Hummus

Here's a quick recipe that I started making recently, proven to be just delicious.

Ingredients:

• 1lb canned chickpeas
• 1/2 cup Tahini paste
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cumin powder
• 1/4 cup EVOO (extra virgin olive oil)
• 1/4 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
• 3 minced garlic cloves

Drain and wash chickpeas in cold water, then add all ingredients to food processor (blender will not work for this), mix on medium high speed for few minutes. I recommend to have the chickpeas in fridge overnight prior to making this recipe as to not overheat the mix while processing in food processor. Otherwise, you can add few ice cubes while mixing it to keep temps down. You can also add a little amount to cold water. It will make it smooth but add in small amounts to avoid your hummus to become to watery (I made this mistake, by the way, the first time I make it).

Good thing about making your own it that you can add more garlic or other spices that you like, make it to your taste.

Server with EVOO and sprinkles of Summac for a typical Middle Eastern cuisine.

Ocean puddle stew

Rich stew with a variety of sea food ingredients.

Ingredients (serves two):

• 1lb sea food mix. Fresh or ready to cook, as seen below.

This one in particular tastes very fresh and has a good variety of ingredients, octopus, squid, cuttlefish, clams, shrimps.

• 1 tsp minced garlic.
• 2 TBS oil.
• 1/2 chopped onion.
• 1 TBS chopped parsley.
• 1 TBS copped cilantro.
• 1 TBS chopped green onions.
• 1/2 cup chopped green peppers.
• 1 cup chopped variety of red, yellow, orange peppers.
• 1/2 cup chopped carrots.
• 1 tsp Chipotle pepper sauce. Or more if you like to kick up heat a bit.
• salt to taste.
• juice from 1/2 lime.
• 1 tsp soy sauce.
• 1 tsp fish sauce.
• 4+ cups water.

Steps:

1. Whether fresh or previously frozen, squeeze juice form 1/2 lime and mix with seafood.
2. Add oil to pot, onions, cook until soft. Add garlic, cook on medium-low heat for a minute
3. Add the seafood ingredients, bring heat to high and fry for 1 min, mix often
4. Add water and rest of ingredients, simmer for 30 min. Test bite a piece of squid or octopus to check, if too hard, simmer for another 10 min.
5. Complete with water if needed, salt to taste.