Date Ka’ak biscuits

Here they are at last – the best ever biscuits. Date filled, sugar dusted, melt in the mouth goodness. There’s an art to making them, but if you’re willing to take the time to master the art, they are well worth the effort. Making these is all about the feel and technique – people who have been making them for years still don’t always get it 100%. If you try them and they don’t quite work, leave me a comment, and I’ll consult with the “master cooks”, Rosemary and Aunty Irene.

No more waiting, here it is.

2 1/2 packets of butter

1 kilo plain flour

2 heaped tsp baking powder

1/3 cup vegetable oil

1/2 tsp mahleb

icing sugar (to serve)

Wash the dates very well. Drain them, keeping them moist. Place them in a saucepan with the 2 tablespoons of butter. Simmer until the dates are soft. Remove from the heat, and allow to cool. Roll the date mixture into small cylinders, ready for putting into the biscuits.

Place the rest of the butter in a saucepan. Bring to the boil, and boil for a few minutes.

Preheat the oven to 150 degrees

In a large, heatproof mixing bowl, mix the flour, baking powder and mahleb. Add the butter slowly and mix in with a wooden spoon. Switch to mixing with your hand when almost all the butter has been added and the mixture has cooled enough. The dough should be moist, but still reasonably firm. When you roll some in a ball it should be shiny and smooth. When you spread the mixture in a disc onto your palm, it should hold it’s shape and not crack too much at edges.

Take some dough and roll a ball the size a walnut. Flatten that ball into a disc on the palm of your hand, about 5cm across. Place some of the date filling onto the dough disc, and then fold the dough over and around the filling. Shape the dough with the mixture in the middle into a cylinder. Place on a baking tray, and pinch across the surfac if you have a pincher. This is not essential, but it makes the biscuits look pretty and helps the icing sugar stick.

Place them in the middle of the oven. Get them out when they start to brown.

To serve, sift some icing sugar onto plate. Press each biscuit into the plate, so that a nice thick layer of icing sugar catches onto the base of each biscuit. Place the biscuits in a place, and then sift icing sugar over all of the biscuit until they are totally covered.

Mama’s Mahshi

Mahshi is a family favourite, because my mother’s Mahshi is a especially good. The word “mahshi” is Arabic for stuffed or filled. In this case it’s vegetable with a mince and rice stuffing. You can make it with capsicum, eggplant, marrow or potato, but the one I like best is tomato. Mahshi is one of those dishes which is also very good the next day, and it freezes really well, so make extra! When I was living in another city for Uni, Rosemary would keep some for me whenever she made it so that I could take it back with me.

Select firm, ripe tomotoes

1/2 kilo premium beef

1 1/4 cup short grain rice

4-5 cloves garlic, crushed

15 medium sized firm but ripe tomatoes

2 large spoons of oil

mixed herbs, salt and pepper

Step 1

Step 1.

Core out the vegetables you are going to use. Preheat the oven to 180 degrees. If you have a fan-forced oven, turn the fan on.

Step 2

Step 2.

Make the filling by combining the mince, rice, garlic, 1 spoon of oil and about half the tomato pulp. Season with salt, pepper and mixed herbs. The pulp makes the mixture soft, and is needed to cook the rice. If you don’t have any because you are using another vegetable, then use some tomato paste and water. Place the stuffing into the vegetables, but don’t push the stuffing in too hard.

Step 3

Step 3.

Put the remaining tomato pulp in the bottom of a pyrex, bessemer or similar heavy baking dish. Put the tomato pulp in the bottom of the basking dish, drizzle with 1 tablespoon of oil, salt and pepper. Place the tomatoes in the dish and cover with the lid or with foil.

Step 4

Step 4.

Bake in the for about 2 hours. By now the baking food should smell delicious, the kind of delicious that makes your family or guests hungry as soon as they come in the door! Remove the lid or foil, and bake it a little longer, until the top of the vegetables get some colour.

Rosemary

Rosemary in her kitchen

Rosemary is an inspirational home cook, and she’s also my mother.  Walk in the door of her home, and you see the kitchen straight in front of you.  You might be greeted by the delicious smells of a baking cake, or a roasting leg of lamb in the oven.

A busy mother with a highly successful career and strong commitment to community involvement, Rosemary’s kitchen techniques are quick and deliberate.  She can put together a family meal in under 20 minutes, but is also well known for her ability to put together a feast for large numbers of family and friends.  She loves to experiment with ingredients and methods, but some of her versions of traditional recipes are the best.

Her favourite foods to cook and eat are Middle Eastern and Mediterranean foods.  My ideas of a what a  joyful kitchen is come directly from living with Rosemary and her cooking at the centre of my life.