Jerusalem

I normally pick a country for the title but in this case I chose to use the city name that is also the name of the cookbook I used for this blog entry.  This week I decided instead of going out to a restaurant I’d make something.  The road to this decision was short but winding.  I was looking for new places for new countries and was searching for Israel and all I was getting were a couple of delis.  I remembered I had a cookbook in my Kindle library called Jerusalem: a Cookbook that I bought when it was a $1.99 deal.  I’d heard the authors on some radio show, one Jewish and the other Palestinian, both from Jerusalem and they discussed the similarities and differences in the food they grew up with and the other influences in the cities cuisine.  Plus it reminded me of the short 1 day tour of Jerusalem I got to enjoy a few years ago.  Add to this that some of my friends are currently observing Lent and going meatless most of the time and I thought hmm…I bet there’s a vegetable main dish in here that might be worth trying.

I flipped through and found several interesting possibilities but settled on the Chermoula Eggplant with Bulgur & Yogurt.  This sounded like would be filling if nothing else.  There is a link to the actual recipe on the Tell Me More page.  I had most of the spices to make the chermoula paste and almost all of the other ingredients were easily picked up at a local grocery.  There were a few things I had to modify though.  I didn’t have and couldn’t find the preserved lemon peel (there is a recipe for it in the book) but I did have some lemon infused olive oil I’d received as part of a Christmas gift so I used that and some lemon zest.  I also couldn’t find bulgur without going further out of my way on a rainy day than I wanted to so I settled for buckwheat as a substitute.  The last change, I wasn’t feeling the cilantro so I left that out entirely.  Oh and since there is just the one of me I halved the recipe.

Here’s the eggplant or aubergine if you prefer after baking with the chermoula.

The chermoula was easy to make and by itself is very flavor packed and I can see where it would be good on other vegetables and some meats as well.  Here is the final product with the buckwheat and some baked pita bread with za’atar and olive oil.

The eggplant and chermoula were good and would be a good central element for a meal that included side dishes other than bulgur or buckwheat.  As mentioned the paste has a great flavor and the citrus plus heat from chile flakes pack some tangy heat to the meal.  The buckwheat I substituted for the bulgur thickened up during cooking but the olive oil and lemon juice cut the pastiness a bit.  There were raisins, olives, & mint all added as well that ramped up the tastiness of the buckwheat and the whole was topped with Greek yogurt and toasted almond slices.  The toasted pita with olive oil allowed me to try another spice mixture, za’atar, mentioned in the book and which I happened to have on hand thanks to the Christmas gift mentioned earlier which had 12 spice blends from around the world.  Za’atar has a bold flavor and I’d say is a blend you to be used liberally on whatever you choose to sprinkle it on.  The mixture I have is a common variety using thyme instead of the original hyssop or za’atar which gives the mixture its name.

I enjoyed the meal and it was quite filling so if you want to skip the meat for a meal and like bold flavors give this a go.  I’m glad I did.