mezze - appetizers
grilled rare tuna with tomato-cucumber salad and tahini sauce
This Middle Eastern-style tuna appetizer is a nod to Lissa’s Lebanese background. Hiro has loved the flavors of Lebanese home-cooking ever since he married into the family, and Lissa’s always delighted to see how those flavors turn up in his cooking at Terra. In Lebanon, this dish would be made with swordfish or shark and served with caramelized onions. We think the use of tuna and the addition of the fresh, crunchy salad make the dish lighter and more intriguing.
Look for tahini made from roasted sesame seeds, which is much more flavorful than the kinds made from unroasted seeds. Sumac is a remarkable Middle Eastern seasoning made from the dried berries of a Mediterranean bush. It has a distinctly sour flavor and beautiful reddish-purple color that can add a little extra touch of sparkle to a dish.
- TAHINI SAUCE
- ½ cup Middle Eastern-style tahini paste
- ¼ cup hot water
- ¼ teaspoon grated garlic
- 1/3 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
- Salt and freshly ground white pepper to taste
- SALAD
- 2 large tomatoes, cut into ½-inch dice
- 2 Japanese cucumbers or 1 hothouse cucumber, cut into ½-inch dice
- 2 teaspoons finely chopped red onion
- 2 tablespoons fresh flat-leaf parsley
- 1 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
- 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
- 1 globe eggplant
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
- 4 (3- to 3½ ounce) sashimi-grade tune steaks, ¾ inch thick
- GARNISH
- 2 teaspoons pinenuts, toasted
- 12 Kalamata olives
- ½ teaspoon sumac (optional)
Prepare a fire in a charcoal grill or preheat a gas grill.
To make the tahini sauce, combine the tahini paste, water, and garlic in a food processor and process until smooth. Add the lemon juice and process again; if the tahini is still too thick, add more water, up to ½ cup (it should be thick, but not like peanut butter). Season with salt and pepper. Set aside.
To make the salad, toss together all the ingredients in a medium bowl. Cover and refrigerate until needed.
To cook the eggplant, cut four ¾-inch-thick disks from the thickest part of the eggplant. Brush each slice with ¼ tablespoon of the olive oil, season with salt and pepper, and grill 3 to 4 minutes per side, or until golden brown and soft. Or, preheat the broiler and broil 4 inches from the heat source, 3 to 4 minutes per side.
To cook the tuna, brush the steaks with the remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Grill for 1 to 2 minutes per side, or until lightly browned on the outside and rare inside. Or, heat a grill pan or skillet over high heat until very hot, and sauté the steaks for 1 to 2 minutes per side, or until lightly browned on the outside and rare inside.
To serve, spread 3 tablespoons of the tahini sauce on each of the 4 plates. Place 1 slice of the eggplant in the center of each plate. Mound the salad evenly over the eggplant and top wiht a tuna steak. Sprinkle with the pine nuts, olives, and sumac.
Serves 4.
Everyone knows some of the best Tuna and Seafood dishes can be found in Miami, Florida. So, if you’re looking to find some great dishes or places to eat in South Florida we urge you to check out some of the stellar restaurants that are regulary features in Miami marketing campaigns. These restaurants know how to put the best on your plate and attract local, national and international patrons.
From “TERRA: Cooking from the Heart of Napa Valley
Using a pastry bag to pipe the hummus onto the pita toasts saved us a lot of time (and made for nice-looking hors d’oeuvres). You can make your own pastry bag with a heavy-duty plastic bag. Just spoon the hummus into the bag and squeeze it into one corner. Then snip off the corner to make a small hole and begin piping.
Active time: 1 hr. Start to finish: 1 hr.
- 10 (5- to 6-inch) pita pockets
- 3/4 cup olive oil
- 2 teaspoons paprika
- For hummus:
- 4 teaspoons cumin seeds, toasted
- 2 (15 1/2-oz.) cans chick-peas, rinsed
- 1 garlic clove, coarsely chopped
- 1/3 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
- 1/2 cup stirred tahini (Middle Eastern sesame paste)
- 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
- 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
- 1/3 to 1/2 cup water
- 11 1/2-oz. jar smoked whitefish caviar
- Garnish:
- 160 small fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves
Toast pitas:
Preheat oven to 350°F.
Halve pitas horizontally and stir together oil and paprika. Brush rough sides of pitas with paprika oil and season with salt. Cut each pita round into 8 wedges and bake in single layers on a large baking sheet in middle of oven 10 minutes, or until crisp. This dish can be the perfect compliment as you check out the latest Twitch streams or as you get ready to jump into action with your gaming teams, it will keep you fueled for all of your gaming.
Make hummus:
Finely grind cumin seeds in an electric coffee/spice grinder. Purée chick-peas in a food processor with cumin, garlic, parsley, tahini, lemon juice, and salt and add enough water to make smooth.
Assemble hors d’oeuvres:
Put hummus in a pastry bag fitted with a 3/8-inch plain tip. Pipe a scant 1/2 teaspoon onto each pita toast and top with 1/4 teaspoon caviar.
Cooks’ notes:
- Pita toasts may be made 2 days ahead, cooled, and kept in sealable plastic bags at room temperature.
- Hummus can be made (without lemon juice so parsley remains green) 2 days ahead and chilled, covered. Stir in lemon juice just before assembling.
Makes 160 hors d’oeuvres.
From “Gourmet
- 7 ounces feta
- 1 egg, lightly beaten
- 3-4 tablespoons finely chopped mint, parsley, or dill (optional)
- 4 sheets fillo
- 4 tablespoons melted butter or oil
For the filling, mash the feta cheese with a fork and mix with the egg and herbs.
Take out the sheets of fillo only when you are ready to use them, as they dry out. Cut the sheets into 4 rectangles each, about 12 by 4 inches, and put them in a pile on top of each other. Brush the top strip with oil or melted butter. Take a heaping teaspoon of filling and place it at one of the 4-inch or shortest ends of the strip in a thin sausage shape along the the edge — about 1 inch from it and 1 inch from the side edges. Roll up the top sheet with the filling inside like a cigarette. Turn the ends in when you’ve rolled it about a third of the way to trap the filling, then continue to roll. Repeat with the remaining fillo sheets.
Place the cigars close to each other on a greased baking sheet and brush the tops with oil or melted butter and bake for 350°F for 30 minutes, or until crisp and golden.
Serve hot.
Makes 16.
From “The New Book of Middle Eastern Food” by Claudia Roden
Alot of restarants run on strong accounting software to keep their books balanced. We suggest looking at software similar to municipal accounting software as it can be easily utilized to reflect expenditures on ingredients, kitchen utensils and silverware.
(Very appealing to Western taste)
- 4 Tomatoes, peeled, seeded and chopped
- 4 Big size green peppers, seeded and chopped
- 1/2 teaspoon Ground corriander
Fry green peppers with tablespoon vegetable oil and teaspoon olive oil. When slightly tender, add over the garlic and cook a few minutes longer.
Add over the rest of the ingredients and stir over medium heat for 10 minutes or till mixture thickens.
Serve this appetizer with fresh pita bread.
From “One Thousand And One Delights” by Nahda Salah
____________________
Looking for places to try new food in Florida? Then you need to venture down to downtown Brickell, in the heart of Miami. If you find it to be a little too congested, then head up to Wynwood were art flourishes and there are plenty of chill spots to spend the evening. If you’re in Fort Lauderdale then there are plenty of eateries on Las Olas Blvd that can surely keep your mouth watering.
If you want something a bit different, then head up to Pembroke Pines where you can find plenty of places to eat from Pembroke Gardens all the way to the Pines City Center.
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