Rice & Grains

The traditional Arab rice for fish is pale yellow with saffron and garnished with pine nuts. Turmeric, the “Oriental saffron,” sometimes replaces the expensive spice. Here the grains become softer and less separate with more water than in other rice dishes, and olive oil is often used.

Many dishes standardized in the courtly kitchens of Constantinople during Ottoman rule spread throughout the Empire. This is one of the classics that you find in all the cities that were once outposts of the Empire. It is good to serve with meat or chicken.

Iranians have a predilection for fresh herbs, which they use in huge quantities. This traditional Iranian New Year’s dish consists of rice cooked with a variety of fresh herbs. Their greenness is believed to ensure a happy and “green” year ahead. The herbs are chosen according to individual taste and mood, and to what is available. Favorite Iranian herbs include tarragon, chives, flat-leaf parsley, dill, fenugreek, and cilantro. Choose 3 or 4 or use them all, but try to use fresh ones.

This is the most popular everyday Arab rice dish. It is eaten on the second night of the Muslim New Year “so that one’s employment may be prolonged and multiplied” like the vermicelli broken into little bits; or, as some say, “so that one may be prolific and beget many children.” Serve with a yogurt-and-cucumber salad, such as the one on page 70.

Yellow rice is a festive, celebratory dish, prepared for its delicate flavor and decorative quality, and in the hope that its color will bring joy and happiness. This spiced version is particularly delicious.

The round, sweet orange-fleshed pumpkins are the ones to use for this dish. The amount of stuffing you need depends on the size of the pumpkin. If you wish to make it without meat, increase the quantity of rice.

This is sometimes made with lettuce leaves.

Serve cold as a first course. Choose peppers that can stand on their bases.

You can serve these hot or cold.

This too is for vegetables to be eaten cold.

A Persian filling of meat and rice with yellow split peas is cooked in a sweet-and-sour sauce and served hot with plain rice.

This is the most common filling and is called hashwa. If the vegetables are going to be stewed, the filling can be mixed raw. If the vegetables are going to be baked, the filling must be cooked first, because the rice needs liquid. Short-grain or round rice is used because it is sticky and binds the filling.

This meatless filling is for vegetables to be eaten cold. These are usually cooked with olive oil. If the vegetables are to be stewed, the rice is used raw; if they are baked, it has to be cooked.

Ma’louba means “upside down” in Arabic. This is a layered meat, vegetable, and rice dish which is turned out upside down like a cake without disturbing the layers. A special wide pan with short straight sides is used to cook it. The eggplant is normally fried first, but broiling in this case does not impair the flavor. It is famously a Palestinian dish. The rice absorbs the meat sauce and the flavor of the eggplants and becomes soft and brown. Serve it with yogurt.

These are the most prestigious and popular kibbeh. The preparation requires skill and application. The art lies in making the outer shells as long (at least that is what we thought in Egypt, for I know now that the Lebanese prefer a small, oval, stocky shape) and as thin as possible. The crisp, light, tasty shells should crack to divulge a juicy, aromatic meat filling. Serve hot or cold with tahina cream salad (page 67), baba ghanouj (page 65), and other salads.

For a grander presentation, people make potato croquettes with the ingredients, using the ground meat and nuts as a filling and sometimes dipping in beaten egg and flour before deep-frying. But it is far simpler and just as good to make it in a baking dish. It makes a delicious and filling dish for a large group.

Because of its whiteness, this is a festive dish served on the New Year to augur a year full of happiness. It is served hot with rice in winter, and cold in summer.

This is good hot or cold. Serve with yogurt and salads.