Blue Cayenne

This started out as a recipe post. Sadly, it has become a eulogy to a gifted chef. 

Greg Malouf has died. 

He and his former wife, food writer Lucy Malouf, did much to introduce the western world to the delights and subtleties of  Middle Eastern cooking. He was often credited with being “the godfather of Middle Eastern cuisine.” 

Greg Malouf was a celebrated Australian chef. His familial background was Lebanese. He operated several important restaurants in Australia, London and Dubai.

This recipe is from Greg and Lucy Malouf’s cookbook A Chef’s Travels in Turkey. 

You can find this cookbook through your local bookstore or on Amazon here. This cookbook was first published in 2008, so you may have the opportunity to pick up a good used copy.

In addition to being a fine cookbook, the description of travel throughout Turkey is excellent. This cookbook is one of a series of Malouf cookbooks  including Saha, Moorish and New Middle Eastern Food. You may well find yourself captivated by this series and travelling (at least in your kitchen) to the far-flung areas of this fascinating region. 

Here is the recipe as I prepared it in my kitchen.

This Sweet and Sour Tofu With Corn is a wonderful Asian-inspired tofu recipe.  Preparation is pretty fast, too—perfect for a lazy end-of-summer meal. It’s beautiful, too. 

Curious about tofu? Tofu was first produced in China more than 2000 years ago, probably as a happy accident when someone curdled soy milk while adding nigari seaweed, a coagulating agent. 

The tofu we buy in stores today has a lot of healthy features. It is protein rich and the protein is a complete protein. That means that tofu contains all nine essential amino acids. Too, tofu is rich in iron, calcium, magnesium, and phosphorus. It is also a low calorie food that contains no cholesterol. 

But, which to buy–soft or hard tofu? It depends upon what you are cooking. Soft tofu contains more water and has a soft, custardy texture, making it better for soups and desserts. Hard (or extra hard) tofu is pressed to remove more of the water in its base. Hard tofu is better for stir-fry and grilling recipes where you want the tofu to hold its shape while cooking. 

This recipe is from Melissa Clark’s cookbook Dinner: Changing The Game. The book is available through your local bookstore or on Amazon here.

Here is the recipe as I prepared it in my kitchen.

If you read this blog, you’ve met our CQO-OT (Chief Quality Officer and Official Taster), Juliet, many times before. Juliet is a 7-pound rescue Yorkie who brightens everything about our world here at Blue Cayenne.

Last week, King Arthur Baking’s Facebook page featured a post that asked readers to post photographs of their beloved pets and then proceeded to match the photo of the pet with a KAB recipe. Couldn’t resist that one, so up it went–a glamour shot of Sweet Juliet.

As it turned out, one of the first replies I got to the post was from one of those Internet creeps who asks you to reply to them privately on Messenger. Didn’t happen, of course, (Blue Cayenne’s editor wasn’t born yesterday, after all)  and, bless them, KAB promptly removed the post. Geesh! The weirdos are everywhere—even on a recipe site.

But back to the post-your-beloved-pet photo KAB promotion…

The people at King Arthur Baking matched Juliet  with King Arthur Baking’s Honey Cake–a really good match for her, I thought, because (of course) I think the sun rises and sets with this little honey of a dog and the cake is a beauty, too.

Here is the King Arthur Baking recipe link: King Arthur Baking Honey Cake.

Here is the recipe as I prepared it in my kitchen.