Date night..

..married style.

I remember way, way back before Nadim and I had any kids, before we were married, back when dates used to be romantic.

Dates like

..eating at the Cottage in Laguna Beach and kissing on the cliffs

..kayaking around Newport Bay

..a road trip to Las Vegas

Now our dates consist of shopping at REI then Lowes.

When confronted about our trend in date nights, Nadim responded,

"Well, their functional dates."

Functional dates?  What??

This is something only a man would say - functional dates.

Please.

At least I got to eat dinner at Zankou chicken.  I wrote a blog about Sarkis Pastry that mentioned Zankou Chicken here if you want to check it out.

Zankou in all its glory

So Zankou is in Anaheim in a heavily Middle Eastern area, so if you want to pick up a hooka or supplies to make Lebanese coffee, you are good to go :)

Order at the counter and wait for your number to be called

 Sometimes it is tricky to get a table in Zankou, once a whole soccer team came in at once. 

Here come the chicken plates

Part of the charm of Zankou is the wide range of people that come in to eat.  It's like the United Nations in there.  I don't know, but I think getting enemies to sit down at a table and eat some delicious Zankou, might solve a lot of the world's problems.

All this goodness is right underneath the Arabic bread

So on the chicken plate you get - roasted chicken, hummos, pickled turnips (the pink sticks), tomatoes, peppers, arabic bread and the garlic paste.  The garlic paste is UNBELIEVABLY good.
 

This is how you do it - Lebanese style :)

If you want to eat Zankou like a regular this is how you do it..

Rip off a piece of arabic bread (also known in America as pita bread), open it up and put in a pickle, some chicken and glob garlic paste all over the top.

Eat and repeat.

Zankou chicken almost makes up for my functional date night, almost but not quite.

I think next date night, I'll be in charge :)

Happy Sunday!

Staycation..

..to the Middle East.

My husband is from Lebanon and according to him, nobody does sweets like the Lebanese.  But when you aren't able to go to Beirut and enjoy Al Bohsali, the next best thing is Sarkis Pastry in Anaheim.

Sarkis has all the traditional Arab pastries and many French as well.  Why French too?  Well in case you forgot your world history, Lebanon was a French colony, hence the awesome French pastries.

In we go :)

Decisions, decisions

Arab sweets, in Lebanon known as B'alawa

In Lebanon, Arab sweets are known as B'alawa.  We know them here as Baklava, the western pronunciation.  The important thing to remember is that Arab B'alawa is not the same thing as Greek Baklava.

Greek Baklava is made with honey and walnuts, I am personally not a fan of Baklava.

Lebanese B'alawa on the other hand is made with a simple syrup (sugar and water, boiled and thickened) and pistachios or pine nuts - can you say delicious?!

"Znoud el sit" - cream filled pastry, one of my favorites

"Kol wa shkor" meaning - Eat and say thank you

French section filled with cakes and tarts

  The kids ended up with some great French pastries.  Son 2 is not a fan of chocolate, can you guess which pastry he chose?

Pastries for the kids

I chose Bourma and Kol Wa Shkor.  Bourma is filled with pistachios wrapped in shredded dough and the Kol Wa Shkor have very thin sheets of filo wrapped around pine nut filling.

Bourma and Kol Wa Shkor - my favorites

Best of all, though is the Knafa which is traditionally served for breakfast.  Knafa is made with a cheese bottom and a semolina topping.  Sounds weird, but tastes delish.  You serve it by warming it up in the microwave and then pouring simple syrup over the top.

Knafa - breakfast of champions!

Interested in more than dessert on your staycation?

Hit Zankou Chicken for dinner first, luckily it is right next door to Sarkis.  Zankou is run by some Lebanese-Armenians and they have awesome chicken and to die for garlic paste.

The best ever garlic paste.  As in top secret recipe garlic paste.

You might want to buy some extra garlic paste while you are there, seriously, its that good :)

Enjoy!

What's for dinner?

Chicken and Dumplings that's what!  Son 2 usually requests chicken and dumplings when it is his week to select a family dinner.  My recipe was my Mom's, and it was one of my favorites as a child.  It couldn't be simpler to make:

Chicken and Dumplings... it's whats for dinner!

Chicken and Dumplings

STEW
3 stalks celery, medium dice (if you want to fish the celery out at the end just cut the stalks in half instead)
bunch of carrots, peel and medium dice (if you want to fish out the carrots also cut in half instead)
4-6 chicken boneless, skinless breasts (I used 4), cut into 3 pieces each
48 ozs of chicken broth
pepper

DUMPLINGS
3 cups Bisquick
1 cup milk

Ready to simmer

Throw all the stew ingredients into a dutch oven and simmer for 1 1/2 hours or until chicken is very tender.  Adjust seasoning, be careful with salt depending on your chicken broth.

first 10 minutes of dumplings cooking

Make dumplings by mixing the Bisquick with the milk, dough will be sticky.  Drop by spoonfuls onto boiling stew (try and set the dumplings on a piece of chicken to hold it up).  Reduce heat; cook uncovered 10 minutes.  Cover and cook an additional 10 minutes.  *This makes enough for two decent size dumplings per person.  If you want more or less dumplings just add or deduct 1 cup of flour and 1/3 cup of milk.

dinner ready to be served

Enjoy!

Dancing Chicken...

or what other people call Roast Chicken.  Son 1 came up with the name Dancing Chicken and it stuck.  I guess because it is a whole chicken and somehow the drum sticks and wings look like arms and legs.  Anyhoo, my recipe started out as Barefoot Contessa's Roast Chicken Recipe, but it has evolved over the years into something new.  Well as new as a roast chicken recipe can be, which really isn't very new.

Ready to start

I start out with an organic chicken.  Sometimes I use a regular roasting pan, but today I used a disposable tray.  If I do use a real roasting pan that I'll eventually have to clean, I line it with foil.

On the plate you will find all the goodies I put inside the bird's cavity or where all the guts came out as Son 2 likes to call it.  First I liberally salt and pepper the inside.  Then I put in sage and a lemon or two from my yard and rosemary from my neighbor (thanks A!), I also cut a head of garlic in half cross ways and stick it in as well.

Notice that I have the bird breast down, I do this because the breast meat comes out super juicy and we don't eat the skin anyway.  After the cavity is stuffed I poured some olive oil over the top of the bird and spread it around using a cooking brush.  Lastly I salt and pepper the outside.

I don't cook vegetables underneath the chicken anymore because my dear husband complained that they were too greasy.  So I roast the vegetables in a separate baking sheet.  Tonight I roasted butternut squash with a bit of olive oil and salt, delicious!

risotto still cooking

I also tried out a risotto recipe.  It was ok, but I think I will keep looking for a better recipe.  It's not worth posting here.

chicken out of the oven and resting

As always the kids surprised me.  Daughter loved the butternut squash, Son 2 the risotto and Son 1 the chicken.  At least there was something for everyone.