Ruth Fox - Tahini and Turmeric: 101 Middle Eastern Classics--Made Irresistibly Vegan

Creamy tahini and fragrant turmeric are just two of the enticing flavors we grew up tasting in our Jewish-Lebanese home in Barcelona. But there was so much more; whenever we think of home, the tastes of tart-sweet pomegranates, earthy zaatar, and floral orange blossom water also come to mind. In Tahini and Turmeric, were delighted to share our interpretations of the classic Middle Eastern dishes we grew up with. Bold, aromatic, and all vegan, these recipes are your ticket to experience Middle Eastern flavors. If youre new to vegan cooking, these recipes will tempt you with fresh, bright ingredients and new flavors. If youre new to making Middle Eastern food at home, be ready to explore beyond the staples of baba ghanoush and baklava. Best of all, many of these dishes are meant to be served on busy weeknights and during casual gatherings with friends. We love sharing good food and good stories around the tablethese are the meals we feed our own family and friends, and have also shared on our blog, mayihavethatrecipe.com. Before we get to the basics, wed like to introduce ourselves:

When I first moved to the United States from Barcelona around twenty years ago, I could barely cook an egg. While I was growing up, my job in the kitchen was only to help our mother clean up. Mami is a speedy cook, so she didnt have time to waste teaching me the ins and outs of her recipes! She would wake at nine a.m., enjoy a cup of coffee, and finish preparing an entire holiday meal by noon.

One amazing fact about Mami is that, besides being a great cook, she is a vegetarian, but cooks the tastiest meat dishes ever, always seasoned to perfection, without tasting one little bit (I can practically see Chef Ramsay rolling his eyes right now). She has a magic touch, I guess.

As far as I can remember, Mami has been a vegetarian. Our father, Papi, is a big meat and fish eater, but his hobby for decades has been tending our amazing fruit and vegetable garden right outside Barcelona. Ive discovered that nothing elevates a dish like freshly picked produce. Stuck in my memory is a ratatouille made with fresh tomatoes, zucchini, eggplants, and peppers, bursting with so much flavor that all we needed to make it a full dinner was a hunk of crusty bread to soak up the juices. Going to the garden with Papi to pick all that juicy, flavorful produce was an even better experience. I loved going to the fig trees and picking as many ripe fruits as possible, so Mami could make dozens of jars of spiced caramelized figs.

After moving to the United States to be with my husband, I spent countless hours on the phone asking Mami for recipes, writing them down, and testing them. Her instructions were never specific: just add a little bit of this and a little bit of that; if you see it needs more water, just add some; feel the dough and see if its the right consistency as if I was supposed to know! But surprisingly, I never asked for measurements. I was so used to seeing Mami cook without ever using a recipe that I thought everyone did it like that. (I guess all that time cleaning up was instructional after all!)

I must have had good cooking genes, because soon after, I began developing my own recipes, using the flavors and spices Mami used at home and combining them with the produce and products available here in the United States. My husband pretty much knew I had inherited those good genes, and Im pretty sure it was one of the reasons he proposed! To this day, he talks about the five-course vegan meal Mami improvised the first time he came to our house in Barcelona for dinner.

My husband is in constant evolution: he was a vegan when I first met him; then, he became vegetarian; then he started adding meat to his diet. Right now, he eats mostly vegan and vegetarian meals with meat or fish occasionally. His diet keeps me on my toes to see how I can adapt a dish and still make it flavorful. The recipes in this book reflect my cooking evolution to bold, aromatic dishes, where vegetables are front and center, and no one misses the meat.

The very first thing I ever made in the kitchen was a red pepper vinaigrette with chopped onion and garlic. It was a Sunday afternoon, at our apartment in Barcelona, and I was bored to death. So I went into the kitchen, hoping to kill some time.