Claudia Roden wrote our family cookbook

Mediteranniean and Middle Eastern cooking is more popular now than ever. I was lucky enough to grow up in a family that knew about if first hand. We were eating yogurt, hummus and babaganoush back in the 1960s. My grandfather, Michael Abdou, came to America in 1925 from Palestine. Because men didn't learn to cook in that culture, my grandfather had to teach himself how to recreate the food of his youth. This food wasn't something he could easily pick up at his local market in Boston, Massachusetts when he first arrived (can you image life without the vast array of hummus now found in every supermarket?). 

Dadou and Mimi (Abdou)

Dadou, as we affectionately called him, discovered Claudia Roden's, A Book of Middle Eastern Food early on. First published in 1972, it became our family cookbook. I received my first copy in 1980, carefully covered with a milar cover, when I went off to university. Along with The Joy of Cooking, that book has been my trusty companion throughout my many homes and would be on my Desert Island cookbook shelf. 

One of the special things about living in London is that every now and then I catch an interview or television series with Claudia Roden. I always feel like I am visiting with family when I see her. Despite growing up Jewish in Egypt, her cooking is culturally the closest to the Palestinian cooking of my grandfather's youth (or is it that was his favourite cookbook!). For an more modern version of this delicious dinner, read my blog post Slow Roast Lamb followed by Lentil Stew. It is really yummy.

If you would like to learn more about Claudia Roden, you might enjoy this article from the Observer Food Magazine: http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2012/mar/18/claudia-roden-spanish-food-interview#

Or see my Desert Island Book List: Desert Island Book List

What would be on your Desert Island Book List?