Once just a street sold fast food in the Middle East, now very well know all around the world, falafel is climbing to the top of food lovers lunch and party menu. Accompanied with hummus and Arabic salad (here in USA known as pico de gallo salad) in a pita pocket, falafel is really good eats.
Apart from the fact that falafel is fried, all the ingredients that go to the recipe are healthy:
- Chick Peas: full in fiber, protein and copper, and a very good source of folate and manganese;
- Broad Beans: good source of dietary fiber, protein, phosphorus, copper and manganese, and a very good source of folate;
- Bulgar: also a very good source of dietary fiber and manganese;
- and all the veggies: onions, garlic, ginger, green bell peppers, banana peppers, jalapeno, cilantro, parsley that goes into the felalfel just boost the taste and the healthy level.
The working week is always very hectic and as everyone is leaving the house at different times, everyone is having breakfast on their own. Usually just some cereal or oatmeal with a cup of tea or milk. But when the weekend comes, the family gathers for breakfast together and indulge in the variety of food spread on the table: scrambled eggs, hummus, labanah, zatar with olive oil, olives, cheeses, turkey ham, strawberry preserve, peanut butter, fresh veggies, and then some more...or less, and of course FALAFEL!
The female part of our family likes creamy, soft flavors, while the male part of the family prefers clean, fresh flavors. So, when I cook pasta I always go in two directions: totally white sauce for one side and simple tomato sauce for the other side. I make my sauces a little special by adding some nutritious vegetables.
The biggest mistake people do when they boil pasta is add oil to the water so they can avoid "sticky" pasta situations. But oil makes the sauce slide right off the pasta and prevents pasta from absorbing all the delicious flavors from the sauce. Result: two individual dishes on the same plate: pasta + sauce; instead of one heavenly meal you cannot have enough of.
Is it really so hard to stick around the oven during the time needed for the pasta to be cooked?
Manage your time.
- Once the water is boiling, it is enough just to stick around and stir the pasta until water boils again, turn the heat down a bit, set timer to 10 minutes (which is the cooking time for most dry pasta), and then just stir occasionally to prevent pasta from sticking to the bottom of the pot.
- And actually the time that it takes for the water to boil and the pasta to cook, is the same amount of time it takes to make the white sauce.
Double Trouble
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