• Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Snapchat
  • Twitter
  • YouTube
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

MsMarmiteLover

  • Food
    • Recipes
    • Vegetarian
    • Vegan
  • Travel
    • France
    • Italy
    • Spain
    • UK
  • Wine
  • Gardens
  • Supperclubs/Events
  • About
    • Press
    • Books
  • Shop
    • Cart

Beyond the conflict: Israel, blogging and a recipe for tofu shakshouka

August 19, 2012 3 Comments Filed Under: Food, Recipes, Uncategorized

Shakshouka: at Cordelia restaurant in Jaffa, at beach restaurant Manta Ray, at Arkadia restaurant in Jerusalem. 
How do you solve a problem like Israel?
Well, you can’t. Certainly a mere food blogger such as myself cannot. All I can do is enjoy and learn about their food, coming as it does from the Jewish diaspora and infused with influences from their Arab neighbours.
So I’m going to write about Israeli food – not the politics, which is a topic without end and probably without solution in my lifetime. Another thing I will talk about is that, on this trip, I got to meet some of the most important food bloggers in the world.
My week in Israel was as the guest of Kinetis, an organisation that seeks to promote Israeli culture beyond the conflict. They invited bloggers from key countries* and, at various times, groups who specialise in particular subjects: music, mummy bloggers and food bloggers. 
Why bloggers rather than ‘proper’ journalists? Joanna Landau, the organiser of these trips explains: “Recent research shows that people are not influenced by celebrity endorsement. Rather they believe their friends’ recommendations.” She elaborated by saying that bloggers are more like friends, people follow their exploits, they are influencers in the way that ordinary journalists aren’t. 
On this journey I met probably the most influential individual food blogger in the world, David Lebovitz, a tall man with a slyly caustic sense of humour. He was originally a pastry chef at the famed Alice Waters restaurant ‘Chez Panisse’ in the United States, until he upped and escaped to Paris where he has resided for nine years. He has an adoring public and gets hundreds of comments on each beautifully written and photographed blog post. Equally influential in her own country is heavily pregnant Estonian blogger Pille Petersoo, creator of the Nami-Nami food blog, who has become a TV and radio pundit expounding on her day job of sociology as well as food. Also on the trip were two ‘professional’ bloggers, paid to write by heavy hitter (both in terms of traffic and influence) group food sites such as Serious Eats (Erin Zimmer, who has a ridiculously infectious giggle) and The Kitchn, represented by Cambria Bold (fabulous font-like name).
Becoming a successful blogger, like anything, requires application and talent. But most of all, you have to keep going. So many blogs stutter and stop after three months. Lebowitz and Pille both started pre-blogger format, in 1999 and 2000 respectively. That’s over a decade of constant posting. Without pay. You only do this if you are committed, slightly obsessed and really have something to say. 
Serious Eats and The Kitchn, the latter site being an off-shoot of Apartment Therapy, started around 2005. Each employs around a dozen bloggers who post several times a day. 
Another reason for inviting bloggers as opposed to mainstream press is that Israel has a vibrant IT and new media sector, not far behind Silicon Valley. One part of the trip we met Israeli internet start-ups and listened to their pitches for new foodie apps. Said one “ipad style computers will match then replace desktop computer within two or three years’. 
Apps, and therefore bloggers, are inexorably part of the future of publishing. 

And so to the food. Yesterday, with sultry summer weather, leafing through the reissue of Claudia Roden’s evocative book ‘Picnics’, I felt in the mood for testing some of the dishes I ate in Israel, at home. Shakshouka is a classic Middle Eastern breakfast dish, eggs baked in a spicy tomato sauce. On my last day in Israel, I went to a cool vegetarian friendly hang-out cafe Orna and Ella  with my friend Professor Aeyal Gross, who had just been protesting against the White Night in Tel Aviv. Orna and Ella served a vegan version: tofu shakshouka. It was one of the best things I ate in Israel.
Yesterday I made it, not knowing the official recipe, but just like before, I scoffed the lot in one sitting. I’m a big fan of tofu, which tends to get a bad press for being bland but, paired with strong tastes, it’s an extraordinary flavour sponge. For this dish use silken tofu, a delightful textural contrast. For the last couple of weeks I’ve been getting purple spring onions in my Riverford Organics vegetable box, so I used those too, for the taste and the colour.

A good slug of olive oil
Half a dozen cherry tomatoes, split in half
1 red bell pepper, seeded, cut into thin strips
5 sprigs of purple spring onions, chopped into rounds
5 cloves of garlic, cut into slithers
A tin of chopped tomatoes
1 box of silken tofu, cut into squares (on your palm, or in the box)
1 tablespoon of sweet paprika
1 tablespoon of freshly ground coriander seeds
1 teaspoon of ground cumin
A few strands of saffron
1 teaspoon or more, to taste, of crushed chilli peppers
Salt to taste
A scoop of sour cream or yoghurt (optional)

Heat up the oil in a good quality cast iron skillet or a decent non-stick frying pan such as Green Pan. Then add the cherry tomatoes and the red pepper strips, fry until slightly golden. Add the spring onions. Ditto.
Then add everything else. Don’t stir. It’s cooked once all the tomatoes seem cooked through and the tofu has sort of poached into a silky wobbliness but still retain a cube-like shape.
Once it’s done, add some sour cream or yoghurt and maybe a few slices of the purple spring onions on top. Eat with warm pitta.
Really, this is a dish to convince non-veggies. 

The red and green peppers are just starting to ripen in my garden

As I couldn’t find the fresh mint in the garden, because I was thinking, mmm fresh mint tea with sugar and pine nuts to cool me down, I accompanied this with a citron pressé, a cool tall drink, popular in French cafés. 

Juice of half a lemon
1-2 tablespoons of caster sugar
Soda water
Ice cubes
Squeeze the lemon into a tall glass. Add the rest of the ingredients.

Citron pressé, watching bumble bees bounce upon the sprigs of lavender, a pink blanket on a green lawn

*Kinetis target bloggers from particular countries like France, Spain and the UK because they tend to have a negative view upon Israel. “The UK has always been pro-Arab”, said Joanna.

Recent posts

Dr Saira Hameed pic:Kerstin Rodgers

The Full Diet: interview with obesity expert Dr Saira Hameed

July 5, 2022

Hostile environment training. Me in front with our kidnappers.

Hostile Environment Training

July 1, 2022

Air Fryer recipe: aubergine sticks with yoghurt, tahini sauce

June 20, 2022

Previous Post: « The Urban Kitchen Gardener by Tom Moggach
Next Post: Light lunch for a city summer »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Anonymous

    August 20, 2012 at 3:56 am

    Thank you for your blog on shakshuka. I really appreciated it. It reminded me of when I went to Israel last year and ate shakshuka. I haven't tried it with tofu yet, but would be very interested to try it. I also appreciated the information about Kinetis. How did you come across this? Although I am a Christian, I am very passionate about the Jewish people and culture of Israel. My heart is very similar to that of Kinetis, as I love sharing my love for the Jewish people and culture with other people and making them aware just how special Israel really is.

    Kind Regards, Debbie

    Reply
  2. Red Kite

    August 24, 2012 at 7:17 pm

    Mmmmmmm shakshuka. One of my favourite things.

    Reply
  3. Red Kite

    August 24, 2012 at 7:18 pm

    Mmmmmmmmmm…shakshuka. One of my favourite things.

    Reply

Leave a Reply to Anonymous Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Recipe Rating




Primary Sidebar

MsMarmiteLover aka Kerstin Rodgers.

Chef, photographer, author, journalist, blogger. Pioneer of the supperclub movement.

This is my food and travel blog, with recipes, reviews and travel stories. I also stray into politics, feminism, gardening.

Subscribe to my mailing list

msmarmitelover

Kerstin Rodgers/MsMarmiteLover
This vegetarian met the worlds most famous butcher This vegetarian met the worlds most famous butcher @dariocecchinimacellaio whose shop is located in Panzano, Tuscany. He trained my favourite food writer @bill.buford in butchery. I told him I didn’t eat meat & he twinkled ‘to beef or not to beef’. He has a Clark gable elegance: moustache, slicked back hair, charm, & a designer shirt depicting cows from @cotondoux paris. I instinctively wore a red & white striped dress which matched the colours of his shop, the red & white of the surgeon. They serve you glasses of Dario’s own Chianti Classico complete with straw bottomed ‘fiasco’. Now where else do you get that? When I return I will try the vegetarian menu at his restaurant opposite. #butcher #panzano #tuscany #chiantishire #chianticlassico #foodsiena #foodreportage
On a very steep street in siena, Tuscany. They’v On a very steep street in siena, Tuscany. They’ve had to be creative with the table legs. We went to the Palio horse race in the shell-shaped piazza where the passion & downright enmity of the different contrada or districts, each represented by an animal or mascot, was on display. The riders go bareback. It’s the horse that wins not the jockey. A riderless horse can win. There are many false starts, a massive explosion going boom in the square each time which led kids to cry. We waited for hours in the cheap seats- the burnt ochre brickwork of the centre. While tourists at windows paid 600 euros for the privilege. I loved the singing, like football chants but operatic- lots of finger pointing at each other. After I went to a contrada dinner on the streets of Siena, a rare opportunity. For 35 euros you attend the largest ‘supper club’ ever- 800 people, 4 courses, generous helpings of chianti. The servers are local teenagers. I wore my ‘Oca’ or goose scarf around my shoulders, looking like a girl guide. A bucket list item ticked off. I only wish my daughter @siennamarla was with me. #travel #food #italy #chiantishire #siena #palio #supperclub #oca #contrada
Looking at vegetables in Italy. Photo by @loredana Looking at vegetables in Italy. Photo by @loredanaparisi72
My piece in the @hamandhigh about the 3 day @heat My piece in the @hamandhigh about the  3 day @heathostile training course. Incredibly interesting & challenging. Link: https://www.hamhigh.co.uk/things-to-do/hostile-environment-training-9037980 to read more #hostileenvironmenttraining
Supper club dishes from Saturday: pickled beetroot Supper club dishes from Saturday: pickled beetroot eggs, cheeseboard, stracciatella & cucumber, tomato/strawberry/peashoot salad with real balsamic & spruce oil, home cured dill gravlax, smoked salmon, homemade sourdough crisp bread, potato salad with wild fennel & lots more! #supperclub #midsummer #eattherainbow (miss you @linnsoederstroem)
Last nights supper club. My first supper club in 2 Last nights supper club. My first supper club in 2 years was great fun. I’m pleased with my food, the guests were lovely, it looked magical in the garden. But the weather! I even had to bring my duvets from the bedroom out. They looked like refugees. But this brought even more laughter! Next event September
My first supperclub in two years will take place t My first supperclub in two years will take place this Saturday 18th June starting at 7.30pm. Tickets are £50 byo you can book here: https://msmarmitelover.com/product/midsommar-supper-club there are still a few places left. Pescetarian menu. Scandi and botanical influences. #gettingbackonmyfeet #postpandemic #smallbusinesses #supperclub #london
I recently completed the 3 day @heathostile train I recently completed the 3 day  @heathostile training course. On the last day I was kidnapped by ex-special forces for a few hours & learnt how to deal with compliance training & a hostile environment. It was one of the most interesting experiences of my life. 3 intense days of combat first aid, navigation & how to survive in a war zone. I handled short, long guns, mortars, grenades, bullets, and tourniquet & bandaged an amputee. I learnt where to sit in a car, where to hide from a bullet, where to protect myself if in a car. It was brilliant. Highly recommended for any journalists, photographers, cameramen, charity workers, paramedics going into any difficult environment say a disaster or war. The stories from the tutors & the other participants were so interesting. My piece on it out soon. Book a course: https://hostile-environment.co.uk/  They also do jungle & desert training. I’d love to join the Antarctic expedition. Anyway that’s me hooded in the front. #adventures #het #hostileenvironmenttraining #experiences #travel
Bundoran beach, Donegal. I spent a week knocking o Bundoran beach, Donegal. I spent a week knocking on doors, going to libraries, searching through graveyards for my Irish forebears. It’s really hard to find information prior to 1850. I found this in last years trip to Arbroath in Scotland. Headstones wear out, records are lost or burnt in a fire, everybody has the same name and are known by nicknames, successive children have the same first name, that usually means they died and the next one is called by the same thing. Women did have children out of wedlock, and people remarried more often than you’d think, plus families fall out & never see each other again. I learnt that my Irish great grandfather michael went to Glasgow & met a woman who came from a similar place: somewhere wild & beautiful by the sea. Then they and their children came to london. Chasing the work & the money always. Politics and economics matter for they push people around from rural to city. And now we rodgers are Londoners. #ireland #scotland #family #travel #roots
How some of us celebrate the Queen’s jubilee! My How some of us celebrate the Queen’s jubilee! My sister & a random Irishman come for the Rory Gallagher festival in ballyshannon. Sis has pulled already!  #getyourcoat #sexpistols #ballyshannon #rorygallagherfestival #ireland
Tullaghan, county Leitrim, Donegal, where my grea Tullaghan, county Leitrim, Donegal,  where my great great grandfather john Rodgers was a postman, then a tailor, then a pawnbroker. #irishheritage #donegal #myancestry #irish #rodgers #travel
I’ve taken down the previous post as it’s poor I’ve taken down the previous post as it’s poor timing considering what’s happened over the last 24 hours. Being British I’ve not grown up around guns. It’s interesting to be on this course and find out more about the reality of them, although my focus is learning the ‘golden triangle’ of first aid, communications and navigation. But at the same time It’s depressing how in America nothing will ever change regarding gun law. RIP.
Me as a punk. #pinkhair @caplanmelissa Me as a punk. #pinkhair @caplanmelissa
Sniffin’ glue: Me n @Jaybladesmbe at the Loctite Sniffin’ glue: Me n @Jaybladesmbe at the Loctite pop up yesterday. I’m all about repairing and upcycling my brocante finds: this time a beautiful pale wood lamp shade stand which had broken off at the bottom. I’m going to rewire it with 2 core sky blue twisted fabric wire, pop on my hand sewn pleated lampshade I learnt to do @workshopminerva and it shall be beautiful. Don’t chuck out your chintz: repair it! #therepairshop #selfie #interiors #popup
in June I’m having my first supper club in two y in June I’m having my first supper club in two years: here is the link to book: https://msmarmitelover.com/product/midsommar-supper-club £50 18th June  Saturday night. Byo.
#chelseaflower coming up. Last year I bought these succulents and planted them in a vintage zinc garden sieve. Now they are flowering. My balcony is like a little greenhouse: I can grow aubergines & other plants that usually need to be under glass. #londongarden #may #plants #succulents in the garden
Lemon drizzle cake. The trick is not to stint on t Lemon drizzle cake. The trick is not to stint on the citrus. I used 7: 2 Italian lemons (from Lidl):some ordinary lemons and some limes (18p) at Lidl. Don’t be afraid to mix and match your citrus. I also used buttermilk from @fenfarmdairy in Suffolk from their honesty shop. Last night we ate it still warm from the oven. #cake #lemondrizzle #homebaking #citrus #buttermilk
A Simple tomato, goats cheese and basil salad, spa A Simple tomato, goats cheese and basil salad, spanking fresh asparagus / fried in olive oil, season, then add a little boiling water, not too much, put on the lid, dressed with lemon zest & Parmesan, @fenfarmdairy baron bigod cheese, good bread. This is how I like to eat. Claire’s plates found at the beccles brocante. #suffolk #suffolkfood #supper #dinnerwithfriends  #vintageplates
Can’t wait to see what they will be like when th Can’t wait to see what they will be like when they are fired. All my favourite themes: gingham and scallops. Thanks to @clairebelljar for a wonderful weekend and pottery workshop. Such fun! #workingwithyourhands #playtime #creativity #ceramics #pottery #suffolk
Making plates with talented potter & old South Ham Making plates with talented potter & old South Hampstead girl @clairebelljar in Suffolk. She has the most beautiful house I’ve ever seen. Such a joy to be reunited with her. #friendsreunited #makers #potters #scalloped #wildflowers #cowparsley #pottery
Another budget gourmet recipe, the Sicilian capona Another budget gourmet recipe, the Sicilian caponata, which is like a more interesting ratatouille, in which you add capers, olives & vinegar. £2.50p. I was asked to develop a series of recipes which were delicious enough to serve at a dinner party but also cheap. I shopped at Lidl. #costoflivingcrisis #budgetgourmet #recipe #vegetarian #vegan #lidluk
Load More... Follow on Instagram

Archives

Copyright © 2022 msmarmitelover