Posts by Laurie Constantino - Laurie Constantino - Page 14

All About Za’atar with Recipe for Za’atar Herb Blend and 5 Recipes for Using Za’atar

Za'atar Bread and Labneh

If za’atar is within reach, anyone can make delicious food at the drop of a hat. The possibilities are endless: Za’atar Olives, Za’atar and Labneh, Za’atar Tomato Sauce with Grilled Meat, Za’atar Bread, and Za’atar Pizza are only a few ways to use this versatile ingredient. I almost have my ...

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Seafood Specialties from Famed Athens Restaurant

The sun is setting over ice-rimmed Turnagain Arm, the inlet I see out my Anchorage window. The snow sparkles in the setting sun’s reflection.

My body is here, but my mind is in Greece. I’m wading the shallows of a Northern Aegean island, a plastic basin of sea urchins floating beside ...

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Beans: A History

Beans: A History by Ken Albala (Berg 2007) may be the most interesting single-subject volume of food history I’ve seen; it reads as easily as a novel. Beans are Albala’s plucky hero, ever striving to overcome the cultural elite’s prejudice against what it deemed low-class trash food.

From ...

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Artichoke Pastitsio with Basil Béchamel (Παστίτσιο με Αγκινάρες και Κρέμα Βασιλικό)

Artichoke Pastitsio

Is it possible to make vegetarian Pastitsio with more zest than its traditional namesake? The answer is an emphatic yes. Artichoke Pastitsio with Basil Béchamel is so alive with flavor it will make your tastebuds stand up and sing the Greek national anthem.

Pastitsio is a traditional Greek dish. As with ...

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Edamame Pesto Spread (Ενταμάμε Πέστο Σαλάτα)

Edamame Pesto and Cheese Sandwiches

I always keep a bag of shelled edamame beans in the freezer. They’re colorful, taste great, and very versatile.

Edamames are green soybeans, harvested while the pod is still soft and bright green. In Japanese, “eda” means branches and “mame” means beans; thus, edamames grow in clusters on the soybean plant’s ...

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The Language of Baklava by Diana Abu-Jaber with Recipe for Jordanian Kofta and Yogurt Sauce (Ιορδανικό Γιαουρτλού Kεμπάπ)

The Language of Baklava

Diana Abu-Jaber grew up in the environs of Syracuse, New York during the 1960s and 1970s. She shares the dominant cultural references of all Americans her age. Her mother and influential maternal grandmother are Americans, their distant heritage “Irish, German, maybe Swiss?” Abu-Jaber’s father is from Jordan; his heritage Bedouin and ...

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