Mezes are a healthy Middle Eastern snack

Middle Eastern menus are riotous in flavour and can be as varied as the company you share them with

Mezes, the Persian for “tasty snacks,” have in fact evolved into much more than mere snack food. Hot or cold, spicy or sweet, mezes are collectively eaten as a meal.

Each country bordering on the Mediterranean Sea has a tradition of small plates to be shared. Spain has tapas, Italy antipasti and Turkey and the Middle East have mezes. Unlike tapas, mezes is not meant to be solely an appetizer, but rather as a “come-on to taste,”says Mid-Eastern cookbook author Paula Wolfert, so people can get together to discuss their day over, what else, good food. The most common mezes are salads and dips made with local ingredients, such as eggplants (see recipe next page), tomatoes, tahini (ground sesame) and thickened yogurt. But the range of dishes can be incredibly extensive, including fried, pickled or grilled meats or fish, as well as other seasonal vegetables.

Some restaurants have a long list of mezes on their menu, with more than 30 different dishes. Typically four or five will arrive at the table and as long as you are interested, more will keep coming!

Enjoying a meal of mezes often means grabbing some hot pitas and scooping up the contents of the shared dishes. In Turkey, a glass of Raki is served with mezes, whereas in Greece you can pair them with a glass of local Retsina wine or ouzo.

To make your own mezes meal, try the following recipes. Group them up with some prepared dips such as hummus and baba ganoush, warm up some pitas and enjoy.

Muhammara (aka Roasted Red Pepper & Walnut Dip)

This delicious Syrian dip is the glamorous cousin of hummus and is equally at home as a dip for pita bread or as a sauce for meat or fish. Pomegranate molasses is available wherever you can find an array of Middle Eastern ingredients, and makes a delicious dark, sweet/tart accent to this dip. (You can substitute lemon juice if you prefer.)

2 red bell peppers, quartered and seeded
1 cup walnut halves
2/3 cup fresh bread crumbs
1½ tsp chopped garlic
½ tsp ground cumin, preferably freshly ground
1/4 tsp cayenne
2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 tsp pomegranate molasses (or lemon juice)
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste

1. Preheat a barbecue or broiler on high heat. Grill or broil peppers with skin side closest to the heat source for 8 to 10 minutes or until skin is black and blistered. Transfer peppers to a bowl and cover with plastic wrap. Let stand until cool enough to handle, then peel off skin. Reserve.
2. Preheat oven to 350° F. Place walnuts on a baking sheet and bake for 10 minutes or until lightly browned and fragrant. Cool.
3. Combine walnuts, bread crumbs, garlic, cumin and cayenne in the bowl of a food processor, and process until walnuts are finely ground. Add reserved peppers, olive oil and pomegranate molasses, and process until uniform. Season with salt and pepper. Serve at room temperature.

Makes about 1½ cups

Smokey Eggplant Salad

Pan roasting eggplant on the stove gives this salad its delightful smokey flavour, but you need to use a heavy-duty skillet, ideally one made of cast iron, for full effect. If you don’t have one available, you can roast the eggplant on high heat on a barbecue, or even in your oven—aiming for a blackened skin wherever possible.

1 eggplant (about 1½ lbs.)
2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 cup chopped onion
1 tsp finely chopped garlic
1/4 tsp chili flakes
½ tsp ground cumin, preferably freshly ground
1½ granulated sugar
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
1 tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp coarsely chopped parsley

1. Heat a large heavy-duty skillet on medium heat. Add eggplant and roast, turning frequently for 30 to 35 minutes or until skin is hard and blackened and eggplant is completely collapsed and tender. Cool slightly, remove stem and skin, and coarsely chop eggplant, discarding any liquid that accumulates. Reserve.
2. Heat oil in another skillet on medium heat. Add onion, season lightly with salt, and  sauté for 10 minutes or until onions are nicely browned and soft. Add garlic, chili flakes and cumin and sauté for 1 minute longer. Add reserved eggplant and stir until flavours are combined. Season eggplant with sugar, salt, pepper and lemon juice, and stir in parsley. Serve eggplant salad at room temperature with warm pita bread.

Makes about 1 cup

Fresh Pickled Vegetables

Lightly pickled vegetables are often part of the mezes table, and they are very simple to make at home. We like to make these pickled with an assortment of harder vegetables, such as carrots and cauliflower florets, adding in a few string beans for colour, but you can use whichever vegetables you desire.

1½ cups apple cider vinegar
1 cup water
½ cup granulated sugar
2 tbsp kosher salt
1 tsp coriander seed, cracked
1 tsp fennel seed, cracked
1 tsp black peppercorns, cracked
1/4 -½ tsp chili flakes
2 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
1 lb vegetables, cut into bite-sized pieces (such as carrots, cauliflower, green or yellow beans)

1. Combine vinegar, water, sugar, salt, coriander seed, fennel seed, peppercorns, chili flakes (the larger quantity if you like it spicy) and garlic in a large pot over high heat. Bring to a boil and boil for 1 minute. For harder vegetables, add to pot and boil for 1 minute longer or until slightly softened but not tender. Remove from heat and transfer mixture to a bowl. Add green beans or any other softer vegetables you desire. Cover and let sit at room temperature for 24 hours. Transfer to the refrigerator.

Give our recipe a try and tell us what you think—“two forks up” or “two forks down!” Send comments to food@outpostmagazine. And if, during your travels, you sample a delicious dish and are able to snag the recipe, send it to us at the same email, and we’ll consider it for publication.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 30th, 2010 at 12:01 pm and is filed under Gourmet. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a comment, or trackback from your own site. Add to del.icio.us.