A Jordanian Supper

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ - Jordan is well-known for falafel, of course, but so much of their everyday cuisine is really simple and also delicious, starting with chicken fatteh.

This is oven-crisped pita with shredded chicken and a yogurt-tahini sauce.

A Bedouin flatbread, which can be made in just minutes without any yeast.

And mutabal, which is an eggplant-tahini dip.

Sort of a Jordanian take on baba ganoush.

Big flavors and simple ingredients.

Please stay tuned.

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♪ ♪ (people talking, vehicle horns honking) - My name is Maria Haddad, and we are at Beit Sitti.

Beit Sitti literally translates, means "my grandmother's house."

And you're here today at my grandmother's house.

This is an initiative that me and my sister started around 11 years ago.

We started it because, when we were young, we used to come here to my grandmother's house, and from her, we used to learn how to cook Arabic food.

When my grandmother passed away, we decided we wanted to keep her house open and her memory going, and to teach people the dishes that she used to teach us.

Fatteh is a series of dishes, and it could be made in many different ways.

But the base and the essential part of it is broken pieces of bread.

So fat in Arabic means to break bread.

And today we made it with chicken.

(sizzling) And the topping, which is yogurt with tahini sauce.

So if you see the color here, it's a little bit darker than the tahini you get.

It's because we roast our sesame before we grind it.

Another thing, when you taste it, okay, it should make your mouth dry.

This is a sign of good quality, like peanut butter.

So I'm going to add a little bit more yogurt just to give it a nice creaminess.

♪ ♪ Now, just going to wait for the rice to cook, the chicken to finish, and we're going to start plating.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ - So today we're going to talk about fatteh.

Now, that's a very common dish across the Levant, the Middle East.

It's three things: it starts with flatbread.

Could be stale, could be fresh, could be grilled, could be toasted.

Then it has yogurt, which may have tahini or lemon juice in it, and then a topping.

When I was in Beirut a few years ago, for breakfast, you'd have chickpeas on top of the yogurt.

So this is chicken fatteh.

And we're also going to add one other ingredient, which you sometimes see in some places, which is rice.

So we're going to have the flatbread and the rice, the yogurt, and the chicken.

So we'll start with the rice, and we are going to soak it.

I never used to soak rice, but in the last couple of years, I do.

I find that it comes out fuller, it has a nicer texture.

It's just a little bit better.

And the trick is, with rice and water, you really don't have to measure water.

You can just put enough water in so it's about an inch or so over the rice.

Okay, so that's enough.

You can let it sit up to an hour, but at least 20 minutes.

And we're also going to do something a little unusual, which is add a tablespoon of kosher salt.

That's going to help the grains become a little fluffier, and it's going to season the grains.

Of course, we're going to rinse this before we cook it, so all that salt won't be in the rice.

So now we have two pita breads cut in half.

We're going to brush both sides with oil.

And instead of staling them, we're actually going to toast them in a hot oven, which gives them really nice texture.

And then we're also going to sprinkle with some spice, some coriander and some sumac.

And that's just going to add more flavor to this.

But these are going to get really nice and crisp, and so when you have the rice, and especially with the yogurt, you want a little bit of texture to that, a little bit of chew to it.

Nice, okay.

So, as I said, we have coriander.

And we have sumac.

Sumac is a very small, dried red berry.

It has a very citrusy flavor, as well.

It's not spicy.

♪ ♪ So this goes into a hot oven, 400 degrees.

We're going to flip them halfway through, eight to ten minutes.

And we're finished with that, we also have some slivered almonds, and we'll put those on the baking sheet and also toast those, as well.

♪ ♪ So we have the rice sitting there in the water.

The toasted pita has come out, with, the almonds are done, and now the chicken.

So we're going to start with a little bit of oil, about a tablespoon.

Heat that up.

And we're going to toast, to bring out a little bit of the flavor, some cardamom seeds, some cloves, and some cinnamon.

And we'll just toast those for a minute or two, just to bring out their flavor.

And they're smoking, which is good.

Snap, crackle, pop's always a good thing when it comes to spices.

Oh, this smells so good.

Okay, that's really nicely toasted.

So now we're going to add the chicken skin-side down, bone-in, skin-on, obviously, chicken breast.

And we're just going to cook this for two or three minutes to start browning the skin.

And then we'll add some water and finish cooking it.

So we'll just take a peek and see how the skin-side down is doing.

Okay, that's nicely browned.

So now we'll add water.

This is just enough water to cover.

We'll also add a couple of teaspoons of salt.

Bring that up to a low simmer, cover, and cook 20 to 25 minutes.

So the chicken is cooked.

We've reserved the cooking water.

We'll be using it in a couple of different places.

So the first thing we need to do is cook the rice.

This is the soaked rice, which, obviously, has been strained out and washed, and we're putting that in the saucepan.

We have three-quarter-cup of rice, and we have a cup and a half of the cooking liquid from the chicken.

And now, since this dish really is interesting, because it flavors each component, right, we have the bread at the bottom, the pita.

We have rice, which we're making now.

We have the yogurt and we have the chicken.

We're going to season each of these.

So we're going to do quite a lot of seasoning here.

We have garlic... turmeric... ...fennel.

We have coriander, again.

And a little black pepper.

So we're going to bring this up to a low simmer before we cover it and cook it 15 to 18 minutes.

Meanwhile, we'll make the yogurt.

Now, as I said, yogurt often has tahini in it or lemon juice.

And we have both of those things here.

We have a little bit of garlic, as well.

The tahini.

And then we have a little bit of the reserved cooking liquid from the chicken.

And then a quarter-teaspoon of pepper and also of some kosher salt.

Okay, so we have the yogurt sauce ready.

Rice is starting to simmer.

Now, one little trick I find, when you, obviously, put the top on, it's going to get hotter and cook faster.

So I would turn the heat down a little bit before you put the top on.

And then I would check it after a couple of minutes just to make sure it's a nice, low simmer.

You don't want it to boil over.

So we'll be back in a little over 15 minutes and check the rice.

So the rice is done.

Let it sit another ten minutes and let me just fluff it up a little.

The third time we've seen that cooking liquid that we strained out, gonna use that to moisten the chicken.

Shredded chicken's moistened.

The rice is nice and fluffed up.

And now we have the pita, which is really nice and toasty.

Also has the sumac on it and the coriander.

Or you could just get a glass of wine and eat the pita.

Actually, I often at home make these instead of buying little crackers.

These are inexpensive and delicious.

Okay, so now we have the rice.

Again, using rice in this dish is a variation you see some places.

Okay.

And we have the chicken.

♪ ♪ And, finally, we have the yogurt on top.

♪ ♪ Okay.

Finally, four additions.

We have those toasted almonds we did earlier.

We have sumac.

I'm going to put the sumac on.

Pomegranate molasses.

This is worth getting the better stuff.

Some of the stuff that's not as good is very sweet and molasses-y.

The really good stuff has a little sharp tang to it.

It's a little more acidic.

And then, finally, a little parsley on top.

♪ ♪ So, there you have it, chicken fatteh.

Great textures-- yogurt, crispy pita, chicken, the pomegranate molasses, the sumac, the parsley, the toasted almonds.

Textures, flavors, little something different in every bite.

This is my idea of the perfect way to cook, because every bite is going to be a little bit different.

♪ ♪ - (speaking Arabic): ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ - I guess you probably know by now, I love flatbreads.

I love flatbreads because they're easy to make.

And then, once you make them, you usually cook them in a skillet on top of the stove.

You can use them to pick up food.

You can use them with food.

They're really versatile and they're also delicious.

This one comes from Jordan.

We were in Petra and we visited a home cook, Fatima Mohammad, and she makes this bread, this flatbread, shrak.

It's very simple to do.

And there's a really interesting technique for rolling it out and stretching it, which we'll get to.

So we have whole wheat flour and we have regular all-purpose flour, and we have some salt.

And we'll just mix those dry ingredients for a second.

Now we'll add the water slowly.

You know, years ago, I took a trip south of Marrakesh into the desert.

And at about 09:00 at night, we met Mohammed, who had six camels.

And we spent three or four days trekking through the desert.

About every three or four hours, you'd see a small oven just there.

And as people move through, and people do migrate through the desert, depending on the season, they would just make their flatbread in the oven.

So you can make it a skillet, you make an oven, you can make in the middle of the Sahara Desert.

So it's one of those breads you can make virtually anywhere in the world.

So we're going to knead this for a total of 20 minutes.

It comes together, as it has now, after three or four.

We'll finish it up for about another 15 minutes, and then we'll be back.

♪ ♪ So now the dough is well kneaded.

(chuckling): So this is a really interesting dough.

You know, most of the time when you're working with pie dough or other pastry, you use a lot of flour because you don't want the dough to stick to the surface.

This is going to be a slightly sticky dough.

And you want to keep it sticky.

You want to keep it sticky because that's really one of the secrets of rolling this out into a nice, thin round.

So just a little bit of flour here, not much at all.

Form it into a ball, put in a bowl.

You want to cover it with wrap.

You can let it sit on the counter for an hour or two, at least an hour, before you cut it into pieces and roll it.

Or overnight in the fridge is fine.

Take it out for at least an hour to let it warm up before you work with it.

So, the dough is rested, and now we're going to cut it into ten pieces.

Now, how do you take a circle, right, and cut it into ten equal pieces?

And by the way, I'm not going to use a lot of flour because you really want sticky dough later on.

So the way I do it is to cut it in half and then try to make a cylinder.

And then you have at least a rough chance of getting this into ten pieces.

So...

Okay, now we're just going to form them into small balls like that.

And it's good, if you have too much flour on the surface-- what you want this dough to do is stick a little bit to it so it forms into a ball.

So we'll finish this up and we'll let them rest 15 minutes, and then we'll come back, roll them out, and cook them in a skillet.

So the dough is rested, and we're going to form it into about a three-inch round with our hands, and then we'll use the rolling pin.

Now, normally, you would want to have a floured surface, so the dough doesn't stick to the surface.

Here, oddly enough, you kind of do want the dough to stick to the surface.

And the reason is, if it sticks, it's not going to come back on itself, right?

It's going to stay rolled out.

So I'm going to get this out to about six inches or so.

You know, normally, you'd be picking up the dough.

You'd be moving it around so it doesn't stick.

Okay, so that's probably almost six inches.

Okay.

This dough is usually cooked on a saj.

It's a domed piece of cast iron that's heated.

And it's amazing to watch people do this.

They have really large flatbreads.

They're flipping them around, they're putting them on the saj, they're taking them off-- they cook in about a minute.

So we're going to use the concept of a saj, which is an overturned bowl, but we're going to use it to do something different.

We're going to use it to actually stretch the dough.

And since the dough really wasn't floured, it's going to stick to the bowl, which is nice.

So it's a good way to take a really thin dough and make it thinner.

You might get a little tiny break there, which is okay.

So that's pretty good.

We made a pretty nice thin shrak.

So we have a cast-iron skillet.

It's heated over medium-high.

So we're going to cook this just a few minutes, and we'll flip it constantly as it cooks.

Okay, that looks good.

So we have one done, we'll go and do the other nine.

♪ ♪ So we're done with our shrak, and now we're going to eat it.

I love olive oil with some salt and some za'atar.

Za'atar is a wild herb.

It's collected all over the Middle East.

Some people say it tastes like marjoram, or thyme, or oregano.

It has its own flavor.

And the spice mix called za'atar has sesame seeds and also sumac in it, those small red berries that have that sort of very sour taste.

So we'll just drizzle a little oil, or a lot of oil, or some more oil, and a little bit of salt.

And a little bit of za'atar.

I'll just take one and dip it in the mixture.

Mm.

What I really love about this bread is, it has a lot of whole wheat in it, and it's also got some chew to it, which is nice-- I mean, it's got real flavor, right?

In lots of places, you would use this really almost as a fork.

You pick up food and eat it that way.

So it's also a utensil.

So that's our flatbread, shrak.

We learned this from Fatima Mohammad, thank you very much, in Petra.

And this goes really well with dips.

In fact, we're going to make a recipe on the show called eggplant-tahini dip, and it will be perfect when served with shrak.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ - My name is Ihab, and we are in the middle of Wadi Rum Desert, and today I'm going to show you how to make mutabal.

Mutabal is an appetizer, and you can eat it just about any time.

It's good for breakfast, and it's good for lunch, and it's good for dinner.

It consists of the main ingredient, which is eggplant, and we season it with salt.

And we add some garlic and lemon.

And, of course, tahini.

♪ ♪ I like to see the brown color from the outer skin getting burnt.

Gives it extra color and flavor.

Just smush it to where it's soft enough.

Some people at home, they put it in a blender, but that's something hard to find in the middle of the desert, since there is no electricity, no power.

And when we go out camping, we pack light.

We don't like to carry a lot of stuff.

I think I'm ready to add some salt, and we add it just to the taste.

I like to use a lot of garlic, but I need to add also is some lemon, lemon juice.

I'll add now the tahini.

Today, since we are in season for pomegranate, I'm going to cut it out and add some pomegranate seed to it.

Final topping is olive oil.

We like to use a lot of olive oil.

And now it's ready to be served.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ - Today we're going to be making an eggplant-tahini dip from Jordan called mutabal.

So typically, Americans would think of this as a baba ganoush, but mutabal does not contain tomatoes or walnuts, and it really is a great way to show off the richness and slightly bitter flavor of the eggplant.

So to get it started, I want to make sure that I'm using a really big, good, plump eggplant.

So to get this started, I'm going to move these over to a baking sheet real quick, and I just want to pierce them.

Piercing the eggplants means that they will not explode and create a gigantic mess in your oven.

Just a few pierces each.

I'm going to take about a tablespoon of oil and cover my eggplant.

Just make sure this gets all over.

All righty.

My eggplants have been pierced and coated in olive oil, so I'm going to take these over to my oven.

I've got it preheating at about 475 degrees.

I'm going to cook them for about 20 to 30 minutes, because I want them really well blistered and cooked through.

So I roasted my eggplants up until they're nice, wrinkled, blistered, and I let them cool for about half an hour so they'd be cool enough for me to handle without burning my hands.

So now I want to take off these stems and scoop out all the flesh.

So first, I'm just going to lop this little stem off and then cut this in half.

And you should be able to just scoop out the flesh onto your board.

And the flesh should separate from your eggplant pretty easily with just using a spoon, all right.

You can just discard the skins after you scoop it out.

I'm going to move this out of the way and get back to my board.

Now, I have my eggplant directly on my cutting board because I want to cut this by hand.

I don't want to put this into a food processor, because I want to be able to have some of the eggplant texture still intact.

So I'm just going to move this over and give it a quick chop.

You don't want this chopped so fine that it's a purée.

You want just a little bit of texture.

All right, I've got all my eggplant nicely chopped up, and so now it's time to put the dip together.

So, first off, I'm going to use a bit of tahini, and I'm going to add just a little bit of boiling water.

I want to loosen the tahini up with both the heat and the water, because adding acid is going to make it seize just a bit.

So I want it to retain that creamy, beautiful texture.

We don't want any lumps.

All right, gonna mix this up until it's nice and smooth.

To this, I'm going to add some garlic, nicely minced, a little bit of lemon juice.

And this is why we have the boiling water.

And about half a cup of my parsley.

All right.

And now it's time to introduce the eggplant to the party.

All right.

Stir this up and combine it pretty well.

A little bit of salt and pepper.

Make sure I'm seasoned up nicely.

My tahini has stayed nice and smooth with my eggplant.

Now that it's all nicely mixed up and combined, time to plate.

♪ ♪ Get all the good little bits up.

Often when mutabal is served in restaurants, it's nicely decorated with a pop of pomegranate seed.

And in this case, we're going to use some parsley, pomegranate seeds, and a little bit of our tangy pomegranate molasses.

Add a little bit of parsley... Don't forget a tiny bit of olive oil.

A couple pomegranate seeds... Look at that beautiful color.

And a quick drizzle of pomegranate molasses.

All right, I'm going to whip up a quick, fresh, traditional tomato-cucumber salad.

I've got diced cucumbers, diced tomatoes, and a bunch of minced jalapeños.

And tip it into my bowl.

Going to add some salt and pepper.

And just a little bit of lemon juice for extra brightness.

Give this a good mix.

All right, I've got my mutabal ready to serve.

I've got my salad all mixed up.

Let's put the plate together.

♪ ♪ Add a little bit of my salad.

And then I have some of the shrak that Chris had made earlier.

So I'm going to just rip off a little piece of that.

There we go.

All right, time to taste.

And do a little rip and dip here.

Get some pomegranate molasses, pomegranate seed, parsley.

Get all those good ingredients in there.

All right.

Mm!

This is so good.

And the pomegranate gives such a nice, bright pop, that the texture of this is remarkable, because it's nice and smooth, but still has a couple of good chunks of eggplant for a nice meaty bite.

And there you have it, quick and easy.

We have our mutabal, which is a roasted eggplant and tahini dip.

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- Funding for this series was provided by the following.

- That meal.

You sautéed, you seared, and you served, cooking with All-Clad, bonded cookware designed, engineered, and assembled in the U.S.A. for over 50 years.

All-Clad: for all your kitchen adventures.

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