Near & Far, the newest cookbook by Heidi Swanson, is a collection of 120 vegetarian recipes inspired by the author’s travels near (her home in San Francisco) and Far (Morocco, Japan, Italy, France, and India). Swanson started traveling shortly after college and now has stamps on her passport from around the world. She carries along journals as a…
Secret Recipe Club: Rgaïf- Msemen (Moroccan Square Flat Bread)
Time for another Secret Recipe Club! For those who haven’t seen my previous Secret Recipe Club posts, this club includes a group of bloggers who are assigned a different blog each month and secretly make a recipe to post on their specified reveal day. I look forward to my assignment email every month and discovering new blogs….
Mourad: New Moroccan Cookbook Review and Burnt Honey Ice Cream
Admittedly not having much knowledge of Moroccan cuisine, I was excited to recently receive a copy of Mourad: New Moroccan. The author, Mourad Lahlou, came to California from Marrakesh to study economics at San Francisco State University in 1985. With no formal culinary training, he started cooking as a way to recreate the dishes from his…
Epcot International Flower and Garden Festival 2014 and Baghrir (Moroccan Crepes)
We had a couple of tickets to Disney leftover from our October trip, so decided to use them for Evan’s birthday. With his birthday right before Easter, we postponed the vacation a week to avoid the holiday crowds. We stayed at Disney’s Pop Century Resort and spent the week visiting Magic Kingdom, Epcot, Animal Kingdom,…
Kefta Mkaouara (Moroccan Meatball and Egg Tagine)
Kefta Mkaouara (Mkawra) is a Moroccan dish traditionally made in a tagine. Small beef or lamb meatballs are simmered in a spiced tomato sauce, then eggs are added in the last few minutes of cooking. It is served from the same dish it is cooked in with crusty Moroccan bread. I used this Khubz Maghrebi…
Bestila (Moroccan Chicken Pie)
Bestila (Pastilla, Bastilla, Bisteeya, Bstilla, B’stilla) is a Moroccan pie traditionally using squab (pigeon). Squab was unavailable here, so I used chicken. It is a savory pie with a hint of sweetness from the sugar topping and almonds. In Morocco, Warqa, a slightly thinner type of phyllo, is used to wrap the pie. If you…
Kefta (Moroccan Meatballs)
Meatballs have their place in cuisines around the world: Italian meatballs, almondigas from the Philippines and Latin America, Frikadelle from Germany, hanbagu from Japan, thit vien from Vietnam, köttbullar from Sweden, and many others. In Morocco, they are known as kefta. Kefta stand out from other meatballs by the spices used. They are generally made…
