"For me, food is how I remember these trips," says Priya Krishna. Photo by Marc J. Franklin.
When the family returned to Dallas, she and her mom would use their intuition and talk to friends from the countries they had visited so they could recreate dishes they had eaten. Hummus from Egypt, dumplings in China — on Sunday nights, Indian food wasn't served for dinner. "We were not restaurant people growing up. We would occasionally go out to the Olive Garden for a birthday," Krishna says.
Krishna recalls visiting different grocery stores as a child where her dad would let her pick out an extra item to take home. Sometimes it would be candy, other times kimchi or noodles. "It sort of empowered me to try and test out that ingredient," she says.
Her book, Priya's Kitchen Adventures features a global selection of kid-friendly recipes that inspire travel through cooking.
For Krishna, Morocco invokes memories of sitting on cushions to eat and the circus tent-like lids lifted to reveal a tagine. In Japan, Krishna recalls the convenience stores and the onigiri stuffed with pickled plum or salmon. "I love going on the bullet train with one of these. They just were the perfect, portable lunch," she says.
Priya Krishna's mother created this tagine recipe to be served over couscous.. Photo by Ana Chouban.
Vegetable Tagine
Serves 4
When we went to Morocco, we traveled all across the country. But we always ate tagine, a stew of chickpeas and vegetables simmered in a flavorful bath of spices and often served over couscous (page 138). It would come in a colorful, ornately decorated wide bowl with a lid that looks like a circus tent (the serving dish is also called a tagine!). When the lid was lifted, the warming scent of the stew would hit my nostrils and make me even hungrier. I had tagine with different combinations of vegetables, or dried fruits (like prunes and apricots), or harissa (a type of chili paste-very yummy). Our last day in Morocco, we went down to the medina and found a vendor who made his own blend of tagine spices. This recipe, which my mom came up with, is inspired by that blend-it's a lot of spices, but they all play important roles.
Ingredients
For the spice blend
- 1⁄4 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1⁄4 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1⁄4 teaspoon ground allspice
- 1⁄2 teaspoon paprika
- 1⁄2 teaspoon turmeric
- 1⁄2 teaspoon ground fennel seeds
- 1⁄2 teaspoon ground cumin
For the tagine
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1⁄2 small yellow onion, diced
- 2 Roma tomatoes, diced
- 1 cup medium-diced butternut squash (best to buy this already diced from the grocery store, or get an adult to cut the squash for you; no need to peel)
- 1 small yellow potato, diced
- 2 medium carrots, sliced into rounds
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more as needed
- 1 (15-ounce) can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
- 3 or 4 slices lemon, plus juice of 1⁄2 lemon (about 2 tablespoons)
- 1⁄4 cup pitted and roughly chopped olives (a mix of kalamata and green is best)
- 1⁄2 teaspoon saffron threads
- Couscous (page 138), for serving
Instructions
-
Make the spice blend. In a small bowl, mix together the cloves, ginger, allspice, paprika,
turmeric, fennel, and cumin (all the spices except the saffron). -
Make the tagine. Warm the olive oil in a medium Dutch oven or other pot over medium heat. Add the onions and cook, stirring occasionally, until they are golden brown along the edges, 8 to 10 minutes. Add the tomatoes and cook until they start to soften, 1 to 2 minutes. Add the spice mix from the bowl (but not the saffron yet!). Let the spices cook until they are really filling your kitchen with nice smells, 2 to 3 minutes.
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Add the squash, potato, carrots, salt, and 2 cups water. Cover and cook until the potato and carrots are soft and you can pierce them with a fork, 5 to 7 minutes. Add the chickpeas, 1 more cup water, the lemon slices, and the olives. Cover and cook until the broth has thickened and you can really taste the flavors (get in there with a spoon and try it!), another 5 to 10 minutes. Uncover and mix everything well. Mash the potatoes a little bit with the back of a large spoon. Taste and adjust the salt, if necessary. Remove from the heat and mix in the lemon juice.
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Combine the saffron threads and 2 tablespoons water in a small bowl and mash the threads
using the back of the spoon-the water should turn golden. Add the saffron mixture to the tagine and mix well. Transfer to a serving dish
and serve with couscous.
"Priya's Kitchen Adventures" inspires a new generation of eaters to cook and try new dishes from the comfort of their homes. Photo courtesy of Harvest.