DIY herbal teas
While ninety percent of the people on earth need coffee in the morning to wake up, I start my day with herbal tea. I am like a hurricane once I get out of bed. I usually make a large mug…
Egg-less shakshuka sandwich
I know, it’s oxymoron to call it shakshuka because shakshuka is always made with eggs but it does taste like shakshuka. We, Israelis, often eat our shakshuka with tahini so the combination of cooked tomatoes and tahini is what makes it…
Swiss Chard Mezze with harissa
Most of the Moroccan Jews I know, including my mother and siblings, would never ever make any Shabbat or holiday dishes on a weekday, and vice versa. My mother, for example, would never make matbucha, a spicy tomato jam, or…
Easy Smoky Harissa
Spicy Tomato Salad (Matbucha)
I can’t write a post about matbucha, Moroccan cooked tomato, garlic and pepper salad, without writing about Yeruham. The cooked salad and my hometown in the Negev, the desert of Israel, go together. The aroma of tomatoes simmered with garlic…
Beet Carpaccio
Yesterday was a fucking, terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. It’s started with a blood test (I hate blood tests, they make me insanely paranoid). It continued with a call to Cigna, our health insurance. I don’t know what is worse, the part that…
Curry Noodle Soup With Vegetables
Living in different parts of the world, you quickly realize that access to authentic Asian cuisine varies greatly. When we were in New York and Los Angeles, finding excellent Asian food was never a problem. But in Tel Aviv and…
Strawberry Jam
I never liked strawberry jam until I made my own strawberry jam and fell in love with it.
Quinoa, Beet & Hazelnut Salad
I’m handing the stage to my dear mother-in-law, who introduced me to this beautiful grain fourteen years ago. Thank you, Estee! I appreciate your help. I love every word you wrote. An on-going, exasperating controversy about Quinoa is how to say it. Most…
Vegan Date & Chocolate Truffles
No time for BS. Just a quick, sweet recipe that I found in a beautiful cookbook called Vegetarian Everyday, written by a sweet Scandinavian couple. Their blog is Green Kitchen Stories. This exactly the kind of recipe I love – a “peace of mind”…
How to make a good green salad
We eat salads on a daily basis (most Israelis do). Most days it’s a simple green salad, then some days more complex salads. There are many types of leafy greens and endless variations of leafy green salads. Leo and Alex’s…
No Machine Banana Ice Cream
A friend of mine from New York recently emailed me this recipe. She wrote: “Thought of you the other night. We made a delish dairy-free, sugar-free banana ‘ice cream’ with a bit of chopped salty almonds and maple syrup on…
5 nutritious Breakfast
I know that Honey Nut Cheerios is easier but do you really want your kids or yourself to start the day with unnatural, full of sugar breakfast? With these light, nutritious breakfasts, you’ll definitely have a good, healthy day. They require very little effort and some willingness.
Yogurt, Apple and Walnut Bowl
YAW is my husband’s accidental invention. He made it one morning while I was pregnant with Leo, ten years ago, and, since then, this apple Tzatziki has become a morning ritual in our house. It’s basically a bowl of plain…
One-pan Middle Eastern breakfast
My cousin Diane is married to Avi, a Jerusalemite who’s well known in our family as the meat expert. He is a great cook. Last month, we were in Israel for a month, and when we stayed with them for…
Collard Greens With Paprika Oil
It’s much easier to stick a tray of chicken and potatoes into the oven or throw a bunch of vegetables and beans into pot than to prepare a bunch of mezzes. But a table covered with small and colorful plates…
Lunchbox salad Kids Love
Here is the most demanded salad among the children in my family, Saba Zion’s Salad. “Saba” means grandfather in Hebrew. My father is a humble cook but can make shoe laces delicious with his seasoning skills. He made us and his…
Fennel, Radish and Nectarine Salad
I can’t bring myself to cook with fire. It’s boiling outside and inside (we don’t have AC, most of the time the weather here in SoCal is perfect). Our meals these days are mainly raw salads with lots of crunchy…
Authentic Hummus
I always forget how much I love hummus and how easy it is to make until I make it. Here in Los Angeles, unlike in Israel, there are not a lot of hummusiyot, restaurants that sell only hummus. In Tel…
Easy & Quick Kale Shakshuka
Kale is very nutritious but I won’t use the word superfood because I’m allergic to it. As much as it is healthy I wouldn’t have eaten it if I didn’t like it’s earthy flavor. Me and the millions of aphids…