It started with the strangest international flight I’d ever been on: a two hour interrogation and full baggage search in Portugal before boarding a military-esque, extreme utilitarian plane, complete with narrow, thread-bare seats without so much as a recline or headrest, no service (no food or drink, screens, pillows or blankets), and more than one heated argument above my head in Hebrew between passengers and crew. Little sleep ensued. Then came a 6am scramble through the airport, crook neck and all (less security on this side, thank goodness), only to dive into an taxi that clearly was a rally car driver in another life (I quickly realised this was the norm – not one car was unscathed). This is Tel Aviv.

Though sleep was now the first thing on my mind, I had priorities: and first was my 9am Delicious Israel tour. Let’s just say my tour guide had a masters on hummus and Israeli nationalism – it was hands down the best food tour I’ve ever done. We began with bowls of creamy hummus topped with liberal olive oil, parsley, ful (a dark, rich fava bean puree) and paprika, scooped up with hot falafel, freshly baked pita and sharp onion wedges (yes you read that right), and my new favourite-  masabacha. Same ingredients as hummus, but deconstructed – all cooked together rather than blitzed – for a lumpy, broken chickpea texture. The next six hours were a blur of food: malabi, a creamy milk pudding topped with pomegranate raspberry syrup and sweet coconut peanut crumble; boureka, crispy and flaky and filled with spinach and cheese; lamb shawarma straight from the spit; market-stall flatbread, spread with tahini sauce, parsley-heavy tabouli, chilli, za’tar and grilled eggplant then folded like an envelope and placed straight into my hot hands. More and more – but I can’t give up all their secrets. Suffice to say I ate, and ate, and ate – and learnt so much more about Tel Aviv and Israeli food, culture and history than I ever would have on my own. 

It’s a sun-drenched, golden-hued city, dry and sand baked. There’s palm trees and the Mediterranean, the odd skyscraper but mainly crumbled bauhaus buildings – one renovated and glowing for every abandoned and windowless version. We walked and ate. Buttery, dense dark chocolate babka, or a white chocolate halva iteration in the morning. Soft and charred whole roast cauliflower served up in a paper bag, smoky grilled eggplant on a bed of creamy tahini sauce with spicy grated tomato for lunch. Market smoothie stands piled high with the biggest pomegranates I’ve ever seen, frequented by both machine-gun toting IDF teens and head-scarfed orthodox women. Restaurants are crowded and lively – expect to do shots with the bartenders – and Israelis eat LATE (we felt like nanna’s rocking up at 730pm). Though the streets are empty on Saturday mornings with Shabbat, the waterfront was packed with joggers and cyclists getting in their weekend exercise pre-coffee – not unlike home. There was no real modern retailing – no mega strip of Zara, Topshop and Nike – but if Tel Aviv was a culture shock, then Jerusalem was that on steroids. 

More about that in another blog post, but below are some of my favourite coffee stops, bakeries, markets, bars and restaurants in Tel Aviv. I loved it. (I have also included a few from Jerusalem down the bottom, but as we only spent a day and half there, I was much less thorough in exploring!)

Cafes & Bakeries

• Nahat Cafe: hands down the best coffee we tried, and a great spot to sit on the sidewalk and people watch. Make sure to order one of their house-made croissants with a pot of salted pistachio butter on the side.
• Dallal Bakery: tucked away in Neve Tzedek, Dallal does a gorgeous, brioche-like babka – one dark chocolate, the other halva- and great coffee. Sit outside in the sun along the marble bar. Also try their poppy-seed tart.
• Lehahim Bakery: you might have already heard of the legendary Bread’s Bakery in NYC – this is the original. It’s a confluence of Israeli, Jewish and Danish sweets: the chocolate babka, rich and buttery with croissant dough, is the best I’ve tried, and we also loved the almond-crusted croissants and dark chocolate rugelach. I’d recommend the larger cafe located in HaHashmonaim St.  
• Cafelix: Cafelix has three or so locations in Tel Aviv, all of which serve up great coffee and sweets. 
• Cafe Levinsky 41: a tiny hold-in-the-wall in Florentine, Levinsky are masters of fermentation: kombucha, kefir and all manner of jars of various fruits, syrups and spices. Order a kombucha and watch as they individually flavour-profile each drink and adorn your glass with herbs and flowers. 
• Little Prince Bookshop and cafe: perfect for free-lance work or brunch, the walls are lined with books and there’s plenty of seating. An impressive food menu too – try their cherry tomato shakshuka. 
• Bucke cafe: one that I was recommended and didn’t quite manage to get to. Go for brunch and order the breakfast tray, filled with dollops of labneh, hummus, eggs, roast vegetables and various salads. 
• Uzi-Eli: a little health food store near Carmel market, this is the place for your smoothies, acai bowls and refreshing juice stops. You can also find them in Jerusalem in the Mahane Yehuda market. 

Restaurants and Cheap Eats

• North Abraxus: you may have heard of the casual Israeli eatery Miznon, which has been steadily taking over the world (Tel Aviv, Vienna, Paris, Melbourne, NYC) one whole roast cauliflower at a time. This is Eyal Shani’s slightly more upscale version, where you can book a table rather than standing at a bar and there are no pitas in sight. Pile in for the torch whole roast, blackened sweet potato ‘that you eat with your hands’, served with creme fraiche and smoked salt, the “white lines of aubergine lined up on tahini”, and so much more. It’s a new menu every day. Call to book. 
• Miznon, if you haven’t been already, for said whole roast cauliflower and pita (pita on the bone, and the falafel pita, are my favourites). 
• Port Sa’id: this the more lively, bar version of North Abraxus. We went to both. Definitely worth it. Try the arab cabbage cake, slow cooked and melting in butter. It’s opposite a synagogue with outdoor seating sprawling out over the steps, and is the ideal place for a lazy sunny lunch with friends. 
• HaBasta: a little place tucked in off a side street of the Carmel Market with a handwritten daily changing menu. Sit outside on the street with eclectic red checked tableclothes, and book if you can. A bit pricy, but probably worth it if market-to-table, local ingredients, wines and interesting flavour combinations are your thing. 
• Hummus Abu Hassan: the OG hummus joint in Jaffa since 1966. Pro tip: the original spot is tiny and you might have trouble getting in at peak hour if there’s more than two of you, but they’ve opened a bigger place about 1km away where you can sit outside in the shade and be dished up plates of hummus, masabacha, falafel and warm pita. 
• Falafel Hakosem and Falafel Gabai: the best falafel I tried in Tel Aviv. Grab a shakshuka and bowl of chopped tomato cucumber salad to go with it.  
• Sabich: maybe the ultimate Israeli fusion food, some of the best street-side sabich can be found opposite the Carmel Market: think fresh pita piled up with grilled eggplant, hard-hard-boiled egg, golden potato. all freshened up with herbs and greens and dolled up with tahini sauce. Filling, delicious AND cheap. 

Markets

• Carmel market: an absolute must walk through in Tel Aviv, but try to avoid Friday afternoon (and it is closed on Saturdays), when it becomes frantic with everyone loading up on shopping for Shabbat meals. Stop for a freshly squeezed pomegranate juice or smoothie, buy spices like za’atar to take home, and feast on all the colours, smells and sounds around you. This is another place included on the Delicious Israel tour- so much to learn here!
• Levinsky market: more of a street with open front stores than a market as such, this is the place for your dried herbs, fruit, pulses and spices. Stop at Cafe Levinsky for a floral kombucha, snack on some dates and buy a bunch of different halva flavours (my favourite was the pistachio). 

Jerusalem favourites

• Mahane Yehuda Market: even bigger and better than the markets in Tel Aviv. Stop by in the morning to watch the bakeries churn out hundreds of pita, the fishmongers and spice-sellers hawk their wares, and the piles of produce and sweets around every corner. Grab a coffee from the Cafelix Roasters and a smoothie from Uzi-Eli while you people-watch. 
• Machneyuda: be warned – it’s extremely loud, in a club-y kind of way. It’s also one of the most renowned restaurants in Israel, by the same chefs that own the Palomar and the Barbary in London. If you like those, you’ll like this. If you like the sound of modern, innovative Israeli food, you’ll like this. Must book online –  and book on the early side if you’re noise-averse. 
• Azura: a more traditional market restaurant. In Ottolenghi’s words, “it tells the story of Jewish immigrants and how their food has manifested itself since grandma’s time”. That famous eggplant dish stuffed with ground beef and pinenuts from Ottolenghi’s Jerusalem cookbook? Inspired by the very dish at Azura. 
• Lina Hummus & Falafel (old Jerusalem): if you are doing a day tour of Jerusalem (which I would highly recommend, we loved ours and learnt SO much) then head here for lunch, deep in the Arab quarter. Bowls of creamy hummus topped with chickpeas, pinenuts and herbs, crisp falafel and vibrant Jerusalem chopped salad. 
• Kadosh Cafe Patisserie: second to the market, a great spot for a pastry or breakfast before starting your day exploring the old city. 

The post Tel Aviv Food Guide appeared first on The Brick Kitchen.

Peach & Tomato Salad, two ways – one all Italian with torn burrata and a basil-walnut dressing, the other dressed up fattoush style, diced with cucumber, herbs and za’atar on a bed of hummus. Jump to Recipe 

It’s been a little while since the last recipe over here – a month has flown past since I wrote about wrapping up a summer term in Oxford with a spring lemon & elderflower loaf and boarded a plane to Barcelona. My first European summer  – well, I can see what the fuss is about. Barcelona, Florence, Rome, Cinque Terre, Venice. Certainly the tourist trail, but I’ve never been to Italy so it sort of had to be done, didn’t it? And despite the crowds (of which there were many, but which can be mostly avoided with a bit of planning), and despite the heat (don’t fight it, just enjoy it – sweatiness included), it was absolutely wonderful. 

I am a creature of habit when it comes to exploring a new city. Views, food, coffee and history. Each place is marked by the local produce market, explored early morning before the day’s humidity descends: Barcelona’s La Boqueria filled with racks of serrano jamon and rainbow stacks of blitzed fruit smoothies; mounds of vibrant zucchini flowers, shiny eggplant and tomatoes the size of my fist in Florence’s Mercato di Sant’Ambrogio; silvery sardines, octopus and swordfish fresh from the boat in Venice’s Rialto. The indulgent pastry and coffee ritual in Italy is another I appreciate – cappuccino or double espresso, vanilla custard filled cornetto or flaky sfogliatelle eaten counterside at Roscioli. Traditional Venetian almond crusted pastries (the Sant’Ubaldo) and chocolate twisted krantz cakes at Dal Mas. Post-market Florentine sfloglia filled with pear, chocolate and ricotta at Pasticceria Nencioni. Lots of walking. Lots of stairs – views over Barcelona from the wonderland of Park Guell, a moment of quiet above the bustle of Florence at Palazzo Vecchio, standing in the wind at San Giorgio Maggiore watching the late-afternoon sun bouncing off waves and boat traffic.  

I am planning on uploading photographs and favourite places from the trip in the next few weeks, but for the moment you can find a photo diary and read a bit about that first week in Barcelona here.

This summery peach, tomato & avocado salad was one I made during our time in Monterosso, Cinque Terre. The morning market was just opening when we loaded up brown paper bags full of juicy yellow peaches, fumbled our way through asking for burrata and pinenuts in mangled Italian (mostly english, to be honest) and bought scoops of vibrantly green local genovese pesto. Then it was a day of views, hiking up and down between the five coastal villages. I’ll remember most clearly the olive trees and grape vines, the radiating heat and dripping sweat, the glimpses of colourful houses and ferries leaving white wash streaks across the ocean down below. It was quiet, save for insects, and we were mostly alone – apparently not many tourists walk the high paths. We stopped for ricotta cream filled croissants and double espressos in Vernazza (Il pirata delle 5 terre) before jumping off the rocks to cool off, and devoured scoops of creamy olive oil & almond gelato in Riomaggiore. Thirty kilometres in the legs later and back in our little yellow and stone airbnb kitchen that evening, I put together plates of roughly chopped tomatoes and peaches, dolloped with torn burrata, toasted pine nuts and a lemon pesto dressing, a side of golden grilled zucchini and eggplant. (Pipe dreams of permanently relocating to a small Italian village were entertained.)

I’d never really used peaches in a savoury context until last summer when I made this peach & tomato salad for friends, and now I can’t get enough of it. It’s so simple it hardly needs a recipe, but here’s one for you anyway. The original was all Italian – basil and prosciutto, fresh cheese and olive oil –  but lately I’ve been changing it up a bit with a more Israeli edge, like a fattoush. Dicing through crisp lebanese cucumbers and finely chopped mint and parsley, tangy with lemon juice and za’atar, served up on a bed of creamy hummus with soft pita for all the scooping. It’s infinitely adaptable – next time I want to try grilled corn. Any other ideas? 

The post Peach & Tomato Salad, two ways in Italy appeared first on The Brick Kitchen.

An easy homemade 3 hour ciabatta recipe – just 15 minutes to pull together, 2 hours rising and straight in the oven. I’ve also included the recipe for this fast roast beetroot hummus, an earthy, sweet variation on your regular hummus rotation.  Jump to Recipe

I first came to hummus making in a round-a-bout way. It was back when I was largely interested in cooking things containing chocolate – weekend batches of chunky chocolate oat cookies, Grandma’s chocolate peppermint slice, frequently whipped up desserts of gooey chocolate self-saucing pudding – over-generous serving spoonfuls topped with mountains of vanilla ice cream. Hummus just wasn’t on my radar. A specialist from Israel was working with my father for a few months, and he and his family were appalled by the hummus quality available in New Zealand supermarkets. You know, the way-too-small, fairly expensive plastic containers of oily, slightly chunky, chickpea mash in the cheese section, often flavoured with pesto or roast capsicum? It was a far cry from their descriptions of restaurants selling only hummus, huge batches of smooth, mousse-like dip eaten by the bowlful.

So they learnt to make their own instead.

They then taught my parents, who caught onto this very quick, very healthy dip that their kids would demolish, and it became a regular weekend lunch – usually with that supermarket deli rotissserie chicken that feels questionable but keeps you coming back for more. By my last few years of school, I’d have friends over for lunch and serve bowls of hummus, probably untraditionally with avocado and ciabatta bread, followed up with whatever cake I’d been trying out that day. But I didn’t really appreciate how much of an art there could be until I discovered Ottolenghi’s Jerusalem, websites like Food52 and more recently read tales of hummus from Molly Yeh’s book and blog. Thalia and I visited Dizengoff in NYC last year, and their version topped with twice cooked eggplant and served with warm pita, sides of Israeli salad and pickles was my new bench-mark (which I haven’t yet achieved, to be honest!).

So I’ve started to learn and adapt. I learnt from Ottolenghi not to use olive oil in the hummus itself, but merely as a good quality drizzle to pool gently atop the finished product (read HERE). I read about slowly streaming iced water into the food processor for maximal creaminess and emulsification. I admit that I do prefer the hummus produced from dried then painstakingly boiled chickpeas (with a bit of bicarb soda) better – so for a dinner party, that’s what I’d do. But I also love being able to whip up a batch from a can within 10 minutes when I’ve been out at university all day – as a compromise in this scenario, I heat the chickpeas and liquid for a few minutes to warm and soften them before blitzing to achieve that warm finished product and a smoother texture. I’ve become partial to a pinch of cumin along with the requisite tahini, garlic and lemon juice.

However, I hadn’t strayed far from the original until this beetroot version. Roasted until almost caramelised and tender, the beet lends a slightly sweet, earthy undertone to the hummus. Topped with quality olive oil, toasted sesame seeds, dukkah and hazelnuts – it’s a favourite autumnal twist.

The ciabatta is an old favourite-  I think I first teased it way back last year alongside this spicy eggplant shakshuka, and have made it numerous times since. It seems to turn out slightly differently each time, maybe dependent on humidity and how much effort I put into kneading the dough, but never badly. It’s flexible. Low maintenance too – 15 minutes to throw together, 2 hours resting, then it is straight on a tray and into the oven. Maybe not as perfect as a loaf created with a biga and using a preheated baking stone – but it’s pretty perfect with your shakshuka or slow-cooked ragu on a Sunday evening.

The post Easy Homemade 3 Hour Ciabatta appeared first on The Brick Kitchen.

A winter Middle-Eastern cauliflower & brussel sprout salad with miso almond hummus – adorned with an oozy poached egg, goat’s cheese and dukkah.  Jump to Recipe 

pro-cras-ti-na-tion |prəˌkrastəˈnāSHən, prō-|
noun
the action of delaying or postponing something

Let’s talk procrastination. I’ve been particularly good at it this week, you see. Very good at browsing the web aimlessly, reading irrelevant new stories, watching instagram stories, checking the fridge in case inspiration strikes, and generally avoiding or prolonging whatever I’m attempting to ignore. I’ve even stooped to the level of scrolling facebook on my laptop, giving up, picking up my phone and scrolling facebook there too, as if something different might miraculously appear on a different sized screen. It’s almost automatic. Procrastination is a strange phenomenon – you’re completely aware of your time-wasting habits, but somehow can’t quite stop yourself. Like Tim Urban put it in the TED radio hour talk I listened to yesterday – it’s like a rational decision-maker monkey waging war on an instant gratification monkey’.

If you want to procrastinate some more, read Tim Urban’s blog post on the topic here for an entertaining ten minutes.

There was another positive spin on it, however. According to Adam Grant (LINK), mild procrastination actually increases creativity – but only a particular form. The key is to start early, but finish late. By starting a task early, you begin to consider possibilities and ideas. They sit and simmer at the back of your brain, a low, slow burn. You make new connections, draw on different resources, and end up with something much more than when you first contemplated it. As long as you don’t leave it TOO long – because then you’ll end up with a rushed, half-finished, unoriginal product completed during an all-nighter right before it’s due. But being too eager, too focussed on getting it finished – sitting down and completing it all in one go as soon as possible – could result in an equally conventional, generic result. It’s a fine line, apparently.

Here in Melbourne, the seasons are really complicating my blog posts and plans. It’s cold, and brussel sprouts, cauliflower and pumpkin are all still around – but strawberries are also the cheapest they’ve been all year (coming down from much warmer Queensland) and zucchini and tomatoes are on special. I’m torn between making winter posts to suit the winter weather, using strawberries to celebrate the arrival of spring, or hanging with the northern hemisphere and making autumnal harvest recipes. Can we not be so confusing please, supermarket?

Today we’ve gone with winter, however.  This middle-eastern cauliflower & brussel sprout salad with miso almond hummus combines some of my favourite ingredients and flavours – golden edged, caramelized florets of cauliflower, fragrant with fresh thyme and garlic; bundles of chopped mint and parsley; the crunch of sunflower seeds, pumpkin seeds and chopped almonds; a hint of pomegranate molasses and tangy lemon juice. Creamy goats cheese and spiced dukkah. The hummus works – don’t doubt the miso. Salty and savoury, a little richer than usual with almonds added too. It’s a smooth and creamy base for the winter vegetable salad. And of course, a salad isn’t complete around here without a runny poached egg on top. It pulls everything together – and who could resist the allure of that bright yellow yolk?

The post Middle-Eastern Cauliflower & Brussel Sprout Salad with Miso Almond Hummus appeared first on The Brick Kitchen.

Smashed pumpkin toast with pomegranate, homemade hummus, crispy kale, feta and a perfectly poached egg. Move over, avocado toast!  Jump to Recipe 

This morning was a turning point, heralding winter’s arrival to Melbourne. Cheeks blushed red with that conflicting icy-heat of cold air, fingers tucked inside sleeves to avoid the chill, and eyes watering in the wind – people move faster in winter. A mixture of trying to send blood around to our extremities and an attempt to get to somewhere with heating as fast as possible, maybe.

My stress fracture injury seems to be finally healing, and though I’m not supposed to run for a few more months yet, I have been going for frequent walks. It is challenging to restrain my impatient legs from jogging  – missing that feeling of burning muscles screaming for oxygen, of your heart being half way up to your throat, and the mindlessness of putting one foot in front of the other. You can think a lot more when you walk, maybe because less of your mental capacity is focused on moving forward. At least I have Lemonade to listen to at the moment.

Cooking is a similar sort of concentration. Rather than being consumed by physical exertion, I’m normally figuring out the ingredients and measurements, the next step to take for maximal efficiency. This smashed pumpkin toast with pomegranate & hummus is like that – once the pumpkin is in the oven, you can prepare everything else, ready to get set go once it emerges, wrinkly and fragrant. Make the hummus, water on for eggs, prep the herbs and spices, start the dishes, crisp up the kale and deseed your pomegranate – the latter hopefully without permanently staining your white shirt or chopping board, like me.

It is also made for the cooling weather (although don’t get me wrong – if you’re lucky enough to be in spring, go ahead and make it too!). Pumpkin is roasted and caramelised, tender and crisp at the edges, then mashed and sautéed with garlic, thyme, roasted almonds and the rich tanginess of pomegranate molasses. Chopped mint & parsley inject freshness, dukkah for that earthy spice, and you can serve it up on a bed of smooth homemade hummus with crusty bread.

Crispy kale offers texture, almost disappearing in your mouth with its fragile lightness. Extras take it to the next level: the pop of bright pink pomegranate arils, chunks of creamy feta, and a perfectly poached egg, yolk oozing down to reach the folds of hummus below.

Move over, avocado toast! 

AND it is one of those dishes that could be served for brunch, lunch or dinner, and is very adaptable. Last night I forgot the almonds, so substituted toasted pumpkin & sunflower seeds. If you don’t have dukkah, just use a pinch of a few spices in the cupboard. Not much mint? Try some parsley as well. Add greens if you like – asparagus for those in the spring, or late summer zucchini or broccolini in autumn. The pumpkin smash itself could be served separately as a middle-eastern side dish. Add harissa if you want a bit of extra heat. Endless adjustments.

You’ve probably noticed by now that I LOVE homemade hummus – if you do too, you might also like:
– Ottolenghi’s Lamb Kofta with Corn, Zucchini & Roasted Carrot Salad and Homemade Hummus
– Middle-Eastern Chermoula Lamb Skewers with Tabouli, Hummus and Pita
– Homemade Bagels with Coriander-Lime Hummus, Avocado & Salmon

The post Smashed Pumpkin Toast with Pomegranate & Hummus appeared first on The Brick Kitchen.