"Let's have lunch at
Cedars Deli," said my wife. That is a highly appetising prospect, even in a
mall food court, so I took no persuading.
It just happens that our first date was at Cedars (another location -- not in a food court!) many years ago. But how has Cedars endured since the 1980s when so many other restaurants have come and gone? How does it attract redneck cowboys, Sikh businessmen, university students, and many others to Lebanese and Mediterranean cuisine, which is not the most familiar here? It's simple: the food is fresh, delicious, very reasonably priced, and served without undue delay.***
Owner (and cookbook author) Mary Salloum never expected to run a restaurant, let alone a small empire of them, but divorce left her scrambling to make a living. What marketable skills did she have? Well, she could cook... If only the bank would back her.... It did, but at an extortionate prime plus 4% interest rate, proving that it expected her to fail. Instead she was an immediate success and has never looked back.
Here is one of her cornerstone recipes, the basis of the falafel sandwich that my wife and I both selected.
Baked Falafel
http://mintgreenapron.blogspot.ca/2011/ ... lafel.html
Makes 2-3 dozen depending on the size.
This recipe makes quite a quantity, so either halve the recipe or stick half in the freezer to heat up for a last-minute dinner idea as I do.
You should start soaking the chickpeas the night before you plan on making these. Make sure that the chickpeas are quite dry after draining, otherwise you will need quite a bit of flour to make them hold together. If they are quite dry, you may be able to get by with no flour at all, especially if you want to fry them.
2 cups dry chickpeas
1 small onion, cut in quarters
1 small potato, peeled and cut in quarters
3 garlic cloves
1 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground coriander
2 tsp salt, or to taste
1/2 tsp ground pepper
1/4 tsp cayenne
up to 1/4 cup (4 tbsp) whole wheat flour
up to 1/4 cup (4 tbsp) corn flour, or more whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
olive or grapeseed oil
1. Soak chickpeas for approximately 24 hours in 4 times as much water as beans. Drain.
2. In a food processor, place onion, potato and garlic and give it a little whirl. Add chickpeas and process until finely chopped. Remove to bowl and add spices and flour, starting with a few tablespoons and increasing until the mixture begins to hold together. Cover with plastic wrap or a damp tea towel and let stand for 2-3 hours.
3. Just before baking, add baking soda and mix thoroughly. Heat oven to 425 degrees. Add a parchment-lined baking sheet and brush a tablespoon or two of oil on it. Place in oven for 3 minutes to heat pan.
4. For small falafel, take approximately 2 tbsp falafel mix and shape into a ball, flatten lightly. Repeat with remaining mix and place on hot-from-oven baking sheet.
5. Bake for approximately 8-10 minutes each side, or fry if desired. Bake them for less time if you intend to freeze and reheat them later, longer if you intend to serve them immediately.
6. Serve with pita bread, thinly sliced lettuce, tomatoes, pickles, tzatziki or hommous. (Hot sauce if you want!)
One of my favourite foodie moments involved Mary`s recipe for fatoush, a bread salad in the same family as Italian panzanella. Faye Levy reprinted it in the
Jerusalem Post, saying it was the best recipe she'd found. So we had the recipe for a Lebanese dish as prepared by a Lebanese woman in Calgary, selected by a Jewish woman in California and published in an Israeli newspaper for a worldwide English-speaking audience. Talk about the globalisation of food.
Fatoush
http://saudigrrl.proboards.com/index.cg ... hread=3129
See also:
http://www.lacuisinehelene.com/2012/06/ ... salad.html
2 small (6-inch diameter) pita breads
8 romaine lettuce leaves, washed, patted dry
1/2 bunch radishes (about 8 medium-sized), cleaned well and thinly sliced
2 green onions, washed, dried, chopped
4 to 5 salad cucumbers, peeled, sliced or diced
2 medium tomatoes, washed, cored, cut into chunks
1/4 cup finely chopped flat-leaf parsley
1 large clove garlic, peeled, crushed
2 tablespoons ground sumac
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice, or to taste
1/4 cup olive oil
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/4 cup fresh chopped mint
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees or turn on the broiler.
Slice each pita bread in half horizontally. Place the pitas on a baking sheet and crisp them in the oven 6-8 minutes.
Remove the pitas from the oven; when they are cool enough to handle, break them into bite-size pieces. Place the pieces in a large serving bowl.
Tear the romaine into bite-size pieces and add them to the bread.
Add the radishes, green onions, cucumber, tomatoes, parsley and garlic. Gently toss to combine all ingredients.
In a small bowl, whisk together the sumac, lemon juice, oil, salt, pepper and mint. Pour the dressing over the salad and toss to coat.
Serve immediately, or cover and chill up to 2 hours before serving.
Adapted from "A Taste of Lebanon" by Mary Salloum
125 calories (51% from fat), 7 grams fat (1 gram sat. fat), 13 grams carbohydrates, 3 grams protein, 379 mg sodium, 0 mg cholesterol, 43 mg calcium, 2 grams fiber.
(***) It also doesn't hurt that Cedars' halal certification is displayed prominently, and the menu clearly indicates which dishes are vegan, or lacto-ovovegetarian, or comply with Canadian Heart and Stroke Society guidelines. Patrons can see at a glance what meets their particular requirements.