Fattoush – Cook the Book Fridays

Have you ever join a group or organization with the best of intentions, only to fizzle out of focus in grand glory? It seems I have done exactly that with the poor ladies at the Cook the Book Fridays cookbook group. The group is a tight knit and encouraging community, having previously cooked through the entire ‘Around My French Table’ by Dorie Greenspan. They’ve become fast friends through the discussion of this delicious cookbook, and having survived the trials and tribulations of cooking every single recipe from it. I watched their posts with interest, from afar, and when they finished we all wondered what would happen next. It turns out that ‘next’ is a similarly impressive feat; cooking each and every recipe from ‘My Paris Kitchen’ by David Lebovitz. Since I have the book and have met David in person, I felt it was a great opportunity to join in the fun.

Cooking an entire cookbook takes a lot of time and commitment. I need to cook for my family regardless, and what better way than to use David Lebovitz’s recipes? I’ve never hit upon a bad one so I didn’t have any concerns about whether or not this would be a challenge. The challenge, it turns out, is not in the cooking but the posting. I have managed to (mostly) keep up with the bi monthly recipes but writing about them and keeping up with the other participants requires a fair amount of time. I also find that, due to legalities, not being able to post the recipe on my blog is somewhat disappointing. I understand that since we are cooking the entire book, publishing each recipe is discourteous to Mr. Lebovitz, but this is (after all) a food blog.  All I can say to my readers is please go buy the book and follow along. Really, you won’t be disappointed! 

Without further adieu, here is the beautiful and tasty Fattoush salad that was the featured recipe for June 3…on July 13th! This one was kind of a ‘no brainer’ because I had all of the ingredients on hand AND needed to use up some old pitas. It was also a really hot spring day (warmer than any day we’ve had so far in July) when I didn’t feel like cooking at all. The three of us demolished this whole salad for dinner, then had pie for dessert. You have to balance the good with the bad right?This salad was really easy to make and assemble. I had romaine lettuce, cherry tomatoes, and cucumbers in the fridge all ready to go so all I had to do was toast the pitas and make the dressing. I finished the salad with fresh herbs from my garden and used up all the ground sumac that I had. Sumac is a spice that I really enjoy because it adds a certain ‘zest’ to whatever you add it to. It heightens the taste of lemons and makes your mouth water! Instead of plain black pepper I threw in some lemon pepper that had been given to me by a friend. She recently moved back to Canada after some time in Dubai and she bought me some of this lemon pepper from a real street side spice souk, a traditional market where people buy spices of all kinds.
If you want to find more ‘up to date’ Cook the Book Friday posts visit this link here. Meanwhile, I shall keep plugging on…