Category: Cooking

In the latest entry from Immigrant Kitchens, Lindsay Sterling learns how to make Russian Beef Tongue from Yulia Converse and Alla Zagoruyko (read the story, get the recipe and see the photos).

Most animal parts come so deconstructed from the whole that I don’t think of animals at all when I’m cooking. Steak tips are steak tips. Hamburgers are hamburgers. This is perhaps how I’ve lived as a meat eater, in a kind of denial: I’m not eating animals, I’m eating meat. But recently I came face to face with an animal part that threatened my usual delusion. At a recent family reunion, my brother-in-law, Tom, gave me a gift from Vermont: the tongue of his young grass-fed, organic heifer.

In the latest entry from Immigrant Kitchens, Lindsay Sterling learns how to make Indian Toor Dal from Shweta Galway (read the story, get the recipe).

I’d tasted dals from time to time in Indian restaurants and liked them, but never had the occasion to cook one. I guess I was intimidated. What were dals even made of? And how many kinds were there? It seemed like dozens,maybe even a hundred. I asked my Indian friend, Shweta Galway, if she’d show me how to make one. She said yes, although she had a funny reaction, like I asked her to show me how to make a glass of milk.

In the latest entry from Immigrant Kitchens, Lindsay Sterling learns how to make jalfrezi from Savita Nooreen (read the story, get the recipe and see the photos).

As we cooked, we talked. “Someone on the school bus asked me if we have houses or we live in caves,” she said in disbelief. “It [Pakistan] is the same as here,” she asserted. “It is a developing country,” she clarified, “Fifty to sixty years ago there was no connection with the rest of the world. The northern part had no schools. But now it’s just like Freeport [Maine]. We have schools, colleges, universities…”

In the latest entry from Immigrant Kitchens, Lindsay Sterling learns how to make Russian Beef Buns from Alla Zagoruyko (read the story, get the recipe and see the photos).

In the latest entry from Immigrant Kitchens, Lindsay Sterling learns how to make Sudanese Gheema from Ekhlas Ahmed (read the story, get the recipe and see the photos).

In the latest entry from Immigrant Kitchens, Lindsay Sterling learns how to make Syrian Kibbeh from Asraa Ghazal (read the story, get the recipe and see the photos).

An Iraqi mother who lives with her husband and three kids in a Portland recently taught me how to make a Syrian food called kibbeh. Kibbeh are made of bulgur wheat, onions, spices, and ground beef or lamb, formed into the shape of lemons and deep-fried. Asraa, my teacher, learned how to make them from a Syrian friend when she was living in Syria after she fled Iraq.

The Blueberry Files has published her annual Thanksgiving turkey buying guide with pricing and additional details on the turkeys available from: Hannaford, Shaws, Whole Foods, Rosemont, Trader Joe’s, Frith Farm, Wolfe’s Neck, Sam’s Club, Valley View Farm and Spring Brook Farm.

It’s once again time to talk turkey! Options abound for frozen and fresh turkeys in the greater Portland area. I want to help you make the right decision in purchasing a bird for your holiday meal – whether you’d rather have the cheapest, biggest bird available, the tastiest breed, or the most local. So here’s 15 options for turkeys in Portland

For additional reporting see also the turkey article in yesterday’s Press Herald.

In the latest entry from Immigrant Kitchens, Lindsay Sterling learns how to make Mexican Tamales from Jenny Sanchez (read the story, get the recipe and see the photos).