Week 41 - Lebanese

The Week 41 challenge, Lebanese, was one of my favorite challenges all year. (I thought it would be when I made it in October, but since it's taken me this long to finish this post, I can now say it with certainty in December.) It was so hard to choose a recipe since I love Lebanese food, but once I found a shish tawook recipe on Feel Good Foodie, I knew that I had to make that. We love getting shish tawook from restaurants, and this one looked delicious. Also, I had made some yogurt-marinated kebabs for our Afghanistan AtWCC and they hadn't turned out as well as I expected (which, of course, you wouldn't know since I still haven't finished that post), so this was a chance at redemption.

The ingredients we used were:

for the chicken and marinade (all spices eyeballed and estimated because I didn't use measuring spoons):

- about 1.5 lbs of boneless skinless chicken breasts ($7.23)

- 1/2 cup plain whole milk yogurt ($0.82)

- juice of 1 lemon (about 1/3-1/2 cup) ($0.39)

- 1/4 cup olive oil ($0.40)

- 1 large spoonful of minced garlic (with some of the garlic water) ($0.08)

- about 1 tsp paprika ($0.05)

- about 1 tsp cinnamon ($0.05)

- about 1 tsp garlic powder ($0.02)

- about 1/2 tsp oregano ($0.02)

- about 1/2 tsp ground ginger ($0.03)

- salt and freshly ground black pepper ($0.03)

for grilling the chicken skewers:

- grapeseed oil for the grill pan ($0.20)

- 1/2 red onion ($0.49)

for the salad we ate on the side:

- grape tomatoes ($2.79)

- Persian cucumbers ($1.99)

- 1/2 red onion ($0.50)

- a few scallions ($0.35)

- 1 can white beans ($0.79)

- 1 can chickpeas ($0.93)

- olive oil ($0.40)

- lemon juice ($0.20)

- sumac ($0.10)

- salt and pepper ($0.02)

also on the side:

- garlic spread ($2.99)

- whole wheat pita ($1.39)

Since we had a full salad alongside our skewers, it was, as expected, not an inexpensive meal. It ended up coming in around $22.26, more expensive than most of our challenge meals ($9.81 for the chicken skewers, $8.07 for the salad, and $4.38 for the accompaniments). We had some salad left over for lunch the next day, but that was it. A little bit more of a "splurge" cooking night, but worth it.

The steps for making the chicken were:

1. Mix yogurt, lemon juice, olive oil, minced garlic, paprika, cinnamon, garlic powder, oregano, ground ginger, salt, and black pepper in a large bowl.

2. Chop chicken into large chunks, and place into the bowl with the yogurt marinade, stirring to coat and making sure all the chicken is covered by the marinade. Cover with plastic wrap, and place in the fridge for at least 4 hours and up to 24 hours (I chilled ours for about 19 hours).

3. Thread the chicken on skewers with a chunk of onion on each end.

4. Add oil to grill pan, and then grill over medium high heat until cooked through and at least 165 degrees inside, about 5 minutes per side.

5. Remove finished skewers and place on plate to rest.

6. Serve skewers with sides (salad, garlic spread, and pita for us).

The salad on the side was just some prep and mixing, most of which I think I did prior to making the skewers. We got the garlic spread and pita from Trader Joe's since I knew I didn't have the capacity to make it all from scratch in one night.

This chicken was amazing. It was so tender, even the pieces from the skewers I left on the pan too long that got a bit browner than I had planned. I think what really helped these skewers come out better than the last yogurt-marinated kebabs I made was that I used plain yogurt instead of Greek yogurt thanks to the recipe notes/comments. I had no idea the water content of plain yogurt was so different (although I probably should have, given the different thicknesses of each yogurt type), so I'm thankful for the recipe note because it helped these turn out so much better than I expected. This was my first time skewering anything and using wooden skewers on our grill pan, and it was so much easier than I thought it would be. We loved our healthy Lebanese dinner, and we would absolutely do this again.

Ilili Box

Remember way back in March when City Kitchen opened and we said we were going to talk about all the places in the food halls? Yeah, me too. So much to catch up on, but better late than never...

A and I each went to a different vendor at City Kitchen to pick up dinner, and then we shared our dishes. The one I chose was Ilili Box, an offshoot of the Lebanese Ilili restaurant in the city. We had never been to the original spot, but we had tried and really liked a sample of their food at a tasting event we went to years ago. We've always thought about going, but hadn't made it there yet, so I thought it might be nice to try out Ilili Box in the meantime. The line wasn't that long, but the service seemed a little bit disorganized. I can give that a pass though since we went when they were still in their first week of service.

The first thing we tried was the Phoenician fries ($2.98, price as of March). According to the menu, these were "skin-on fried potato fries seasoned with salt and sumac served with an Aleppo pepper fresh garlic emulsion." The price and portion size seemed about average as far as food halls go these days. The seasoned fries were tasty, and the dipping sauce was really garlicky in a good way. We really liked these, but that was mostly due to the sumac salt (I love sumac) and the dipping sauce. The fries were just fries, but overall it was a good side dish.

I also chose the pressed chicken sandwich ($7.35 when we got it in March), which contained roasted sumac chicken, garlic whip, and Lebanese pickles in a pita. If you were thinking it was going to be the size of a burrito, or a wrap sandwich from some deli, you'd be wrong. In size and style, it reminded me a little bit of the Turkish tacos from the Pera truck that I tried a few years back, although these were longer in length (as I would hope they would be, as they were also more expensive).

The flavors inside the sandwich were good, and we really liked the combination. The only problem was that the portion size was extremely small for the price. For over $7, we were expecting something more filling in terms of size. Combined with the fries, that was over $10 before tax, but not really a tremendous amount of food. I just checked and it looks like the price of this is now $8.04 according to the City Kitchen site, so I hope they're putting a little more in the sandwich for that price.

Our overall assessment was that the food at Ilili Box was pretty good as far as taste, but it was a bit pricey for what you got in terms of amount (a common theme at food halls). We might try them again sometime (although obviously we haven't made it back in the past 7 months), but it probably won't be part of our regular rotation.

Shawafel

When I go to Karam II for lunch, I usually pick up the 3 item small vegetable combo, which comes with a side of pita, for a tasty and healthy meal. When I order at work for dinner, I often get the chicken taouk (grilled chicken cubes in a pita sandwich) or sometimes the vegetable salad combo and maybe samboussek on the side. We discovered last night that Karam actually delivers all the way to our apartment and in honor of trying that out for the first time, I got something different - the shawafel sandwich.

The shawafel sandwich... I can't stop saying shawafel
The shawafel sandwich contains falafel and shawarma (choice of chicken or meat - I went with chicken). It was a really tasty sandwich. The soft falafel mixed well with the small pieces of shawarma and the grilled pita. It wasn't the best falafel I've had (I wish Taim still came to midtown...) but it was good. The chicken shawarma was nicely flavored. Also, unlike some other pita sandwiches, this one had all the ingredients evenly spaced throughout, which meant every bite was full of shawafel-ly goodness. I would order this again.