The fascinating world of Jewish food stretches across many cuisines. As well as joining an extended family for their Shabbat feast, we join a number of accomplished home cooks to learn the secrets of favourites including Jewish penicillin (chicken soup) with matzo balls, some slow-cooked beef dishes, and a classic orange and almond cake.
A journey through some of the regional specialties of North America takes us into the delicious family recipes from chefs and home cooks who whip up crab cakes, cornbread, Southern fried chicken served with grits, a great recipe for ribs and barbecue sauce, and a classic pecan pie.
A cuisine full of fresh flavours and clever use of spices. From the marvellous salad called fattoush (made under the Hills Hoist and with herbs just picked from the garden) to a delicious baked minced meat dish with burghul, pine nuts and spices; a wonderful ancient grain called freekeh, and a sensational pistachio baklava.
A journey into some of the flavours, dishes and ways of eating across the Horn and West Africa. Recipes include a traditional doro wat (a fabulous slow-cooked chicken dish with spices and chillies which starts with a mighty 5 kilos of onions being cooked in a huge pot with no oil or fat); Somalian corn in coconut milk; the one-pot wonder from Nigeria – joloff rice; some hints on eating with your hands; and the delights of the Ethiopian coffee ceremony.
This episode is jam-packed with beloved dishes that range from roast beef and Yorkshire pudding to good old fish and chips; rollmops to summer pudding; pork pies to pickles; and get loads of advice on everything from pub grub to the correct behaviour at an English afternoon tea.
Elaborate and ancient, delicious and lovingly spiced, we discover how to cook the prized rice dishes of celebration, fragrant with saffron and scattered with nuts and barberries. We also join a crowd for one of the most unusual breakfast dishes on earth, learn how to make slow cooked duck with green herbs, and spend time with one of the top kebab makers.
What fun we had meeting German expatriates and filming some of their treasured dishes – pork knuckle cooked with caraway seeds, a hearty comforting lentil soup, incredibly flavoursome marinated beef in red wine and spices, a quick clever cabbage recipe plus an absolutely showstopping wonder of a Black Forest cake – this will be the one you’ll beg to be made for your birthday!
In this episode we learn how to make true dukkah (the aromatic mix of spices, nuts and seeds) from two experts, discover how easy it is to make a feast from okra and lamb, and see the ancient and treasured national dish called molokhia come together. A belly dancing expert teaches us to make ful medames and we learn to make the Aussie version of Nile perch cooked in clay – barramundi cooked in a tagine (Egypt’s version of the Moroccan tajine). Look out for the easy recipe for the wicked sweet called basbousa.
From the tango dancing couple who show us how to create the perfect Argentinian asado to the empanada queen and her recipe; from Chilean all purpose salsa to simple Peruvian ceviche (lime marinated fresh fish), plus the secret to making luscious caramel, this is a beautiful colourful episode and a great start to the series.
