Doug and I were invited to dinner at the home of Araksi and Onnik Dinkjian a few weeks ago. Their world-class musician son, Ara, and
his daughter, Arev were in town for a brief visit, so this provided us with the
perfect opportunity to catch-up on family news.
(Click here to preview some of Ara's incredible music.)
(Click here to preview some of Ara's incredible music.)
Araksi served a table full of scrumptious mezza items
before dinner, including ‘sheel abour’. As we slathered the sheel abour onto pita wedges, Araksi asked if I knew where
she had gotten the recipe. I truly had no idea. She said, “I got this recipe at your house from Betty Kabobjian** when
we were together for Mandy’s high school graduation party – in 1999.”
It’s interesting to see how recipes make the rounds.
**A little family background: Dick Kabobjian,
Betty’s husband, and my dad were cousins, so we’ve known the two of them forever.
Betty was always the hostess-with-the-mostess and all around incredible cook.
Dick, like all of the other Dikranagerdsi I know, loved to party. Whenever Dick and my dad got
together, you’d never know what juicy dialog would pop out of their mouths. Women
blushed in their presence – and - everyone had a good belly- laugh.
I digress… back to the recipe.
I posted a similar recipe - ‘Sour Spinach and Rice’ -
from the “Assyrian Cookbook”, sent in by John and Pat Nashmy, but didn’t have the
Kabobjian version. Arkasi kindly provided me with a copy, which I will now share
with you.
Sheel Abour
Ingredients:
2 – 10 oz. packages frozen chopped spinach, thawed and
excess liquid drained
½ cup rice (short grain works well)
½ cup fine (#1) bulgur
Salt and pepper to taste
2-8 oz. cans tomato sauce
½ cup fresh lemon juice (or more)
2 cups water
2 large onions, finely chopped
½ cup canola oil
Directions:
1. In a large saucepan, cook together the spinach, rice,
bulgur, salt and pepper, tomato sauce, lemon juice and water - first bringing the liquid to a boil, then
reducing the heat to medium-low and covering the pot - until rice and bulgur
are soft – about 25 minutes.
2. While the spinach-rice mixture is cooking, heat the
oil and sauté the onions until soft but not burned.
3. When the spinach-rice mixture is done, add the sautéed
onion.
NOTE: Serve as an appetizer with
pita chips or wedges of pita bread, or as a side dish. This can be served hot
or cold.
Is this the same as spinach pandjar?
ReplyDeleteI have found several recipes with the word panjar, pancar, or pandjaregheni in the name. The first, 'Panjar Aghtsan' is a beet salad with vinegar, oil and sugar. The next, 'Pancar Salatasi' is also a beet salad with butter, onion, and a yogurt-garlic sauce. Then there is 'Pandjaregheni Dzevadzegh', a vegetable omelet with leeks, spinach, lettuce, etc. Finally, 'Pandjaregheni Aghtsan', a vegetable salad with cooked Swiss chard, parsley, yogurt and garlic. Do any of those sound familiar?
ReplyDeleteIf you wish to continue the search, you can email me: robyn@thearmeniankitchen.com. Thanks!