Amira's Kitchen
By Sarah Kittle
Awafi! from Amira’s Kitchen is a beautiful cookbook of approximately 250 pages featuring about as many recipes with ‘the flavor of Tel Keppe,’ as it says in the introduction. From Apricot Jam to Zerda, the book spans many generations of time-worn and much loved meals, recipes handed down throughout the years.
The act of preparing a meal is an overt act of love and these recipes are treasures. The effort required to make a meal at a time when you had no refrigeration or access to ingredients from anywhere other than down the road or in your own backyard is immense, and all that happens before you get into the kitchen!
Sitting in Amira’s kitchen on Cass Lake, this author can’t help but notice how warm and cozy it is and how good it smells, like all the lovely recipes that have ever been made there are welcoming you in. Amira herself, pretty and petite, puts a plate of homemade Bata’s Takhratha Da-Khalola (peanut butter bread - page 49) in front of me and says with a smile, “I thought you were Chaldean.”
The cookbook itself is a work of art, with beautiful photos of each dish and additional photos of ingredients and preparation. The recipes call for fresh, local ingredients with in-season fruits and vegetables.
Amira’s mother, her grandmother, her mother-in-law and her sisters are all co-conspirators in the kitchen and they helped her perfect these recipes which often have no specific measurements. In her forward to the cookbook Amira wrote:
When I asked my grandmother how much salt to put in the bowl, she cupped her hand and said, “This much.” So began the painstaking task of putting into words the directions to prepare our beloved family dishes. I had a few recipes that would feed 50 people! Needless to say, I had to adjust for fewer servings. I had no written instructions, so I had to create the correct measurements through trial and error. Sometimes it worked; sometimes it didn’t. Hence, this cookbook is a true labor of love.
Working together in the kitchen to create a meal to feed those you love is a bonding experience that Amira wants to share with her readers. Her four children, Kristin, Lavonne, Natalie and Alvin all know their way around a kitchen but it was Kristin’s engagement that made her ask her mother to write down her recipes. She wanted to carry that tradition into her own home.
It took more than two years to compile her collection. Every recipe had to be tried and some took a while to sort out the details of ingredient amounts. Then came the task of writing the cooking directions. “There are so many people that helped with this book,” says Amira. She’s not exaggerating.
From the children that asked to the husband that shopped and the mothers that cooked and the friend who wrote down each step of the cooking process and everyone else who was involved – including the guy that unknowingly gave her the title – Amira is grateful for the help. Her book includes a “thank you” page and a lovely forward that explains the traditions and that some of the recipes take more time than people have grown used to. “You must chop and slice and dice and stir and boil and bake and roast.” The results, she promises, are “worth the effort.”
Scientists tell us that our sense of smell is directly related to memory. For Amira, the smell of a good meal takes her back to Tel Keppe where during the holidays, the entire village would celebrate as family. “The aroma still tickles my nose.”
The cookbook is a labor of love not only for her children, her grandchildren and her husband, cooking and preparing meals to nourish their bodies and souls, but it is also a way of keeping her mother and grandmother with her and introducing them to each new generation. “It’s a legacy,” she says. “A legacy of love.”
The cookbook is only available at select locations: Kashat Mediterranean Market in Farmington Hills; Babylon Ethnic Foods in West Bloomfield; Ishtar Ethnic Food in West Bloomfield; Salon Edge in West Bloomfield (Amira’s place of employment); North Oaks Dental in Royal Oak (her son’s practice), CK Fruit Market in Madison Heights; the Chaldean Cultural Center in West Bloomfield; and the website amiraskitchen.com.
“Homemade, delicious dessert is a symbol of love when you can’t find the right words.” So reads the introduction to the dessert section of the book. The Chaldean News is pleased to share “Magda’s recipe” for apricot preserve coffee cake, Amira’s husband “Immad’s favorite cake.”
Cake ‘d Murraba
Prep time: 30 minutes
Cooking time: 30-35 minutes
Prep: preheat oven to 350°.
Ingredients and Materials:
3 eggs
1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons orange juice
1 cup sugar
3 ½ -4 cups all-purpose flour, divided
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon ground cardamom (hale)
zest of one orange
2 cups apricot preserves
2 round 9” pans, greased with solid
Crisco shortening
thick plastic food wrap
large bowl
medium bowl
whisk
Directions:
In a large bowl, whisk eggs. Then add butter, vanilla, orange juice and sugar, stirring together for one minute. In a medium bowl, mix 3 cups of flour with baking powder, cardamom and orange zest. Slowly add dry ingredients to the large bowl of wet ingredients. Do not use an electric mixer; combine ingredients by hand. Dough should be dry, not sticky, and able to roll out smoothly. If dough is too sticky, slowly add a little flour. Divide the dough evenly into 4 small balls. Place 1 dough ball between 2 pieces of thick plastic wrap. Roll out this bottom layer into a 10” circle. Remove upper plastic wrap and flip the dough into a baking pan, carefully removing the second piece of plastic wrap afterward. Fill the bottom of the baking pan with the dough, gently pressing to get the air out. Next, press the dough halfway of the sides of the baking pan. Top this with 1 cup of apricot preserve and spread evenly. Next, roll out top dough into a 9” circle. Place this top layer of rolled dough over the preserves, gently pressing the dough. Repeat for the second 9” pan. Egg wash: In a small bowl, beat 1 egg with 1 teaspoon of water. Using a pastry brush, gently brush the egg wash over the top of each cake before placing in the oven. Bake both cakes on middle rack for 30-35 minutes. Serve with fresh coffee or tea. Awafi!