Freekeh Recipe

In the Western Countries when you want to prepare lunch or dinner the main carbs that come to mind are rice, pasta, potatoes or bread. Rarely does anyone think of Freekeh. Freekeh (pronounced: Free-keh), very popular in the Middle East, is smoked green wheat. Freekeh was first discovered about 2300 years before Christ, in a small village in the Levant area.

Time were tough, the village was under siege! So the village folks decided to harvest their wheat crop early and they then burnt their green wheat. Soon afterwards, they noticed that when they rub the burnt outer layer of the wheat, there were green grains inside. These green grains are what we call Freekeh. Now you know why it is called smoked green wheat, as the wheat is burnt to prepare it.

Freekeh has a distinct smoky, nutty flavor that I love!!! While my attempts to get the family to eat healthier food through trying to introduce brown rice and whole wheat pasta have been disastrously unsuccessful (nobody liked the flavors), luckily everyone in my household loves Freekeh!

Freekeh is very nutritional, even more than brown rice as it has 4 times higher fiber content plus more protein, calcium, iron and zinc. On top of that Freekeh has lower fat content. Perfect wouldn’t you say?!?

Freekeh is sold either as larger grains (used in today’s recipe) that are served as a side dish just as rice, or small cracked grains used to prepare soups, check my yummy chicken freekeh soup. Try Freekeh with my Chicken with Onions recipe. 

Decorated Ice Cubes

I have been browsing the net lately for birthday ideas for my little one. There are SO MANY great ideas out there!!! I was astound! So stay tuned as I share with you more of those in the coming few weeks.

One of the things I liked a lot are these decorated ice cubes at We Share Ideas. They are so attractive! So simple! So easy to make! And, I think it is safe to say, they will be a main attraction at your next dinner party or gathering. It is difficult to imagine that they will not leave a lasting impression with your guest.

Basic Crepes Recipe

I love homemade stuff, especially when it comes to food!!!! A favorite is homemade jam prepared in summer for winter recipes. 

An ideal companion for any jam is crepes. Crepes are so good that there are some restaurants devoted to crepes. Crepes with honey, crepes with chocolate, crepes with jam, crepes with fresh strawberries, crepes with strawberry sauce, crepes with cream, and the list goes on and on.

Today, I want to share with you my basic crepes recipe. These crepes are good for salty and sweet garnishing plus you can prepare your crepes beforehand and freeze them for time of need. Just make sure to lay a layer of wax paper between the crepes, then wrap them well and freeze.

DIY Marshmallow Flower Bouquet

I LOVE, LOVE flowers!

Nothing can brighten my day as a bunch of flowers! So imagine the effect of edible flowers! Flowers are such a great way to express your feelings and love…

You can imagine how excited I was when I accidently found these on this Portuguese site devoted to sharing ideas. The tutorial on how to prepare these beautiful, attractive, impressive marshmallow flowers was so clear and included self-explanatory photos. I am soooo looking forward to preparing these for my daughter’s birthday in two weeks.

You will instantly fall in love with these flowers and you will think, “why didn’t I know about these earlier?!?!”

Stuffed Cabbage Rolls Middle Eastern Style Recipe (Mahshi Malfouf محشي ملفوف)

Stuffed cabbage leaves are universally loved!

As many countries attribute it to their cuisine, I decided to try to find the origin of stuffed cabbage rolls. I did a google search and WOW…..you won’t believe how many countries insist that stuffed cabbage is THEIR DISH! Some forums even have heated discussions on the subject! So I settled that finding the exact origin is a lost cause and agree to the fact that stuffed cabbage leaves are very, very, very, very popular across the Middle East, Balkan countries, Eastern Europe, Armenia, Finland and Sweden.

Arabs call stuffwed cabbage “Mahshi Malfouf”. “Mahshi” means stuffed and “Malfouf” has a double meaning of ‘cabbage’ and ‘rolled’. Turks and Armenians name them “Dolma”. Poles call them “Gołąbki” meaning ‘little pigeons’ while Czechs and Slovaks refer to them as “Holubky”. They are known as “Sarma” to Serbs, Croatians and Bulgarians and “Sarmale” to Romanians. Swedes and Danes call them “Kåldolmar” while in Finland they are known as “kaalikääryle”. Whatever their name, stuffed cabbage rolls are the epitome comfort food!

I found it strange that stuffed cabbage rolls are popular in Sweden and Finland. All the other countries are close to each other, while these two are so far away. So how did cabbage rolls reach their cuisine?

In 1709, Charles XII of Sweden lost the Battle of Poltave against the Russians and fled to Moldavia which was controlled by the Ottoman Empire. There, he spent two years in exile trying to convince the Ottoman Empire to help him defeat the Russians after which he returned to Sweden. Since he had borrowed considerable amounts of money from Ottoman creditors to finance his wars, they followed him to Sweden and during this time stuffed cabbage rolls were introduced in Sweden and from there to neighboring countries.

Cabbage rolls consists of cabbage leaves wrapped around a filling that traditionally is based around meat and rice and seasoned with a variety of seasoning. There are also popular vegetarian adaptations. The rolled cabbage leaves are then cooked by either baking, simmering or steaming. The sauce that the rolls are cooked in, or served with, is the distinctive factor that varies widely between the different cuisines. Also some cuisines use fresh softly cooked leaves for wrapping while others use pickled leaves.

In the Middle East “Mal-fouf” dishes are very popular. We use cabbage leaves, vine leaves, and Swiss chard leaves for rolling. The stuffing can include meat or not. The districting factor in our version is the spices we use and the lemony sauce. The Armenia version, that my grandmother used to prepare, is also lemony but much more so than this version.