Lablabi (Tunisian Chickpea Soup)

Sometimes I pick out a recipe and I don't expect much from it.  Take this recipe for instance.  I thought it would be good, but mostly I wanted another easy vegetarian recipe and I got suckered in by the poached egg in the photo.  I'm such a sucker for poached eggs.  Runny egg yolk is my jam.  And yes, I know I sort of mis-used that term.  So I sent Alex the recipe and said "hey, we should make this sometime."  And then we both proceeded to not do anything about it until New Years Eve rolled around and I wanted a simple dish to make for lunch that didn't require too many ingredients from the grocery.  Luckily, we had everything we needed in the fridge.  In the spirit of full disclosure, if we had been short on eggs I would have made a special trip to the grocery store just to get eggs.  There was no way that I was going to make this soup without poached eggs.  It was one of the "optional enhancements" listed in the original recipe but I think it is totally crucial.  Even if I weren't obsessed with poached eggs I would think it was crucial for the recipe as a whole.  Without the egg the soup lacks body and richness.  As the egg yolk melts into the soup it makes the broth a little creamier.  And while we're on the topic, I think the harissa is another necessary element.  If you don't like heat, just add a little, but I think that without harissa you will be missing out.  The same goes for the fresh herbs - the parsley and mint gave the soup some brightness and freshness.  But if you absolutely had to pick one thing to leave out, I would leave out the herbs.  Or the drizzle of evoo.  You could leave that out too. But if you make the soup and add the egg and harissa you will be pleasantly surprised by just how tasty the soup is.  Don't get scared when you taste the chickpeas by themselves prior to adding the garnishes.  They taste a little bland, but the broth is delicious.  And the soup as a whole with the addition of the garnishes is warm and comforting, not to mention really tasty.

Recipe after the jump!

Spicy Chickpea Soup

I love soup.  It makes me incredibly happy.  I'm not sure what it is about soup that makes me so happy, but what isn't to love about a hot bowl of soup on a cold night?  Soup is warm, comforting and delicious.  And it is a wonderful way to try new flavors and new ingredients (or to see old ingredients in a new light).  For instance, we eat a lot of chickpeas in our apartment but I have never tried a chickpea soup before.  And I don't think I have ever added yogurt to soup before.  But the chickpeas work really nicely to thicken the soup and give it a creamy texture.  And the yogurt was the perfect finishing touch because it gave the soup a wonderfully tangy flavor and a smooth, creamy texture.  If you ask me, the dollop of yogurt really made the soup.  I was a little weirded out by adding apple juice to a soup, but if you really think about it, adding apple juice isn't all that different from adding diced up apple.  So we went ahead and did it (or really I did it because the deal was that I would cook dinner if Alex got the ball rolling on our taxes - I like to file early).  The best thing about this chickpea soup was that the ingredients were really easy to find ingredients (and there weren't all that many of them) and the soup came together really quickly.  Once you threw everything into the blender and pureed it, it really took no time at all to bring to a simmer and serve.  And even though the ingredients only simmered together briefly, the soup tasted like a composed dish that took much longer to make.  I served the soup with salad and some whole wheat sourdough bread and it made a really tasty (which was the adjective that Alex kept using to describe the soup), easy and hearty winter meal. 
 
Recipe after the jump!

Marinated Kale and Chickpea Salad with Sumac Onions

Sunday at the farmers' market I picked up a couple different varieties of extremely tender kale - one of which I had never seen or heard of before - from 5 lbs of Dirt.  The kale was tender enough that I didn't want to cook it, but still hearty enough (because it wasn't baby kale, which cost a whopping $8 per 1/4 lb and if I am brutally honest, my blog and I are not worth $8 per 1/4 lb) that I wanted to wilt it a little bit.  So often when we buy kale we end up braising it or otherwise cooking the bejesus out of it, but I wanted to serve the kale we bought at the market as close to its raw state as possible this time since it was so beautiful and tender.  So I dug through my stash of recipes to find this one, which I came across a few months ago in the midst of a recipe downloading blitz.  I remembered two things from reading the recipe.  First, that it was from a collection of vegan recipes.  Second, that the author of the recipe spent some time talking about wilting kale in dressing, which we have never tried before.  Actually, I guess I remembered a third thing, that the recipe was from Kenji at Serious Eats but that's not really relevant.  Last night we went ahead and "wilted" the kale in dressing.  And it worked out really well.  Actually, the whole recipe worked out really well.  Not only was the kale itself the perfect degree of tender, but the Dijon-based dressing was really nice and the sumac onions were fantastic.  I thought they added a really nice sweetness, flavor and texture to the salad.  It never would have occurred to me to first soak the onions to remove any harshness and then season the raw onions with spices and sesame seeds.  It was kind of a brilliant move if you ask me.  I was actually stealing them out of the bowl while we finished up our entree and eating the onions one by one with my fingers.  I'm like a small child.  But I would like to maintain that unlike a small child I make really good food!

Recipe after the jump!

Moroccan Garbanzo Bean and Feta Pitas

I have one complaint about this dish - the chickpea salad is all one texture, a little mushy.  I wish there had been something crunchy to liven it all up.  One of the reviews suggested roasting the chickpeas for some crunch.  But we didn't want to take the extra time.  I wish we had.  If it hadn't required another trip to the grocery store (our 5th trip in 3 days), I would have picked up some kalamata olives to throw in for some salty kick.  I thought about adding some red bell pepper for crunch and a little sweetness, but I decided against it because the red bell peppers at the store didn't look that good.  I also thought about just serving the filling as a salad over a bed of romaine lettuce and serving it with pita chips for crunch, but Alex wanted pita sandwiches so we went with pita sandwiches.  I know I have already said it, but I really missed the crunch.  If I were to make this again (and I'm not sure that I would because nothing about the recipe really stood out for me), I would roast the chickpeas so they are nice and crunchy.  And I might still serve it with pita chips.  And I might kick up the flavor a little bit (or serve with hot sauce).  The flavor wasn't bad, but it didn't jump out at me either.  The Greek yogurt added a really nice flavor that I was initially skeptical of, but I ended up wanting more of it.  The yogurt was probably my favorite component.  Even though we had wonderful fresh tomatoes and cucumbers from the farmers' market, it was really the yogurt that shined.

Recipe after the jump!

Roast Chicken Breasts with Garbonzo Beans, Tomatoes and Paprika

Sometimes I think that Alex and I make entirely too much roast chicken.  I would say that we roast up some chicken breasts at least once a month.  Roast chicken breasts really have become one of our easy go to weeknight meals.  So it's no surprise that I have a hard time resisting new roast chicken recipes.  I found this recipe when I was trying to figure out how to use the gorgeous yellow heirloom cherry tomatoes that I got from Holton Farms this week.  Have you ever picked a tomato from a farmer's market (or a garden if you are lucky enough to have one) and smelled that lovely tomato scent of a really nice, ripe, fresh tomato?  So heavenly.  It makes me sad that you so seldom find a nice tomato here in NYC unless you're lucky enough to take part in a CSA or have time to hit the farmer's market.  Actually, I heard a customer in a long conversation with the manager at my local grocery store complaining about just that - the dearth of good tomatoes at NYC grocery stores.  Anyway, I found this recipe and once I started reading through the ingredients I became really intrigued.  I love chickpeas and roast chicken.  And a spiced oil of garlic, cumin, smoked paprika and crushed red pepper flakes to flavor it all?  Genius!

My only complaint about this recipe was that the chicken skin didn't crisp up like I wanted it to.  But I make that same complaint 90% of the time when we make roast chicken breasts.  Getting the skin crispy while keeping the meat moist is really freaking hard!  This meat was crazy moist.  And it was really flavorful.  And those tomatoes and chickpeas were to die for.  The chickpeas were slightly crispy and the flavor of the tomatoes had concentrated during the roasting process until they were super sweet and juicy.  I wasn't sure how I would feel about the yogurt sauce, but it was really nice.  Mixing just a teaspoon of the oil in gave the yogurt really amazing flavor.  The recipe suggests saving some leftover chicken and making pita sandwiches with the chicken (once you rip the meat off the bone) and the tomato-chickpea mixture.  Drizzled with some of that yogurt sauce I bet it would be pretty delicious.  This recipe goes on the list of ones that we will definitely make again.  I might tweak it a little bit to get the skin a little crispier, but that's the only change I would make.  I love it when you start with a great base recipe like this one.

Recipe after the jump!

Chickpea Salad with Lemon, Parmesan and Fresh Herbs

Strangely enough when I was flipping through the April issue of Bon Appetit, this was the first recipe that caught my eye.  I say strangely enough because there are all sorts of exotic and delicious-sounding recipes in there.  Why in the word did I immediately focus on a simple chickpea salad?  To be perfectly honest, I have no idea.  I love chickpeas.  And I love basil.  It just seemed like the perfect easy lunch.  I decided that rather than just serving the chickpeas, I would serve the salad atop a bed of baby arugula.  For my portion I also threw on a nice tuna fillet but Alex is not a fan of tuna fish so that is his tuna-less bowl pictured above.  The dressing for this salad contains the exact same flavor profile as the Lemon Fettucine with Slow Roasted Cherry Tomatoes, and yet I found this salad to be deliciously bright and fresh, whereas I found the sauce for the pasta to be harsh and overpowering.  I think it all comes down to the proportions of the lemon juice with the evoo.  Here there was close to the same amount of lemon juice and evoo.  In the pasta there was a substantially greater amount of lemon juice than evoo.  We also used a better quality evoo in this salad than in the pasta and that definitely made a difference.

Recipe after the jump!

Crispy Roasted Chickpeas

The first time I had roasted chickpeas was at Prune in NYC.  I know it sounds like a vaguely strange (and not altogether appetizing) dish, but we finished off the entire dish in seconds and asked for more.  They were unbelievable.  The chickpeas were crispy, salty and totally addictive - the perfect bar snack.  They sort of reminded me of corn nuts, another bar snack that I also love.  I have heard that bar snacks are intentionally salty so that it makes you drink your beer/drink faster and then order more to drink.  How very sneaky.  But unlike most bar snacks, these chickpeas are full of protein and relatively healthy for you.  And they are totally easy to make at home.  All you need is a can of chickpeas, a splash of evoo, s&p and the spice blend of your choice.  As a good Maryland-girl the first spice mix that comes to mind is Old Bay, but if Old Bay just isn't your thing you can use a creole seasoning blend, or a Moroccan spice blend.  For this batch I threw together my own Moroccan spice blend using ground coriander, cumin, cinnamon, cayenne, and ginger and then sprinkled it all over the chickpeas fresh out of the oven.  Totally delicious.

Recipe after the jump!

Chickpeas with Chorizo

Chickpeas and chorizo are a very standard combination in Spain.  Sometimes you see chickpea and chorizo stews and sometimes you just see chickpeas and chorizo sauteed together.  Every once in awhile you see some spinach thrown into the mix.  Tonight we decided to sautee together chickpeas, onions, garlic, chorizo, and flat leaf parsley, all seasoned with a pinch of sweet paprika and a splash of sherry vinegar.  Together they make a hearty, satisfying meal - one that we served with some pan con tomate and a simple arugula salad.  The bitterness and freshness of the arugula salad helped lighten the whole meal up so that it felt appropriate for a 90 degree summer evening.  I know that some recipes include some toasted bread crumbs in their chickpeas with chorizo and I think we will definitely try that out next time.  I also might throw in some baby spinach to saute up with the chickpeas and chorizo for a little variety.  That would make this dish more of a one pot roughly 20 minute meal, which sounds pretty awesome to me.

Recipe after the jump!

Tunisian Soup with Chard and Egg Noodles

So our best friend Mark came to visit, which is great because we love Mark.  And also because when he is in town we eat great food and give Mark a tour of our favorite NYC restaurants, bars, etc.  It has become a tradition that every time he comes to visit, he gets off the bus in NYC on Friday, takes a cab to our apartment, and we head straight to Fatty Crab UWS where we get the steamed buns, the sliders, the wonton mee, the watermelon pickle with pork belly, and whatever else strikes our fancy.  This time we tried the Malay fish fry and the fried chicken (which was so ridiculously good).  Then Saturday for lunch we hit Ippudo for ramen, and then Yakitori Totto for dinner.  Both were sickeningly good.  I will be dreaming about the special spicy ramen at Ippudo, as well as the tsukune (chicken meatballs), the chicken wings, and the negi tori don (charcoal broiled chicken thighs and scallion with raw egg over white rice) from Yakitori Totto for weeks to come.  If you live in NYC and haven't been to either place yet, you really need to get over there.  They are delicious.  In between all of these delicious Asian meals we were snacking on cookies from Levain Bakery, and more cookies and soft serve from Momofuku Milk Bar.  Then we finished off our dining extravaganza on Sunday with brunch at B. Cafe for burgers, croque monsieurs (or madames) and french fries.  Aside from breakfast, it was our only non-Asian meal of the weekend, which is how things typically go when Mark comes up to visit.

So while all of that food we consumed this weekend was crazy delicious, now I feel like a python who swallowed a whole cow - all lethargic and sleepy.  That burger Sunday afternoon might have put me over the edge.  After that meal Alex and I both had to hit the gym.  Later Sunday night we didn't have the energy to cook so we got delivery.  So for tonight's dinner I wanted something light and vegetarian.  After a particularly gluttonous weekend, vegetarian just seems like the way to go.  And since it is still cool outside, soup sounded like a great option.  This soup manages to be both light and hearty at the same time.  The spiciness of the harissa and the smokiness of the toasted cumin seeds give the soup some serious flavor.  I modified the recipe to add more Swiss chard, more noodles, and a bit more chicken stock.  I love chickpeas, but I think that the Swiss chard is more where it's at with this soup.  I like the chickpeas and all, but they don't absorb the flavors of the soup the way that the chard and the noodles do.  I love soup.

Recipe after the jump!