Tag Archives: rose water

Mini-kadaifi cakes

If you walk into a pastry shop in Beirut (specializing in Arabic sweets), a good third of all pastries will be made with this dough, called kataifi or shredded phyllo dough. I saw  once  how this dough is made: A batter is piped through hundreds of minuscule little holes onto a hot griddle which forms [...]
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Brioche with date

A notable treat carried by cart vendors alongside the common kaak. I wanted to make a luxury version at home. So I made it with a rich brioche dough (I just added a bunch of egg yolks). You can make it the street-way, without all these yolks. It is a special treat, ubiquitous during Ramadan. [...]
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Rice flour cookies

To all my Chinese friends, I wish you a happy New Year. A Kurdish subculture exists in Lebanon made up of folks who for reasons of persecution or poverty have had to leave their land and seek employment here. I befriended many Kurds while in Lebanon. One of them, Asma, is a Kurdish woman originally [...]
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Makaroons

The French have their macarons, the Italians their macaroni, the Lebanese  their makaroons. Closer to the Italian version, Lebanese makaroons are made with flour (semolina or plain flour) and water into a dough and can be savory or sweet. You will get a sweet version today; these are also called “Zeinab’s fingers” assabeh  Zeinab. Flavored [...]
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Sweet bulgur (Smeedeh Hamra)

Rummaging through the kitchen cupboards at my parents’ house can yield interesting discoveries: I found a jar that contained  a viscous, caramel-colored paste. Can you guess what it was? I called  the jar’s donor, Um Elias,  mountain-dweller, mother of six and seasoned farmer. Her answer was: ” Debess el-enab, from your grapes!” i.e. GRAPE MOLASSES. [...]
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