Food Photos: The Bane of My Existence

Why do I use photos that clearly aren't a photo of the dish I'm writing about? Because I hate having to take photos of my food! Sometimes, it's my dinner. If I need to style the dish, I'm eating a cold dinner. No thank you! Sometimes, my dinner isn't particularly photogenic. As a blog reader, I'm annoyed by articles that have endless photos of the food from every angle along with many photos of the production. Overkill, I say. I also have no patience for scrolling over a bunch of photos to get to the recipe I am looking for.

But, a photo is important for catching a reader's eye in the overwhelming noise that is the internet. That's why I include interesting photos of food that I have found in Wikipedia Commons in my posts, when I don't like/can't be bothered to snap a gauzy, perfectly lit photo of my dinner (oh, wait, I never do that). Live with it. I cook and I write about food which is my passion. Photography definitely isn't my passion. I leave that to people who are way better at it than I am!

Now, I discover that the photos blow up my list of most popular posts. Ugh! As I said, photos make me crazy. [It's a bug in the widget from Blogger so I hope the thumbnails will reappear at some point.]

The photo above is mine. It's not all that pretty but that cauliflower sure tastes good! It's seasoned with tahini, lemon juice, and Aleppo pepper. Aleppo red pepper is slightly spicy - not nearly as hot as crushed Italian red pepper - and has a lovely fruity flavor. I think it's far more useful in the kitchen than crushed red pepper because it's more subtle. Find some. You won't be sorry. It's great on eggs, hummus, chicken, and right here in this cauliflower recipe.

Roasted Cauliflower with Tahini and Lemon
(serves 4-6)

non-stick cooking spray
1 large head of cauliflower
salt
¼ cup tahini
juice of 1 lemon
¼ to 1 teaspoon Aleppo red pepper

Preheat oven to 400°F. Spray a large rimmed cookie sheet generously with non-stick cooking spray.

Trim off leaves and cut off the tough bottom of the stem on the head of cauliflower. Most of the stalk is edible so don't try to cut out all of it. It will cook up tender. Slice the cauliflower about ½" thick. The slices won't hold together; doesn't matter. Put the cauliflower, in a single layer, on the greased cookie sheet. Spray with cooking spray and sprinkle with salt. Roast the cauliflower in the hot oven for 30 minutes or until tender.

While the cauliflower is roasting, combine the tahini, lemon juice, and Aleppo pepper in a small bowl. Set aside.

When the cauliflower is done, remove from the oven and increase the heat to broil. Spread the tahini sauce evenly over the cauliflower. Return the cauliflower to the oven and broil until the sauce browns up. Serve hot.

Hummus

Dried chickpeas. Canned chickpeas are the express lane to hummus, however.

Hummus, that simple Middle Eastern pureé of chickpeas, tahini, and lemon juice has taken the country by storm. Hummus is the next salsa, available in supermarkets and convenience stores everywhere. You can even pick up a snack pack at the airport. In my recipe, a generous dose of olive oil helps to emulsify the ingredients so it's smooth and creamy. Adds some delicious flavor too. Some recipes use more tahini then this one. Tahini is roasted sesame seed paste. Think peanut butter made with sesame seeds. Unlike peanuts, sesame seeds have a bitter edge, so I go light on the tahini. If you add too much, the hummus is bitter and a little chalky.

You can make your own hummus easily if you have a food processor. Without it, it's not easy to get a smooth pureé. There are lots of commercial hummuses out there now. Some are good and some are weird and well, not so good. My favorite brand is Sabra. The original and the red pepper are our favorites. My daughter, who once upon a time described hummus as disgusting, is now a huge fan.

Hummus is a great way to get more beans into your diet. Chickpeas (also known as garbanzo beans) are one of my favorite beans. They are full of protein, fiber, and complex carbohydrates. They soak up flavors and are important is a wide variety of cuisines: Italian, Indian, Middle Eastern. In Italy, they are called ceci and they combine deliciously with pasta, like in this recipe for pasta with chickpeas, spinach, and sausage.

This recipe is super easy because I used canned chickpeas. If you have some time or a pressure cooker, you can cook them yourself. You'll need 1 ¾ - 2 cups cooked chickpeas. You can use the juice from ½ a lemon up to 1 lemon's worth. If you use a whole lemon, it will be fairly tart and lemony. A whole lemon yields about 3 Tablespoons of juice.

Hummus
(makes about 2 cups)

1 15 oz. can chickpeas, drained but with liquid reserved
juice of ½ - 1 lemon
5 cloves garlic, peeled and coarsely chopped
3 Tablespoons tahini
½ teaspoon black pepper
½ - 1 teaspoon salt
4 Tablespoons olive oil plus more for garnish

Add the chickpeas, ½ of the reserved liquid, lemon juice, garlic, and tahini. Process until the chickpeas are a thick pureé. If it's lumpy, add more of the can liquid until it starts to smooth out. Add ½ teaspoon salt, black pepper, and the olive oil. Process until it's smooth and creamy. Check for salt; add more if necessary. Gets better if allowed to mellow in the fridge for a few hours, though it's best eaten near room temperature. To serve, drizzle with more olive oil.

Fun with Eggplant

Eggplant was on sale this week. I wanted to make some baba ghanoush but I bought enough to make more than that. So, here are 2 recipes that use eggplant. In fact, they both start with eggplant broiled whole but after that, they go in totally different directions. There are no pictures of the dishes because neither of them looks all that interesting. But, they taste so good, each in their own way.

Baba ghanoush is a Middle Eastern eggplant dip enhanced with tahini and lemon juice. It retains the delicious smokiness that comes from getting the eggplant skin well-charred.

The other recipe is Indian, using a plethora of fragrant spices to transform the eggplant into something special. It's called Creamed Eggplant but the cream isn't that key to the dish. You could leave it out and it would still be awesome. The original recipe called for vegetable oil. I used butter instead and I do think it adds a depth of flavor. Use vegetable oil if you prefer. There is enough flavor here even if you use a neutral oil.

Both recipes came from Madhur Jaffrey's World of the East Vegetarian Cooking. I have added additional instructions on broiling the eggplants. She says to rinse them after peeling but I feel that is not necessary. Just be careful about removing all the skin because it would add a lot of bitterness, seeing as it's burned totally by the time it's done. It does take a while to cook the eggplant but it's worth it. The long broiling develops the smoky flavor that enhances both recipes.