GATHER TOGETHER
Chef connects over food
Succulent cubes of lamb and eggplant are spiced with cumin and served with peppers in this grilled dish from the border of the Black Sea in Turkey.
The recipe is one of more than 50 in Black Sea: Dispatches and Recipes Through Darkness and Light by Caroline Eden (Quadrille/Raincoast, $50).
Readers are escorted around the legendary Inland Sea, treated to anecdotes about its diverse food and literary history and made hungry by the well-written recipes collected by this veteran British travel and food writer.
Food and location photographs give immediacy to the story, which is as much an armchair read as a cookbook.
Edinburgh-based Eden concentrates on three coastal cities — Odessa, Istanbul and Trabzon — but the whole coastline and its cuisines are covered in an enticing style that makes the reader eager to travel there.
At Tokat, high above the Byzantine city of Trabzon, where Count Dracula was once imprisoned, a café offers trolley service for grilled lamb to enjoy with the anise-flavoured apéritif, raki.
TROLLEY KEBAB Serves: 4
▪ 1 lb (454 g) lamb leg, in 1 1/2-inch (4-cm) cubes
▪ Salt
▪ 2 small onions, grated
▪ 1 tsp (5 mL) cumin seeds, toasted, crushed, or 1 tsp (5 mL) ground cumin
▪ 1/4 cup (60 mL) vegetable oil
▪ 1 whole garlic bulb, roasted
▪ 1 tbsp (15 mL) olive oil
▪ 1 medium eggplant, cut in 1 1/2-inch (4 cm) pieces
▪ 1 green bell pepper in thick slices
▪ 2 large, ripe tomatoes, quartered
1. Preheat oven to 400 F (205 C). Trim papery covering from garlic bulb and cut a narrow slice off the top, leaving bulb and cloves intact.
2. Drizzle with 1 tbsp (15 mL) olive oil, wrap bulb in aluminum foil and bake for 30 minutes, until cloves are soft. Cool and squeeze out the soft flesh from each of the whole cloves.
3. Place meat in a large bowl, sprinkle with a little salt and stir in onion, cumin and vegetable oil.
4. Toss and let stand for two hours at room temperature or overnight refrigerated, bringing meat to room temperature before grilling.
5. Preheat grill to hot. Rub kebab skewers with a little oil (bamboo skewers must be soaked first in water). Thread lamb onto skewers, alternating with the vegetables. (Cut side of eggplant should face the meat.) Brush with the olive oil.
6. Grill kebabs under the hot grill for 15-20 minutes, turning occasionally. Remove from grill and let rest for 2-3 minutes.
7. To serve, slide food from skewers and serve with spicy peppers and bread, seasoning with the squeezed out garlic cloves.