Category: Appetizer

Camembert en Croûte Salad

People often ask me if I feel deprived as a serious foodie who keeps kosher, and the answer is “no”. As someone who’s been kosher since birth, I don’t crave “treif” simply because I’ve never tried it. And there is really so much available on the kosher market today, that I don’t really feel like I’m missing out.

BUT… (there’s always a but isn’t there?!), traveling as a kosher keeper is hard stuff. Especially when you go places that don’t have much kosher available, and you’ve got to stuff your bag with cans of tuna and crackers. I have to admit that part isn’t easy, and for that reason, I usually choose to travel to places based on the kosher availability there.

Which totally works for me because eating out, I feel, is part and parcel of a vacation. I’m not the sit-by-the-beach and suntan kinda gal, so I’d rather hit the town and see what it has to offer.


I love exploring different food cultures and traveling really opens your eyes to different ingredients and flavor combinations. On my recent trip to Paris, I ordered the camembert salad, which was served simply over a bed of iceberg lettuce, with a drizzle of balsamic and honey and a sprinkling of pine nuts. It really made me rethink the whole camembert thing (I always just wrap it in puff pastry), and I knew I was going to recreate it when I got home,

I took the best of the salad, and paired it with the “en croute” concept, for a deconstructed cheese salad of your dreams. There’s not much else to say about this other than IT’S AS GOOD AS IT LOOKS.

Camembert, if you’re not familiar, is a soft and creamy, surface-ripened cow’s milk cheese. The white bloomy rind is totally edible, with barely any moldy flavor. As someone who is not a fan of moldy cheese, I absolutely love Camembert (and brie!), so I wouldn’t be scared off by it.


If you’re not quite ready for Camembert on it’s own, I recommend wrapping it in puff pastry with some fig jam and candied nuts and baking until puffed and golden. That’s really what got me into this wheel of wonder to begin with and it’s absolutely amazing!

Camembert En Croûte Salad

2 sheets puff pastry, thawed in the fridge overnight
1 stick unsalted butter, softened
2 large cloves garlic, minced
1/2 tsp oregano
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp kosher salt
2 tbsp parmesan cheese
2 bunches cherry tomatoes on the vine
2 tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper, to taste
1 wheel Camembert or brie
1/4 cup pine nuts
1 4oz. pkg baby arugula
1 6oz. jar marinated artichoke hearts
raw honey, optional, for serving

For the basil oil:
1/4 cup packed basil leaves
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
salt and pepper, to taste

Add to a blender or food processor and process until smooth. Strain out the basil leaves if you wish.

Store in an airtight container in the fridge for up to one week (bring to room temp before using).

NOTE: for bright green oil, blanch the basil leaves first by placing them in boiling water for about 10 seconds and then removing to ice water.

For the balsamic syrup:

1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
1 tsp honey

Combine the balsamic vinegar and honey in a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer, uncovered, until it is reduced by half and coats the back of a spoon. Cool completely (it will thicken as it cools), then transfer to a jar and store in the fridge for up to 1 month.

Method:

In a small bowl, combine the butter, garlic, oregano, garlic powder and salt.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Remove the puff pastry sheets from the fridge and cut into thirds at the folds. Spread the butter over each piece and transfer to a parchment lined baking sheet. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese. Using a pizza cutter, cut into triangles. Return to the fridge while you prepare the other components.

Place the tomatoes on one side of a baking sheet, drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Prepare a small foil packet and place the pine nuts in it. Place in the corner of the same baking sheet. Prepare a second foil packet and place the Camembert inside. Place on the baking sheet, opposite the pine nuts packet.

Place the baking sheet of puff pastry and tomatoes in the oven. After 8-10 minutes, remove the packet of pine nuts. After 15 minutes, remove the brie.  Continue baking the tomatoes and puff pastry for another 10 minutes, until the puff pastry is puffed and golden, and the tomatoes have softened.

To plate: arrange the arugula on a platter. Top with tomatoes, artichokes and pine nuts. Place the Camembert on top with the puff pastry alongside. Right before serving, drizzle basil oil, baslamic syrup and honey over the salad and serve.


halloumi cheese waffles with tomato jam and balsamic syrup
brie marsala pizza
dried fruit brie bites

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Arayes: Kofta Pita Pockets


I love how today’s food trends have made Middle Eastern food so popular. Otherwise, I probably never would have heard of sabich, or hawaij, or arayes.

So what are they? Arayes are native to Lebanon, where they stuff kofta, a spiced beef or lamb mixture, into pita pockets and grill them. Yes, it’s as good as it’s sounds.

What I love even more than traditional arayes, is that chef’s have been creating their own adaptation of the classic for a fun twist. A local restaurant had fish arayes on the menu last week, and I’ve been seeing lots of other variations of the traditional filling as well.

While I’m usually one for turning tradition on it’s head, I loved my classic recipe so much that I went with it. But I did spare you the annoying blogger habit of calling anything with 3 corners hamantaschen, because frankly, they are not. Although in the festive Purim spirit, they are triangular, and they really do make the perfect Purim party appetizer.

Speaking of Purim party appetizers, I love to put out of bunch of finger food for my Purim feast every year because everyone is so busy coming and going, there’s hyper kids all over the place and probably a bunch of adult drunks too – so no one really wants a formal meal. Finger food makes the perfect spread and arayes are just the thing.

Some other great party appetizers that I’ve done in the past include:

drunken hasselback salami
pulled beef tacos
hummus bassar
breaded honey drumsticks
hot dog eggrolls
potato borekas
franks in blanks
chicken wings
charcuterie board
roasted sweet potatoes with gooey pecans (recipe in Millennial Kosher)
lachmagine pizza (recipe  in Millennial Kosher)

Enjoy!

Arayes Pita Pockets
YIELD: approximately 24 pita pockets

1 small onion, roughly chopped
2 cloves garlic
1/2 cup packed parsley
1 1/2 lbs. ground beef (not lean) or ground lamb
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp allspice
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1/4 cup pine nuts, optional
6 pitas
1/3 cup olive oil
prepared tahini, for serving

Method:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Add the onion, garlic and parsley to the bowl of a food processor and pulse until chopped. Add the mixture to a mixing bowl with the beef, cumin, allspice, salt, pepper and pine nuts (if using). Gently stir the mixture to incorporate all the ingredients.

Cut the pitas in half and fill each pocket with about 1/4 cup of the meat mixture, flattening it out so it fills the pita evenly. Cut the pita halves into quarters and place on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Brush both sides of the pita with olive oil and bake for 20 minutes, flipping halfway through.

Serve warm with tahini, for dipping.

Related Recipes:

Jerusalem hummus in jars
mechshie
herbed pita chips
grilled chicken fattoush

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Salami Tarte Tatin

OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG!!!!
S-A-L-A-M-I  T-A-R-T-E  T-A-T-I-N!!!!!!!

OK I can’t remember the last time I’ve been so excited about a recipe!!! Salami time AKA Purim, AKA the Busy In Brooklyn yearly salami tradition is here and YAYYYYYY!!


I love that the young girl who used to throw her weekly salami sandwiches down the incinerator chute is now known for her salami trash-ups! My friend recently said to me, “You know Chanie, no one is every going to look at salami without thinking of you”, and I’m OK with it. In fact I’m all over it. Because becoming known for a particular ingredient means I’m doing a good job as a blogger and that my friends, is my jam (also job, but yes, jam!).

So… why in the world am I so excited? Well I’ll tell you. If you’re not well versed in French pastry, you might not be familiar with the classic dessert, TARTE TATIN, an upside-down pastry in which fruit is caramelized in butter and sugar as it bakes under a blanket of puff pastry. Fancy pastry chef’s make their own, but most recipes call for the store-bought variety which means only one thing – QUICK & EASY.

But still, WHY am I so excited??? Well traditional tarte tatin uses fruit as it’s base, and you even might find some unique recipes for vegetable-based tarts, but you have never found a SALAMI tarte tatin and I, my friends, think it’s pretty genius. And I’m a pretty hard sell.

Whats more than the salami is the bourbon caramel that the salami bathes in as it cooks down. Yes, you got that right. Bourbon. Caramel. And although I abhor margarine, there was no winning here because coconut oil + salami is a no go, so I caved. And I’m ok with it. I mean the puff pastry is virtually all margarine anyway, so whats another few tablespoons, amiright?

It’s hard to keep up with myself with this salami thing and I was worried about how I’d one-up my previous recipes. The now infamous drunken hasselback salami is sold at virtually every kosher deli stand, and salami babka has made it around the world, so coming up with something new was quite daunting. But I’d said I hashtag #nailedit on this one.

I’m also crushing on the photos of this recipe, which is why I’m doing a lot of salami rambling aka filler content :) But in case you’re still scratching your head on this whole salami thing – it’s a BUSY IN BROOKLYN Purim tradition that I started a couple of years ago on the blog, after reading about a custom to eat salami on Purim, since it’s hung, like HAMAN. Cute, right??

I hope you love this recipe as much as I do!  Happy almost-Purim!

Salami Tarte Tatin

1-2 14oz. Abeles & Heymann salamis, sliced 1/4″ thick
1/2 stick margarine
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup bourbon
1/2 tsp salt
1 sheet puff pastry sheet, thawed in the refrigerator
whole grain mustard, for serving

Method:

Remove the puff pastry from the fridge and roll it out to the same width as you skillet. Using a knife, trim the puff pastry into a round shape to roughly fit the size of your skillet. Return to the fridge.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In a cast iron (or oven-safe) skillet, melt the margarine and brown sugar, whisking as it cooks so the mixture combines into a caramel. Add the salt and bourbon and continue stirring until the mixture is thick and bubbly. Add the salami slices, overlapping them slightly to form a pattern (you may need more or less depending on the size of your pan and how you lay them out). Cover the salami with the puff pastry and tuck in the sides, if needed, with a spatula.

Transfer the tarte to the oven and bake for 35 minutes, until the puff pastry is puffed and golden.

Place a large plate over the skillet and flip it over.

Serve warm with mustard.

NOTE: this pastry is best served fresh as the dough can get soggy from the syrup as it it sits.

VARIATION: for a sweet and spicy caramel, add a spoonful of mustard to the caramel.

This post is sponsored by Abeles & Heymann.

Other Salami Recipes:

last year: salami potato latkes
two years ago: salami babka
three years ago: salami quiche
four years ago: beer battered salami chips with beer mustard
five years ago: drunken hasselback salami
six years ago: salami chips

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Everything Bagel Keto Crackers

I’ve been dieting ever since I can remember, and if you’ve been with BIB since the early days, you probably remember when I posted about the South Beach Diet which I went on religiously after every baby. But then I started a career in food and diets that eliminated entire food groups became difficult to stick to. I also had a 90 day stint with Whole30, which I still firmly believe in as a nutritional reset, but not really as a way of life. It’s far too restrictive and there was so much prep involved which became near impossible with my busy lifestyle.

So, when I finally decided I was done with my yo-yo habits recently, I wanted to commit to a plan, if only for a few months – but a strict regimen that would help me lose the cookbook + baby + stress weight of the past few years – and with lots of people I know losing weight on keto, I decided to jump in blindly.

I thought keto would be easier to manage – that is, no major food planning – and I have to admit that that part is totally manageable. Since I cook pretty healthy for the most part, I find that adapting my regular dinners is pretty easy. I have no problem with grabbing a quick lunch, and I mostly skip breakfast, which isn’t a bad thing on keto since 16 hours of intermittent fasting is encouraged. The problem then, is the counting.


I legit hate diets where I have to weigh my food or count my calories. Maybe it’s the flashbacks of being on Weight Watchers in high school, when my scale became my best friend, but it’s legit the worst part about this diet. In this case, you’re not quite counting calories or weighing your food – you’re counting MACROS = grams of protein, carbs and fat throughout the day.


For optimum results on keto, it’s important to stay within your macros if you want to stay in ketosis. Keeping carbs under roughly 20 grams is HARD because every. single. thing. has carbs. And I’m not talking about pizza or pastries here. I’m talking about not overdoing the veggies. I’m also finding it hard to reach my fat macros, and for the first few weeks, I religiously entered my entire food diary into the Carb Manager app to keep track- and I saw a big difference. The weight came off easily. But now as I’ve settled into the diet, I’m getting sick of counting and while I haven’t gained any weight, the scale (and my inches) are extremely slow moving.

I’m still not ready to quit though, I just want to find the right balance for myself because I know this plan can really work if you do it right. In the meantime, these super easy keto crackers (which I adapted from this Pesach recipe by the genius challah/babka queen @naomi_tgis, Naomi Elberg), have been getting me through Shabbos meals because we all need some crunch to eat with our salads/dips when everyone else is eating fluffy Challah.

I’ve been trying them all different ways, and the everything bagel version wins hands down, but give the variations a try as well when you get bored of them!

Everything But the Bagel Keto Crackers
recipe adapted from Naomi Elberg

1 1/2 cups packed super-fine almond flour (167 grams) (I use Bob’s Red Mill)
1/3 cup everything bagel spice
1/4 tsp salt (see note)
1 extra large egg

Method:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a small bowl, combine the almond flour, everything bagel spice and salt and stir to incorporate. In a small bowl, lightly beat the egg. Add the egg to the flour and mix until a dough forms.

Place the dough in between 2 sheets of parchment paper and roll out until very thin. Remove the top layer of parchment paper and cut the dough into squares using a pizza wheel. Transfer to a baking sheet (if it doesn’t fit, remove scraps from around the edges and roll them out again, placing them on a second baking sheet). Bake for 10-15 minutes (depending on thickness), until lightly browned and crisp.

Cool completely and break apart. Store in an airtight container.

VARIATIONS:

For seeded crackers, add 1/3 cup mixed seeds (sesame, pumpkin, sunflower, flax) instead of the everything bagel spice.
For za’atar crackers, add 2 tbsp za’atar and 3 tbsp sesame seeds instead of the everything bagel spice.

NOTE: Depending on the saltiness of the everything bagel seasoning you use, you may/may not need to add salt.

Related Recipes:

how to build a fish board
artisan toast, 6 ways
tuna with anchovy panko crumbs

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Mushroom Cauli Soup

So it’s been nearly 3 weeks since I started keto and I have to admit – I’m bored. How much cheese/eggs/steak/broccoli, cauliflower/cabbage and nuts can you eat? I’m all about variety in my diet and I get bored so easily!


One thing I promised myself when I started this diet was that I was not going to spend my day in the kitchen preparing special foods for myself. I was going to adapt my regular family recipes and make them work for me, and so far it’s been working. When I wanted to make this soup, I just substituted the bread crumbs with almond flour and removed some of the soup for myself before adding the orzo. I added some cauliflower rice to my portion and it was such a nice change from my typical steak and roasted veggie dinner!

Coming up with soups that aren’t tomato or bean based is a little difficult (tomatoes are not encouraged on keto because they are high in sugar). In general I’m a big fan of legumes in soup, and I love grains like barley and farro too, so it’s a challenge. I decided I wanted to do a keto-approved riff on mushroom barley soup, since everyone in the house loves it, but I knew I couldn’t use barley. I decided to use cauliflower to give the soup some creaminess and body, and it was a huge hit. I didn’t tell my cauliflower-hating kid that it had her least favorite veggie in there and she thought it was delicious (until she watched my Instagram story and was suddenly nauseous – ha!)
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So alas, this Mushroom Cauli Soup – a play on Mushroom Barley Soup – so long as you say CAULI with the same enunciation as BARLEY :)

Mushroom Cauli Soup

3 tbsp olive oil, divided
2 10oz. pkgs cremini mushrooms, sliced
1 3.5oz pkg shiitake mushrooms, sliced
1 cluster oyster mushroom, chopped
1 large leek, white and pale green part only, sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 cup dry white wine
1 head cauliflower, roughly chopped, or 1 pkg. frozen
1 large zucchini, roughly chopped
32oz. chicken stock or broth (I use Imagine no-chicken broth)
2 cups water
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp soy sauce
1/2 tsp Trader Joes umami seasoning, optional
salt and pepper, to taste

Method:

Heat 2 tbsp of olive oil in a soup pot or dutch oven. Add the mushrooms and saute until all the liquid evaporates and the mushrooms start to caramelize. Remove from the pan. Add an additional tbsp of olive oil, leeks and garlic and saute until softened and fragrant. Deglaze with wine and scrape up the bits from the bottom of the pan. Add the remaining ingredients and bring the soup to a simmer. Cook until vegetables are soft and tender, about 20 minutes. Using an immersion blender, blend half of the soup so some chunks of cauliflower remain. Stir in the mushrooms and serve.

VARIATION: Add some heavy cream or coconut milk before serving for a creamy finish!


Related Recipes:

zucchini basil soup
spinach white bean minestrone with zoodles
cream of leek soup

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