The Mediterranean Dish - Simply Dinner.
125 Easy Mediterranean Diet-Inspired Recipes to Eat Well and Live Joyfully.
Suzy Karadsheh with Summer Miller, photographs by Caitlin Bensel.
Clarkson Potter/Publishers, New York. 287 pages.
The internet has spawned an enormous number of food blogs, not all of them equally enjoyable or professional. Born in Port Said but now resident in North America, Suzy Karadsheh posts her very interesting blog (one of my favourites) two or three times a week and it is always a pleasure to see it land in my inbox. Subscription is free; like many food bloggers she sells stuff in her online store but hey, she has to make a living just like the rest of us.
This is her second recipe book. The first one, which I have not read, was a New York Times best-seller.
It is of course not practical to prepare every dish she posts, but most are mouth-wateringly attractive and she has never disappointed. The book in question is equally interesting and the recipes certainly seem to be on a par with those in her blogs.
I should perhaps point out that her recipes, in the book as well as in the blog, are truly Mediterranean in the sense that they are from a number of countries bordering that sea and not only from Italy and Greece as many people think when this kind of diet is mentioned.
The book opens with a moderately extensive introduction about the nature of the Mediterranean diet. The health benefits of this eating habit have been intensively researched in numerous well-designed studies and should be well-known to most people. Home cooks who do not have much experience of this diet will find the section on her favourite herbs and spices useful. Some of my current favourites, such as sumac, Aleppo pepper and ras el hanout, to give only a few examples, should be more widely known; we must also not hesitate to frequently use dried fruits, grains or berries in salads and cooked dishes. All of these are easily available in The Jaw. There are also some helpful hints about meal prepping which should save time.
The rest of the book is organized into the usual sections on various dishes, such as mezze, quick overnight meals for weekdays and/or busy home cooks, kebabs, one-pot and one-pan dishes, vegetables and breads, drinks and desserts and lastly, party essentials such as dips, sauces and so on.
The layout of the pages makes for easy reading and her writing style is attractive. I must admit to being somewhat surprised that there was no mention of an air fryer. This kitchen aid is rapidly becoming more popular and with good reason.
On the other hand, converting instructions for a dish meant to be prepared in a conventional oven to an air fryer isn’t rocket science: lower the temperature by 25⁰F (about 15⁰C) and decrease the cooking time by 20-30%.
Also, one needs to adjust for smaller batches – since air fryers’ baskets are much smaller than ovens, cooking will be accelerated, so it is necessary to check on the food more frequently.
Anyone interested in healthy dining and tasty food should have this book in the kitchen bookshelf.
