276514 Sat Feb 12 17:25:40 -0800 2005 16 31 Home Cooking 0 1459095 About 10 years ago, I printed (but never tried) some recipes from a website called Zoon's Kitchen. I have recently discovered that these recipes replicate, almost exactly, the wonderful Persian food the mom of a high school friend used to make. I recently tried to find the site but it no longer exists! I only have the recipes for Khorest Karafs (Celery Stew) and the Gormeh Sabzi (Green Herb stew) but wish I had printed out all the recipes from the site becuz these two are so perfect. Does anyone have any of the other recipes from that site. I would be sooooo happy to get them!! Good Persian cookbook recommendations would be much appreciated as well. I have tried Najmieh Batamangli cookbooks, but was not impressed. Thanks! Sat Feb 12 17:25:40 -0800 2005 0 kavi 1 1459096 Really? I just bought silk road cooking. What's wrong with her books? Sat Feb 12 17:32:36 -0800 2005 1459095 0 Roses 2 1459118 I have her older books, "A Taste of Persia" and "Persian Cooking for a Healthy Kitchen" and have not seen the one you have. I love her descriptions of the culture and the history she includes. I'm not saying the the food produced using her recipes are not good, but they just don't reproduce the flavors I remember. I don't know if this is a regional difference in cooking styles or if she substituted ingredients but the results are somewhat different. For example, she uses lime juice in the recipes whereas the recipes I have from Zoon's Kitchen call for limu omani (dried lime) which produces a different flavor. Sat Feb 12 20:44:00 -0800 2005 1459096 0 kavi 3 1459145 Batmanglij's "New Food of Life" uses dried Persian lime in the gormeh sabzi and koresht karafs recipes. Ramazani's "Persian Cooking" uses dried Persian lime in the gormeh sabzi but lemon juice in the koresht karafs. When fresh juice is used, Batmanglij seems to prefer lime juice and Ramazani to prefer lemon juice. IMHO, both are pretty good cookbooks, but I'm no expert on Persian food. Sun Feb 13 02:54:50 -0800 2005 1459118 0 Chimayo Joe 1 1459098 Have you tried Persian Cooking: A Table of Exotic Delights by Nesta Ramazani? Is it any good? I've been getting into middle eastern cooking and thinking of buying some cookbooks. Sat Feb 12 17:50:01 -0800 2005 1459095 0 Roses 1 1459206 Hi. I have an older cookbook, "In a Persian Kitchen" by Maideh Mazda, from Charles E. Tuttle Company, from 1960. It is excellent, and you might be able to borrow it through the library, or find it on the internet. I had a Persian friend in college, so learned to cook rice the Persian method, "chelo", and loved the chicken with pomegranate sauce, "Fesenjan". And, I remember green rice, excellent flavors of dill and cinnamon and such. I will post a separate recipe above for a fantastic and simple way to prepare and improve the flavors of melons, especially this time of year when they aren't at their best. It's from this same cookbook, called Melon Delight. Sun Feb 13 18:17:21 -0800 2005 1459095 0 JennBenn 2 1459210 Not sure if that book would do for what Kavi seems to be looking for. No dried lime in any of the recipes, at least. "In a Persian Kitchen"'s recipes use lemon juice. Sun Feb 13 18:36:04 -0800 2005 1459206 0 Chimayo Joe 2 1459355 This book makes substitutions all the time, but it is excellent if you aren't able to easily get many Persian ingredients. They're good simple recipes and the use of spices will be very interesting to people unfamiliar with Persian cooking. More like home cooking than some of the fancier books like Batmanglij's New Food of Life. Mon Feb 14 23:21:14 -0800 2005 1459206 0 plum 1 1459244 The cookbook my Iranian husband uses most is M.R. Ghanoonparvar's "Persian Cuisine: Traditional Foods". There is a second volume on regional foods, also good. The publisher's page is: http://www.mazdapub.com/Persian-Cuisine.htm I don't like Batmanglij's cookbooks that much either, but a few of her recipes are spot on. I always use her recipe for khoresht-e lubiya (stew with green beans) from New Food of Life. Khoresht-e karafs is a favourite of mine too. One of my husband's relatives makes it with sour yellow plums (alu bukhara) and it is fantastic. This same woman tops her mast-e khiar (cucumber yogurt) with rose petals and angelica (gol-par), so perhaps Batmanglij isn't 100 percent bosh. I once posted the family recipes for chelo and ghormeh sabzi on the General Topics board but I am afraid I can't find where they have gone. Finally, if you can remember the URL for Zoon's kitchen, see if the Internet Archive Project "Wayback Machine" can help you out: http://www.archive.org/ Mon Feb 14 09:05:01 -0800 2005 1459095 0 plum 2 1459335 100 percent bosh! Crap! Why? Do they not come out as they should? Mon Feb 14 16:58:56 -0800 2005 1459244 0 Roses 3 1459353 Some of Batmanglij's recipes turn out quite well. I would recommend khoresht-e lubiya sabzi (stew with green beans), kuku-ye sabzi (herb omlette), ash-e reshteh (noodle soup) and her recipe for carrot preserves with rosewater. However, her recipes do tend to be a bit fiddly, and she uses lots of ingredients that my husband insists aren't supposed to be there (like cardamom in gheimeh). She uses a lot more rose petals than most Persian cooks.... Other recipes he insists he's never seen anyone make, like quince stuffed with meat. I like the pretty pictures, but Batmanglij doesn't seem haimish home cooking to me. I have better results with Ghanoonparvar or Mazda. Mon Feb 14 23:14:37 -0800 2005 1459335 0 plum 4 1459360 I'd say the Ramazani book that's been mentioned in this thread falls between Batmanglij's "New Food of Life" and Mazda's "In a Persian Kitchen". Recipes aren't as fiddly as Batmanglij's and not as stripped down as Mazda's. Ramazani does use some ingredients that caused me to raise an eyebrow though. I don't think that soy sauce is traditional. Maybe something that modern Persian cooks have adopted? Or maybe just a Ramazani quirk? Tue Feb 15 03:03:56 -0800 2005 1459353 0 Chimayo Joe 5 1459361 La times did an experiment once making a middle eastern grain cake from an ancient recipe and left it to ferment for months to see what they would get. Anyway, long story short, end result: soy sauce. Tue Feb 15 04:20:48 -0800 2005 1459360 0 taka 2 1459336 Have you used Nesta Ramazani or Margaret Shaida or Wendy Ebrahim? Do you recommend any of them? Mon Feb 14 17:06:56 -0800 2005 1459244 0 Roses 3 1459342 I haven't tried any of those you mention (never heard of them actually), but will make an effort to find them. There are some Persian recipes in Claudia Roden's "The New Book of Middle Eastern Food" (a really great book!!). Her Addas Polow (rice w/lentils and dates) is wonderful, although I modify it slightly by adding fresh, chopped garlic when cooking the meat. Mon Feb 14 17:55:24 -0800 2005 1459336 0 kavi 1 1459245 I think this is the Zoon's Kitchen you are looking for. Link: http://web.archive.org/web/20020124171858/http://ozone.ess.sunysb.edu/docs/Food.shtml Mon Feb 14 09:13:14 -0800 2005 1459095 0 plum again 2 1459302 Thank you -- this is the website!! I am printing out the recipes as I type this so I don't loose them again. I really appreciate everyone's help and comments!! Mon Feb 14 14:24:31 -0800 2005 1459245 0 Kavi