal. The latter sounds like an interesting idea, but then my husband would need to find a minyan for ma’ariv of men doing similar. We ended up agreeing on a brunch for the seudah this year. Eggs, bagels, fruit, veggies and salmon sound like a plan…
Years ago I made a Persian Purim feast… I can’t for the life of me remember what I served, but rice was certainly on the menu.
So, in the spirit of Nutrition Nerd, I’ll teach you how to make brown rice in a crockpot. It’s SUPER easy. Put in a cup of brown rice and 2 cups water. Cook for 2 – 2.5 hours. If, for some reason (you have nothing else going on in your life, right?) you forget the rice, don’t worry, you’ve just got brown rice with crispy edges. The middle is still edible.
Hope you’ve enjoyed my strung together food photo, exotic Persian dish, halachic (Jewish law) note, and recipe all in one post.
Gail says
What a nice combination of vegetables. They look delicious.
Leora says
Thanks, Gail. Too bad my kids won't eat those. Well, maybe they'd eat one or two snap peas.
Larry Lennhoff says
As it happens, I was at one of Lily's two purim seudah. During the day she made a dairy dish with buttermilk, cous cous and some vegetables. I wasn't there for that one. For Friday night she made another purim dish - plates of cous cous, vegetables, boneless pieces of lamb in a very sweet marinade, and a sweet dish of nuts, raisins, and I think prunes. You laid out some of the cous cous as a base and then took whatever you wanted of the other ingredients and put them on top. Yum!
Leora says
Lily couldn't understand why I wanted to photograph her food. Blogs? How would I explain blog?
Sometimes I show up at her house on a Sunday afternoon and there's a feast laid out. Even her spaghetti with sauce is delicious.
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