In the past few years, my family has had a tradition of Meatless Mondays. We try not to eat meat more than a couple of times a week, but on Mondays we eat only vegetarian dishes, meaning no meat, chicken or fish. Since I do not eat carbs either, Meatless Monday is a bit of a challenge.
"Can my friends come over for dinner?” I got a text message from my younger son. “Sure” I answered. Fortunately, most of my son’s friends like to eat at our home and enjoy some unfamiliar flavors. This time I contemplated what I should prepare. A few years ago we adopted the tradition of meatless Monday, and since then, Monday became a day of food experiments.
In my childhood home we ate couscous only in one way. Hand made and steamed over a pot of soup. It was almost impossible to enter our small kitchen when mom would make couscous. In one bowl there was the semolina that mom would wet slowly while stirring so that no clumps would form.
“Is there nothing else to eat?” I asked opening the pot on the stove. “No” said mom, “sit down and I’ll fix you a plate.” “No,I don’t like it, I’ll make something.” “What will you make?” Mom insisted, “salad” I answered opening the refrigerator. “But salad is not a meal”.
The first time I tasted quiche was in the first apartment I ever rented in Tel Aviv. We were 3 roommates in our early 20’s. To this day, I can’t explain why we chose a 30 something woman that just came back after living quite some time in Canada to take the place of the roommate that left. Back then, mid 30’s seemed to us as one leg in the coffin.
One of the things I like most is finding new recipes or revising old recipes. When we host or are being hosted, these are the times when the joy of creation rests upon me and I turn the guests into guinea pigs for dishes I have never made before. One of the times last year that that we were invited to friends, I asked what we should bring, the answer was a salad. “What do you think about black lentil yam salad?” I asked my better half. “Yam?” she looked at me playfully, “isn’t that one of the vegetables that you don’t eat?”