My kids have “seasons”.  For a long period string beans were the best side dish I could give them.  Than the passed to ignoring any string beans dish.  Today, it’s something in the middle:  Sometimes they will eat, sometimes they won’t.

Anyway, the recipe I want to write here bellow is a good and easy one.  Even if your kids will not taste it, it is still worthwhile cooking:  As I said, it is easy, and tasty for you, if not for the rest of the family.  So here it goes:

Ingredients:

1 Kg string beans

1 Kg diced beef or mutton meat

2 grated red tomatoes

6 pealed and sliced garlic cloves

black pepper

1/2 teaspoon baharat spice

1/4 teaspoon cinamon

1/4 teaspoon turmeric spice

1 teaspoon sweet paprika

Directions:

• Dice the meat and simmer it in a wide pot toghether with the tomatoes and garlic.
• Add all spices and cook the meat for an hour on small fire, till the meat is soft.  Add water if needed.
• Add clean string beans – cut them into halves so that they are not too long.  Some people cut them also along their length so that you get short half string beans – I am too lazy for that.  I just buy frozen cut string beans.
• Cook for another hour on small fire till the sauce thickens.

That’s it!

Meatballs with Spaghetti

Today I want to write here a recipe for meatballs with tomatoes sauce.  This is always a hit with younger children, and is loved also by older children and adults.  It can  be served alone, or together with spaghetti.

Ingredients:

For Meatballs:

500 gr. ground meat (can be beef, turkey, chicken or a mixture of the above) – that is 1.1 lbs

1 grated onion

1 egg

1 tablespoon flour

chicken soup powder

sweet paprika

a pinch of black pepper

For Sauce:

1 chopped onion

200 gr. tomatoe paste (that is 7 oz of tomatoe paste)

2 cups of boiling water

sweet paprika

chicken soup powder

2 teaspoons sugar

Directions:

• Fry the chopped onion in a big pan.
• Add the other sauce ingredients and mix well.
• Mix in a bowl all meatballs ingredients.  When the sauce is very hot create balls and add to sauch.  Cook till the meat is soft.

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There are also 2 days of fast (and fasting in Jewish tradition mean *real* fasting: no eating or drinking for the period of the fast):  One, Tzom Gedaliah, is a minor fast we had last Monday.  The second, a major fast, is Yom Kippur – the Day of Atonement, which will start this evening till tomorrow evening.

These fasts in now way cover up for all the calories we gain during all the holidays.  For today, the day before Yom Kippur, it is even considered a mitzva (a good deed) to eat.

Anyway, I wanted to share today the way I roasted chicken for this last weekend, a very simple recipe that came out delicious:

One thing that you may have discovered already is that in order to not get the chicken pieces dried up when roasted in the oven, it is best to first have them boiled in water (but not for too long, so they will not get too mushy), and then fry them with a little oil.  This way the inside of the chicken remains soft even after roasting.

I usually also throw in a few potatoes with the chicken casserole.  To be sure these potatoes will cooked enough I boil them too for about 10 minutes before they go into the oven.

After boiling everything I put it all in a casserole (you can add also a few other vegetables, as carrots and squash), added some oil, red wine, garlic chips, black pepper, salt, a few drops of lemon juice and chicken barbecue seasoning. I put it in the oven for an hour, and voila! – a wonderful meal for almost no work at all.

Anyway, today I wanted to post an easy and yummy recipe I got some time ago for Kurdish Kiftah, which are actually just meat balls, but more spicey, without any tomatoe sauce, but kids love them nontheless.  It’s also good for babies who do not yet eat eggs.  So here it goes:

Kurdish Kiftah

Ingredients for meat balls:

1/2 Kg ground meat

1/2 Kg ground goose breast

(I am usually lazy and take 1 Kg of ground beef meat or ground turkey instead of both, it still comes out good enough)

1 1/2 cups rice

salt

black pepper

Spices:

1 tablespoon chicken soup powder

1 tablespoon turmeric

salt

black pepper

Directions:

Mix all meat ball ingredients and make tennis-ball sized balls.  Put them in fridge for a few hours (otherwise they will fall apart during cooking).

Boil water and add the spices.  Put the meat balls in boiling water and cook for at least one hour on low fire.

That’s it!   I told you it was easy!

Last night I took the dog out, and Hizki volunteerd to cook dinner.  He has cooked a few times for himself and his friends, but this was the first time he actually volunteered to make something for the family. I was so proud of him!

Hizki wanted to fry hot dogs and potatoe chips for his siblings.  When I came back with the dog, he was still cutting the potatoes.  So I helped him with that, though I must admit I did not keep up with his standards of how the cut chips should look like:  I cut them too thick for him, and didn’t always cut off the edges.

Anyway, everything was finally done, and everyone was happy.  But then Hizki decided to add also some grilled lamb ribs to the meal.  We had 2 packages in our freezer, so we just soaked 4 ribs in barbecue  sauce and grilled over our new grill pan.  Well, that was a great meal!

It would have been better to soak the ribs for at least half an hour (even better is to soak them for over 2 hours, or overnight), but as you know, you don’t always plan ahead your meals so well.  At least I am not that planned-ahead type of person.

Anyway, here are a few marinades we might have used, and I certainly do plan to try them soon with our new grill pan:

1. Citrus Marinade:  Mix some orange or grapefruit juice with white wine and rosemary.
2. Herbs Mrinade:  Process together some parsley, basil, mint, garlic, hot pepper and pickled lemon with olive oil.
3. Red Wine:  Mix some red wine with ginger, split English pepper, garlic, and rosemary or thyme herbs.
4. Spices with oil:  Mix curry or cumin with black pepper, cloves and oil (I use canola oil).
5. Sweet Marinade:  Mix honey, white wine, salvia, and white pepper.
6. Capers Marinade:  Capers, olive oil, pickled lemon and a little mint.