[Sca-cooks] Fwd: Recipe redaction, A Type of Ahrash

[Terri Morgan]

I cannot eat lamb and feel sad when such interesting recipes are presented. In your opinion, would there be a type (combination) of ground meat that would approximate the flavour of lamb? I have used 2 parts ground turkey to one part ground beef, but have no idea if my mix actually came close since I haven't tasted lamb in 20 years or more.

Hrothny

-----Original Message-----
Some more love for the e-list...

Last night I redacted "A Type of Ahrash" from the Anonymous Andalusian
cookbook for supper:

A Type of Ahrash
This is the recipe used by Sayyid Abu al-Hasan and others in Morocco, and
they called it isfîriyâ. Take red lamb, pound it vigorously and season it
with some murri naqî', vinegar, oil, pounded garlic, pepper, saffron,
cumin, coriander, lavender, cinnamon, ginger, cloves, chopped lard, and
meat with all the gristle removed and pounded and divided, and enough egg
to envelop the whole. Make small round flatbreads (qursas) out of them
about the size of a palm or smaller, and fry them in a pan with a lot of
oil until they are browned. Then make for them a sauce of vinegar, oil, and
garlic, and leave some of it without any sauce: it is very good.

My redaction:

2 lbs ground lamb
2 eggs
2 T soy sauce (for a vague murri-esque flavor)
2 T vegetable oil
1 T cider vinegar (because it was either that or distilled white)
3 T spice blend

Smoosh together until thoroughly blended. Make small patties, fry in olive
oil. We did not use the vinegar/oil/garlic sauce (the Consort referred to
it as "salad dressing" and informed me it was not necessary), and keen eyes
will note that although garlic appears in the original recipe it does not
appear in my redaction, because I forgot it. The resultant patties were
still delicious. The recipe made 14, it probably would have made 16 if I
hadn't made them slowly larger over time. The remaining ones are going into
the freezer to be dinner one night at our camping event next week.

Consort opined that another couple teaspooons of spice blend would not have
been too much spice--I thought it was fine as it was, but agreed with him
that any more than another T would be too much. I initially thought that I
was going to need to add breadcrumbs, because it was very loose to start
with, but after it was well mixed it was just sticky. I didn't add
additional lard because the lamb was about 80% lean, and I read (possibly
in the Flori-thingy, possibly in one of the cookbooks) that "red lamb"
meant lean meat. As it was, it was just perfect, not too greasy, not at all
dry.

Spice blend:
2 T each whole grains of paradise and cubebs, ground
2 T ground cumin
2 T ground cinnamon
2 T ground ginger
~ 1 t whole cloves, ground
~ 1/2 t saffron, ground with the cloves, etc.

Keen eyes will note the absence of pepper, coriander, and
lavender--Dependent #2 is horribly allergic to both pepper and
coriander/cilantro while Dependent #4 is horribly allergic to lavender. In
the interests of not poisoning household members, I substituted of grains
of paradise and cubebs for the pepper and coriander, and just omitted the
lavender entirely.

-- 
Margaret FitzWilliam of Kent, OL