CHEF ABBAS KANSO, ACTING EXECTIVE CHEF, DUSIT THANI DUBAI
Background: Chef Kanso hails from a family of chefs — his cousins have worked for royal families and television stations.
He has cooked for the Saudi royal family three years in a row during their summer vacations. He has been featured in a cookbook and travelled worldwide.
When it comes to food, nothing less than perfect will do for Chef Kanso.
Tips for Ramadan: Break your fast with dates and soup, go to pray, wait for a while and then eat your main course. Do not drink too much water when you break your fast. This will make you feel full very quickly.
Instead, drink juices such as jallab (smoked date juice), karkadeh (Hibiscus juice) or apricot juice.
For suhoor, have eggs, cheese zaatar or something similar to what you would have for breakfast. And drink sahlab.
Burghul with tomato/kibbeh banadoura
- 600g burghul wheat
- 10g salt
- 5g sweet pepper powder
- 100g onion, chopped
- 600g tomato, peeled and diced
- 60g tomato paste
- 5g white pepper
- 6g cinnamon powder
- 100ml olive oil
- 15g fresh mint, chopped
- Vegetable oil, for frying
For garnishing:
- One small onion, finely chopped, then fried in olive oil until semi-crisp
- Sprig of fresh mint
Sauté the chopped onion, season with the salt and powdered pepper. Add the diced tomato. Add tomato paste and simmer over low heat for 10 to 15 minutes.
Wash and drain the burghul, add to the tomato mixture and cook for 10 minutes. Garnish with fried onions and mint and serve on a ceramic platter.
Samakeh harrah (spiced hamour coated in tahina and pine nuts)
- 800g baby hamour, whole, cleaned from the bone
- 15ml lemon juice
- 2 bay leaves
- Salt and pepper, to taste
- 10ml corn oil
- 5g cumin powder
For the coating:
- 200g tahina paste
- 20ml olive oil
- 10 green chilli, chopped
- 3g sweet chilli powder
- 100ml cold water
- 25g garlic, finely chopped
- 10g fresh coriander, chopped
For garnishing:
- 1 lemon, quartered
- 20g walnuts, gently toasted
- 20g pine nuts, toasted
Mix the salt, pepper, cumin, bay, lemon juice and corn oil. Use this to stuff the fish. Wrap in aluminium foil and bake at 180°C for 20 minutes.
Whisk the tahina and cold water until the paste loosens a little. Over medium heat, simmer the olive oil, chopped garlic, green chilli and coriander, stirring constantly.
Add the tahina and sweet chilli powder, mixing it again over a low flame for 10 to 15 minutes, until the oil in the tahina bubbles to the surface.
Remove the foil from the fish and discard the skin; keep the head and the tail. Spread the tahina sauce over the fish.
Decorate with toasted pine nuts, walnuts and fresh lemon wedges and serve.
Roast lamb leg with Oriental rice
- 1 large spoon onion, chopped
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 2 cups basmati rice
- 4 cups water
- 1/2 tsp sweet pepper
- Salt, to taste
- 50g lamb, minced
- 1 leg of lamb
- 100g bucket garner
- Almond
- Pine nuts
- Cashew nuts
- 2 tbs ghee
Heat the ghee in a large saucepan. Add the onions and cook until soft. Add the minced lamb and cook. Add the rice and the spices, add the water, bring to boil and add salt and pepper to taste.
Reduce the heat, cover the pot and cook for 15 to 18 minutes. Remove from heat.
Wash the leg of lamb, season with salt, pepper and olive oil. Place them in a tray with some bucket garner and a little water and roast for about 90 minutes.
When cooked, place the rice in the plate and top with the lamb. Sprinkle the roasted pine nuts, almond and cashew nuts.
KJELL KOLLIN, EXECUTIVE CHEF, KEMPINSKI HOTEL, MALL OF THE EMIRATES
Background: Chef Kjell wanted to be a carpenter but changed his mind after doing his apprenticeship at an opera house in Stockholm, Sweden.
During his travels in Sweden between 1982 and 1985, he discovered his love for the culinary arts.
He swapped Sweden for the world in 1989, visiting countries such as Switzerland, Germany, Norway and Japan and mastering the traditional cooking styles of various cultures.
Tips for Ramadan: Cut down on salt, sugar and all refined items. Use as many fresh items as possible and avoid processed food. Also remember that if you freeze food, you miss out on most of the mineral content.
For example, seafood contains iodine, a mineral key to the functioning of the thyroid gland. When you freeze seafood, iodine is the first thing that is lost.
Rosemary and black pepper-baked apples with rhubarb and vanilla ice-cream (serves 4)
- 4 Granny Smith apples
- 10g fresh rosemary
- 100g honey
- 5g black pepper, crushed
- 1 vanilla bean
- 100g rhubarb (caramelised stick)
- 10g unsalted butter
For the pastry cream:
- 150ml fresh milk
- 50ml fresh cream
- 40g egg yolk
- 50g sugar, granulated
- 18g custard powder
- 5ml vanilla essence
Put fresh milk, fresh cream, custard powder and vanilla essence in a saucepan and bring to boil. Mix egg yolk and granulated sugar. Pour on to the hot mixture to form a cream. Cool before use.
For the baked apple, mix fresh rosemary, honey, crushed black pepper, vanilla bean and unsalted butter in a saucepan and bring to boil.
Remove the core of the apple and pour the honey-rosemary mixture on to it. Bake in a preheated oven at 180°C for about 15 minutes.
For setting, cut the baked apple and fill the core with pastry cream. Add the reduced mixture of rosemary, black pepper and honey. Garnish with a rhubarb stick and serve with vanilla ice-cream.
Marinated salmon and turbot with caviar (serves 4)
- 280g salmon, marinated
- 120g turbot, marinated
- 24g sugar
- 12g salt
- 4g white pepper
- 4g mustard seeds, roasted
- 10g fresh herbs
- 40g fennel
- 40g potatoes
- 1 lemon
- 200g cauliflower coulis
- 50ml milk
- 50ml cream
- 10ml extra-virgin olive oil
- 4 slices breads, crisp
- 20g caviar (optional)
- Charcoal salt, to taste
Marinate the salmon and turbot in a mixture of salt, sugar, fresh herbs and mustard seed for 24 hours. Cut into thin slices and arrange on a plate.
Cook the cauliflower with milk, cream and extra-virgin olive oil until soft. Blend in a mixer until smooth.
Check the seasoning and arrange on plate. Steam the sliced potatoes and fennel and keep cool. Arrange it on the plate.
Cut lemon zest and fillet and garnish. Serve with crisp bread, dill and charcoal salt.
Steamed Atlantic cod with sweet prawns mustard velouté (serves 4)
- 800g Atlantic cod (skin on)
- 4 sweetwater prawns
- 0.2l lobster velouté
- 0.2l lobster stock
- Roux (flour and butter)
- 4g mustard seed, roasted
- 4g white pepper
- 10g flat parsley, fresh
- 20g horseradish, grated
- 2 eggs
- 400g potatoes, mashed
- 200g potatoes
- 100ml milk
- 50ml cream
- 10ml extra-virgin olive oil
- Black pepper, to taste
- Salt, to taste
Season and steam the Atlantic cod and sweetwater prawns until just undercooked and let rest on a cloth. Boil the lobster stock and bind with roux (mixture of soft butter and flour in the ratio of 2:3).
Cook for 10 minutes, season and add grain mustard. Cook the potatoes with skin on in salt water for 20 minutes. Peel and mash with fork while hot.
Boil the milk, cream and olive oil and add the boiled and mashed potatoes, check the seasoning and serve with grated horseradish. Boil the eggs for 12 minutes and cool in water.
Shell the egg and grate yolk and egg white separately. Arrange the items on the plate and serve with lemon zest and flat parsley.
CHEF MICHEL P. SOULET, EXECUTIVE CHEF, SHERATON JUMEIRAH BEACH RESORT AND TOWER
Background: Chef Soulet discovered his passion for cooking as a 12-year-old on a journey through England with his parents. They had stayed at a hotel in Brighton and were impressed with the service, especially in terms of food.
“This was not some mashed potatoes and roast chicken, it was an experience,” he said. It was at that point that he decided to go to hospitality school and turn his love for cooking into a career.
Chef Soulet said he always preferred working in hotels to working in private restaurants.
After about five years of studying, Soulet began travelling the world and exploring different kinds of cooking styles. He said his explorations have helped him create new recipes.
Wild berry soup (serves 4)
- 3 cups mix of strawberries, blueberries and raspberries
- 1 cup cream
- 4 cups plain yoghurt
- 6 tbs honey
- 1/2 cup orange juice
- 1/2 cup fresh honey-ginger sauce
- 1 cup orange juice, fresh
- 3 slices ginger, peeled
- 2 tbs honey
For the orange-and-honey ginger sauce, combine all ingredients in a pan, bring to a boil and let reduce to half.
Purée the berries in a blender, add the cream, yoghurt, honey, orange juice and orange-honey ginger sauce. Purée again.
Pass through a fine strainer and refrigerate. Serve in chilled bowls or soap plates. Decorate as you want.
Seafood paella (serves 4)
- 1/2 pod sliced garlic
- 1 sweet pepper
- 400g rice (medium round kind)
- 5 squid, sliced
- 1g saffron
- 1l strong fish stock
- 200g tomato
- 4 prawns
- 4 gambas
- 4 mussels
- 4 ash fillet
- Olive oil
Heat the olive oil in the paella dish. Roast the garlic a bit, not till it turns brown. Add the squid and the peppers, cut into large quarters. Add the rice and the saffron and then add the fish stock and the tomato.
Season. Arrange the fish fillet, prawns, gambas and mussels in the paella. Bring to boil and let cook for 10 minutes, lower the heat and let simmer for 10 minutes.
More hot fish stock may be added if the rice is not tender and needs more cooking time. When the rice is cooked, remove from fire, cover paella with towel and let rest for five minutes before serving.
Note: Paella is a very versatile dish. You may add almost any vegetable, chicken, lamb, fish and seafood or any combination of the above.
They will add personality and flavour to your creation. But the most important item is rice. It must be round. The best variety is Bomba.
Mango and maple syrup crème brule (serves 4)
- 2 mangoes, ripe
- 50g maple syrup
- 1 vanilla pod, cut lengthwise
- 2 Cape Heavy cream
- 5 egg yolks
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar
- 6 tbs brown sugar
Peel the mango and cut into thin slices. Place the slices in the crème brule dish. Pour the maple syrup on the mango and refrigerate.
Remove the seeds from the vanilla pod and add them to the cream. Warm the cream in a saucepan and keep away.
Whisk the egg yolks and granulated sugar in a stainless-steel bowl until white. Pour the warm cream into the egg mixture and mix well. Pour in the warm brule dishes.
Place these in a bain-marie and bake in a hot oven for 35 to 40 minutes or until a knife inserted at the edge of the mixture comes out clean. Take out from the oven and let rest for three hours.
Before serving, sprinkle brown sugar on top of the cream and burn with a torch until the brown sugar melts and forms a crust.
Secret of paella: it’s all in the rice
According to Soulet, paella emerged when Muslims first came to El Palmer in Valencia, Spain, in the 8th century. They brought with them rice and saffron, a spice used to colour and flavour food.
However, the Arabs and the Spanish would cook large quantities of food and the leftovers would be given to the servants and the poor.
It was then that the locals learnt to combine what ingredients they had, such as seasonal vegetables and wetland wildlife (snakes, snails, etc), with the food they were given.
As people became rich, they began adding meat and seafood to the dish and soon, it became an international phenomenon. “In Spain, it’s used as a party dish”, says Soulet.
“There were instances when it was cooked to feed 20,000 people and a boat paddle was used to stir it.” everal theories try to explain how the term paella was coined.
It is said to have emerged from the Arabic word bakaya, which means leftovers, and also from the Egyptian word pila, which describes the plate on which food is cooked. he word could also be from the Spanish term paella or the ladle.
According to Soulet, the trick to making good paella is in the rice. He explains that the grains used in paella are different from those commonly used. They are more round.
This rice is rare in this part of the world and the best bet would be to go to a speciality store that sells Spanish products or find someone who travels often to Spain.
Soulet highlighted three key ingredients to making good paella — saffron, the right kind of rice and a good imagination.
CHEF HUSSAIN NAIM, LE MERIDIEN
ABU DHABI
Background: Chef Hussain Niam was Syria’s weightlifting champion before he answered the call of the basics of cooking in 1954, all the while gathering tips from top chefs.
Today he is with Le Meridien Hotel, Abu Dhabi, and the man in charge of the buffet during Ramadan.
“I was lucky to have learnt how to prepare classic foods such as Arabic and European, from an early age. I picked up a lot of things,” said Chef Naim, who ha been living in Abu Dhabi since 1991.
Fil-fil mashwi maa zaitun (roasted red bell pepper with black olives. Serves 4)
- 4 red bell pepper, medium sized
- 200g black olives, sliced
- 50ml lemon juice
- 10g garlic, chopped
- 1 tbs olive oil
- Salt, to taste
- 5g parsley, chopped
- Lemon wedges, to garnish
Roast the red bell pepper in the oven for 10 minutes at 220°C. Let cool. Peel the burnt skin and deseed. Dice. Arrange over a platter topped with sliced black olives.
Make a dressing, adding chopped garlic and parsley, lemon juice, olive oil and salt. Sprinkle over the top of the salad, garnish with chopped parsley and lemon wedges.
Chicken moussakan (roasted chicken with sumac powder. Serves 4)
- 1 (1,200g) chicken, whole
- 1kg onion, sliced and peeled
- 75g sumac powder
- 5g black pepper, crushed
- 150ml olive oil
- 10g salt
- 20g coriander leaves, chopped
- 200g tomato, deseeded and julienned
- 2 loaves saj bread
Roast the chicken, seasoned with salt and pepper, in an oven for about 45 minutes at 200°C. Separate the meat from the bones and julienne. Sauté the onion in olive oil for 10 minutes.
Add salt and pepper. Mix the cooked onion with the shredded chicken. Add the sumac powder, tomato juliennes and chopped garlic. Add half the tomato mixture to the chicken.
Lay a piece of bread flat, put a little chicken mixture on it and roll it like a spring roll.
Heat in an oven or a pan grill for a couple of minutes before serving. Serve with the remaining tomato-sumac mixture on the side.
CHEF JOHN SINJOBI, CHEF DE CUISINE INDEGO GROSVENOR HOUSE
Background: To say Chef Sinjobi is passionate about food would be an understatement. This native from Kerala, India, has been in Dubai for about two years, before which he was in Mauritius.
“My goal is to create a new dish every day. Nothing too complicated — just something that is healthy and simple enough for anyone to make,” he said. His mum was the biggest support behind his decision to take his career further.
“We had little ingredients to work with but my mother would always be able to create something out of them. I became a chef immediately after graduation,” Chef Sinjobi said.
Lamb-chop biryani (right)
- 12 lamb chops
- 300g onions, sliced
- 1 tbs ginger-garlic paste
- 50ml corn oil
- 50ml butter, clarified
- 200g tomato purée
- 3g green cardamom, cloves and cinnamon sticks
- 1 tbs red chilli powder
- Salt, to taste
- 2 tbs coriander powder
- 1 tsp turmeric powder
- 1 tbs garam masala
- 600g saffron pulao
- 3g mint and coriander leaves, freshly chopped
For garnishing:
Fried onions and raisins
Marinate cleaned lamb chop with a little ginger-garlic paste, salt, garam masala, turmeric powder and oil. Keep aside. Heat oil and clarified butter in a thick-bottomed pan. Add the whole spices and sliced onions.
Sauté until the onions become slightly brown. Add ginger-garlic paste, fry for two minutes. Add the powdered spices. Add tomato purée after two minutes and allow to cook.
In the meantime, pan sear the marinated lamb chops and cook until three fourths done. Add the lamb chops to the gravy and mix well. Check the seasonings.
Add coriander and mint leaves, keep a little aside for garnishing. Add the saffron pulao and top with the ingredients mentioned for the garnish. Add garam masala.
Cook on a low flame, with tight lid on, for another 10 to 15 minutes; make sure the biryani does not stick. Remove from fire, mix gently and serve hot with raita.
Fried bread topped with mango-flavoured sweet yoghurt (left)
- 8 slices of bread
- 2 mangoes, ripe
- 100ml Alphonso-mango purée
- 50g icing sugar
- 200g yoghurt, fresh
- 1 pinch cardamom powder
For garnishing:
Sliced pistachio
Trim the bread edges, cut into triangular pieces. Deep-fry the bread until golden brown and soak in thin sugar syrup for two minutes and arrange on a serving dish. Peel the mango and purée with the help of a blender.
Place in a bowl and mix well with rest of the ingredients. Pour this mixture on the arranged bread. Serve chilled, garnished with sliced pistachio.
