AFGHAN LAMB IN CHERRY SAUCE - QORMA E ALOO BALOO

Afghan Lamb in Cherry Sauce with rice and cauliflower

Your comments are welcome!

By Humaira                                                 

It's not every day when lamb meets cherries in a pot. In the case of today's recipe, Qorma e Aloo Baloo, the end result is a symphony of sweet and sour delight for your taste buds.

After 33 years of living in the United States, I still remember cherry season in Afghansitan, when my mom’s cousin would deliver boxes of cherries to our home. Jeja, my mom, would get busy making jams and cherry juice before the lot went bad. 

My younger brother and I would secretly stuff our faces with fresh cherries before we were found out and banished from the kitchen.

In memory of those days I have previously shared a Cherry, Garlic and Yogurt side dish, the wildly popular Bubbly Cocktail with Cherry Syrup and Humaira's Whirling Cherry Cocktail.

AfghanStreetVendorCherries

Afghan street vendor selling cherries 

My creations are not always welcomed by my children. They live in fear of the next recipe, and the “strange” dish that will be presented at dinner. I was convinced that the rich taste of slow cooked lamb and the sweet cherry sauce would not be popular. But, to my surprise, I got two thumbs up.  

Generally I find sweet and sour dishes overwhelming. so I served this with a side of braised cauliflower, Gulpea and Afghan white rice, Challaw which was just the right combination of sweet and savory. This dish will also go well with a side of fresh salad or yogurt.

My sister Nabila made this dish with beef over the holidays. Of course I tweaked what created and discovered the lamb works well too. I hope you like this dish and I welcome your thoughts in the comment section of this post.

Cherries

Qorma-e-Aloo Baloo

Lamb in Cherry Sauce

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 yellow onion diced

1 pound boneless lamb stew, cut in bite size pieces

1 tablespoon ground coriander

1 1/2 teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon black pepper

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

24.7 oz.  jar of dark Morello cherries in light syrup from Trader Joe’s

1 cup loosely packed cilantro leaves

Note: If you are not near a Trader Joe’s, you may use two cups of any type of canned or frozen sour cherries.  If you are not a fan of lamb, just substitute beef stew meat. It is equally delicious.

Add olive oil in a heavy bottomed pot with lid, place on medium high heat. Add diced onions to the pot and sauté for 3 minutes or, until the onions are translucent. Save 1/2 cup of cherry syrup from the jar and drain the cherries in a colander. 

Wash meat thoroughly; pat dry with a paper towel before adding to the pot.  Sprinkle the coriander on the meat, stir well and cook on medium high for five minutes or until the meat is browned.  Add the cherry juice, turn the heat down to low, cover with the lid and simmer for 45-50 minutes, stirring every ten minutes.

Just added cherries and cilantro to the pot

Once the sauce thickens add the cherries, cilantro, salt, black pepper and cayenne pepper. Stir well and simmer for 20 minutes without lid. 

Serve with challaw rice and a side of salad or yogurt.

Your comments are welcome!

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THE PEARL THAT BROKE IT'S SHELL - A BOOK

By Humaira

As a little girl in Kabul, I loved playing football (soccer), biking, and jumping off our home's ten foot high wall into a pile of snow. In the two countries where I spent most of my childhood, India and Afghanistan, boys had freedoms that girls could only dream about. Perhaps that is why I decided to take on a boyish persona. Without any labels or criticism, my Afghan parents accepted my eccentracities and accomodated my request for short hair and boyish clothes. 

HG & Baba

Baba and I, 1977 Kabul, Afghanistan

Now, my eldest daugther has the same tendencies. Perhaps the tomboy gene was passed on to her. While fellow moms in San Francisco congratulate me on how I handle this "situation", I delight in her obsession with building a skate board as opposed to shopping for makeup.

It was last year when I first learned about the popularity of a practice called "bacha posh", dresses like a boy. The director of Love In Afghanistan, asked me for cultural advice on the unique play she was directing for the Arena Theatre. The play is a love story, if you didn't already guess it, between an African American rap artist and an Afghan girl who is a bacha posh.  

Prior to this call I was familiar with the term but I thought it was something that came about during the time of Taliban, when women were imprisoned in their homes and needed a man to represent them in the outside world. 

It turns out that Dan Rather's popular documentry, "A Family Secret", brought families dressing their daugthers in boys' clothes is a widely practiced, ancient custom in Afghanistan. My family and I are  not convinced that the practic of bacha posh is "widely" practiced, as the documentry claims.

However, it's a subject that has caught the imagination of the Western Media. Since  2010, there has been shows, articles, interviews and now a book by Nadia Hashimi, THE PEARL THAT BROKE'S IT'S SHELL.

I am thrilled to see an Afghan write about this subject. Nadia's book delves into the world of Rahima, who becomes Rahim while guided by stories of her great aunt Shekiba, who was also a bacha posh.

The book helps the reader get into the story immediately. Within the first couple of chapters, the reader experiences the family's struggle and the mother's desperation, which forces her into the decision of turning her daughter into a boy.

Rahima, reluctant about the transformation to Rahim, quickly embraces his new life as he delves into freedoms bestowed on boys. He covets the higher status in his family and exemption from girl chores. He is the one who rights the wrong of the mother with a cursed womb which can only carry girls.

Rahim eventually has to face going back to being a girl, once he reaches puberty. He has to give up his freedom to freely go outside, save his sister's honor and help his desperate mother, when the prospect of marriage to settle a family debt enters his reality.

I hope this introduction whets your appetite, and inspires you to pick up this book for your summer reading.  When my family left Kabul in 1979, I left my boyish persona behind and re-invented myself as a girl when we reached the United States. Unfortunately not all women have the luxury to freely cross the gender divide as I did at age thirteen. 

NadiaHashimi

Nadia Hashimi was born and raised in New York and New Jersey. Both her parents were born in Afghanistan and left in the early 1970s, before the Soviet invasion. Her mother, granddaughter of a notable Afghan poet, went to Europe to obtain a Master’s degree in civil engineering and her father came to the United States, where he worked hard to fulfill his American dream and build a new, brighter life for his immediate and extended family. Nadia was fortunate to be surrounded by a large family of aunts, uncles and cousins, keeping the Afghan culture an important part of their daily lives. She and her husband are the beaming parents of two curious, rock star children and an African Grey parrot.

Humaira Ghilzai of Afghan Culture Unveiled speaks to Nadia Hashimi about her book, lessons learned and Nadia's challenges as a vegetarian Afghan.

Humaira: How did you get interested in the practice of bacha posh? 

Nadia: A few years back I read an article by Jenny Nordberg in the New York Times about the bacha posh practice.  I had heard of the practice but I started to think about what the tradition meant for girls of Afghanistan.  Most girls in Afghanistan do not experience life as a bacha posh but it is done.  What message does this send to the youth of the country?  How does a young woman cope with experiencing life as a boy and then again as a girl girl in a society with such a gender divide?  I came to appreciate that the bacha posh practice could be a compelling means of taking a closer look at the gender gap and its implications for Afghanistan's daughters.  

Humaira: What did you learn about yourself while researching and writing your book?

Nadia: Great question!  The biggest realization for me was that I am more outraged, than I thought, with the injustices suffered by women and girls in today's world.  I've always believed that women need to stand up for our rights because injustice reaches every corner of the planet. even a progressive country like the United States.  

The process of writing this story, however, channeled my energy.  I want others to be as outraged as I am at gender inequality in any form.  Sometimes it's subtle, like a salesperson sidestepping a woman to address her husband, the assumed "decision maker" in the family.  Sometimes it's blatant and brutal, like rapes dismissed with a shrug of the shoulders because "boys will be boys."  I've realized also that I need to be very conscious of how I raise my daughter and what I teach her.  

Though she is only three years old, I encourage her to stand up for herself around other children (including her four year old brother!) and that sometimes she will need to raise her voice.  It is equally important to me that I raise my son to respect a girl's personal space and opinion.  As parents, it's our responsibility to model this behavior in the home and deliver clear messages to our children if we want to see a change in the world around us.  

Humaira: I believe you've been there once with your parents. Is that right? What were your impressions of Afghanistan the first time you visited? 

Nadia: My trip to Afghanistan in 2002 was both heartwarming and heartbreaking.  I was so happy to meet cousins, uncles and aunts and to walk through the neighborhoods I'd gotten to know through my parents' stories.  I was thrilled to see school children lining up excitedly in the school yard at the start of the day and meet Afghan physicians staffing a new hospital for patients with tuberculosis.  

On the other hand, it was disheartening to see an overflowing maternity hospital with laboring women in hallways, courtyards and unsanitary beds.  My mother's family home had been reduced to rubble, recognizable only by a curved railing that once led to their backyard.  

Hope and despair coexisted on the same street, in the same home.  The country has suffered greatly with decades of violence and instability. On the other hand, Afghan youth were particularly anxious to get an education and nearly every young person I spoke with had admirable, professional aspirations.  My hope and belief is that optimism will trump despair and that the nation will recover.

Humaira: What are your favorite Afghan dishes?

Nadia: I am, as my husband says, a rare Afghan in that I am a vegetarian (though in the last couple of years I've started eating fish as well).  For those familiar with Afghan food,meat is a huge part of our cuisine but there are plenty of yummy vegetable dishes as well.  Just this past weekend, my sister-in-law cooked vegetarian mantoo (dumplings) as a special treat.  Both my sister-in-laws are intuitive and creative cooks and I'm lucky that I get to enjoy their talents!  For my favorite rice dish, I would have to go with mosh-palow, rice with mong beans,  It's so hearty on a winter day!

Humaira: Do you enjoy cooking?  Do you cook Afghan food?

Nadia: I don't cook every day so when I do cook, I really enjoy it.  I make Afghan food regularly but I also find it fun to try new dishes and ingredients outside my comfort zone. With warmer weather here, I get to do some of my most enjoyable kind of cooking - grilling!  Our household loves grilled eggplant and it's wonderfully easy (as long as you don't get distracted).  I also like to do chicken kebabs.  I marinate them in yogurt and spices for a few hours and they seem to be a favorite with the family.  In the winter, I bring out the slow cooker for dishes like vegetable stew or soups that warm the belly with lots of flavor.

Of course, there's nothing like making good old fashioned cupcakes with the kids.  They love helping me measure and mix the ingredients, a good introduction to practical skills. I try to stick with dishes that are fairly uncomplicated because I want to enjoy my time in the kitchen.  Food is so important to our health. It plays a major role in our social lives and it's a daily necessity.  The more ways we find to enjoy it, the better!  

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AFGHAN ICE CREAM SUNDAE - FALOODA

By Katie

Here in San Francisco we spend the better part of July and August in a blanket of fog, sweaters and close-toed shoes firmly in place, waiting for “our” summer to arrive.   This usually happens come September, just as the rest of the country is pulling out their woolens.  When temperatures moved north of 90 degrees here last week, there was only one thing to do:  eat ice cream. 

Humaira and I told the kids we’d be getting together after school one day to make sundaes.  They were over the moon.  But their visions of hot fudge and whipped cream came to a screeching halt when they learned we’d be making Afghan sundaes (falooda), with nary a maraschino cherry in sight.

I could relate.  When I first heard about falooda, I was similarly perplexed.   I couldn’t wrap my mind around the dessert’s combination of crushed ice, noodles and ice cream.   How could it be edible, much less tasty?  But a few spoonfuls into my first falooda  at Salang restaurant in Little Kabul and I was sold.   

Falooda is a South Asian specialty served during the warm months in Pakistan, India and Iran, and among others.  Each country lends its own twist on the dessert.  In Afghanistan, this means shaved ice is topped with rosewater- or cardamom-flavored handmade ice cream , rose water-flavored simple syrup, vermicelli noodles, plenty of Afghan cream (called qaymaq), and a generous measure of chopped pistachios.  Afghan ice cream is very rich, almost dense, and made in a unique way, which Humaira wrote about a while back.  You can read about it here.

As for our afterschool sundae fest, the kids seemed genuinely surprised by how good the falooda was.  That’s not to say they’d opt for an Afghan sundae over a banana split.  But the bowls were licked clean and nobody asked for the chocolate syrup.

Afghan Sundae

Falooda

2 ounces thin rice vermicelli or glass noodles

¼ cup simple syrup*

1 ¼ tsp. rosewater

3 cups ice

1 quart premium vanilla ice cream

¼ cup unsalted, chopped, toasted pistachios

Cook the noodles according to package directions and cool to room temperature.  You can do this by running cold water over the noodles.

In a small bowl, mix together the simple syrup and rosewater. 

Put the ice into the bowl of a food processor fitted with a metal blade and process until the ice is finely chopped.

Set out four serving bowls.   Put ½ cup chopped ice into each bowl.   Set 1/3 cup cooked noodles over the ice in each bowl.  Top the noodles with 2 scoops of vanilla ice cream.  Drizzle 2 teaspoons of the simple syrup over each bowl of ice cream.  Sprinkle 1 tablespoon of nuts over each sundae.  Serve immediately. 

*To make your own simple syrup combine 1 cup water and 1 cup granulated sugar in a small saucepan.  Bring to a bowl, stirring regularly, and boil for 5 minutes.  Set the syrup in the refrigerator to cool.  Refrigerate the leftover syrup in a jar with a fitted lid.  It will keep for a month and is useful as a sweetener for cold beverages such as iced tea and lemonade. 

Serves 4

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