♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ - You know,
North Africa is well known for many of its ingredients,
including preserved lemons, harissa, and of course,
the dish shakshuka. But what about
a Moroccan meatball tagine? Or maybe a spiced pasta
with chicken and green beans from Libya? So please stay tuned as we explore the unique flavors
of North Africa. - Funding for this series
was provided by the following: - Introducing Hestan ProBond, crafted from the resilience
of cold-forged stainless steel. We collaborate with top chefs
to redefine cookware and the kitchen experience. Italian craftsmanship meets
innovation with Hestan ProBond. ♪ ♪ - You know, many years ago,
actually, I had my honeymoon in Marrakesh,
oddly enough. And I got a lesson-- we got a lesson--
from a local chef, and he made a chicken tagine. And what really struck me was, there was no sautéing. He put some onions in and
some oil and some olives and some ginger,
et cetera, spices, and just let it cook for
an hour and a half or two hours. And the flavors were
really bright and separate. And I thought,
what a great way of cooking. But there are lots of other
types of tagine dishes, as we found out in later years. One of them is a meatball
in tomato sauce tagine, which is not something you'd
really think of, right? I mean, it's, it was new to me. - Well, let's take
a step back for a second. So tagines are,
of course, named after the pot in which they're cooked,
a tagine. This pot is
really uniquely shaped. It's got this very broad,
flat bottom, this conical lid
that fits really tightly. So what this pot does is,
it's really about cooking with very low heat. It's about cooking things
very slowly and concentrating the flavors. And it also relies on spices. We're going to use spices
instead of browning to develop that deep flavor. This dish,
we're going to be using a skillet instead of a tagine. We're going
to start with tomatoes. So we're going to use
whole canned tomatoes, because they have a little more
texture, meatier flavor. - This is a technique we actually do here, and it just means that
when you squish the tomatoes, they don't end up all over you. So many people are afraid
of using their hands in cooking. - I agree. - And they usually are the best
tool for a lot of things. - Squishing tomatoes,
you do end up with bits left. You're not breaking out
a blender you have to clean. You're not breaking out
a food processor. And these aromatics. What we're gonna do is,
we're gonna sauté a base, and then we're going
to split that base. Half of it remains
in the pan for the sauce. Then half of it gets
pulled to the side and used to flavor
the meatballs. We're going to start
off with one large onion. We're going to cut
that stem end off, put it down flat,
cut it through the root end. And, of course, whenever
you're cutting onions, you want to leave that root end
intact. That's holding all
those layers together. And, you know, we don't have
to be too precise here. So we're just
going to cut up and down, and then just cut crosswise. Keeping my fingers back,
using that claw grip. So I've chopped up
our one large onion. Butter is traditionally used,
it's called smen, S-M-E-N,
and it's a fermented butter, often cooked
with spices and stuff. But it does
add sort of a real funk. - Well, tomatoes go with butter.
- Oh, beautifully. - It's a good combination. - They magnify
each other's flavor. So, four tablespoons. If you have ghee,
you could use ghee in this dish, which would be great. Which is a clarified,
slightly fermented butter. And, you know,
you don't have to wait until the butter is melted. We can add those onions
right in. - Now, if you're cooking onions, you can put them in a cold pan
with cold oil. There's no reason
you have to wait. In fact, it's better
not to wait, because you may end up
with too much heat. - I'm going to add a little salt
at this point, a quarter-teaspoon. Adding salt at the start
of cooking your aromatics helps break them down. It breaks the cell walls,
releases moisture. They're going to cook faster. And we're going to cook
this down till it's softened. It takes about five minutes--
you don't want to brown them. We're not looking
for those brown, sort of heavy,
Maillard flavors here. We just want to soften it. And at this point, I'm gonna
go ahead and prep my garlic. So it's ten cloves of garlic, but that flavor really
cooks down. Mincing garlic can be
a real pain in the neck. I just take the side of
my knife and smash it flat. So use the heel of my hands and just keep it
away from the blade. And then all you have to do is rock your knife back
and forth. Now we have our ten cloves of
garlic-- we're gonna hold off, and we're going to add
the garlic with our spices. - Okay. - Those are looking
pretty good, Chris. So it's been about five minutes. At this point,
we're going to add our garlic, which I will scoop up
and transfer there. So stir that in, please,
so it sees some heat. And in come the spices. So I really recommend grinding
your spices fresh, especially really, really
volatile spices, like cumin. The flavor of cumin
is so fleeting. The dried stuff tastes a fraction
of what fresh-ground does. It doesn't have to be perfectly
fine for a dish like this. You can have sort of
chunky spice in there. Coriander seeds--
really, really volatile. So that is certainly
one of those spices I recommend grinding fresh. Then a teaspoon of cinnamon, then a little heat. We're just adding
a quarter-teaspoon of red pepper flakes--
you can always add more if you like, but it's best
to start off with a little. So at this point,
what we're going to do is, we're going to scoop off
about a half-cup. You know, you don't have to be
super-precise there, but about a half-cup. Then we're going
to build our sauce here. So we're going to add
a cup of beef broth. If you don't have beef broth,
chicken broth will be fine. Water will be fine. Bouillon cubes work great. You know, they're in the pantry,
they're just going to work fine. You do need to adjust
for the salt content. Scale the total salt down if you
are using a bouillon cube. But now let's take
those tomatoes you so nicely crushed
and add it to the pan. Now we're gonna
bring it up to a simmer, and we're going to let
it simmer for 15 minutes. One of the reasons I really,
really love this dish is, we're not browning
the meatballs. So we're not spreading
that sort of volatized beef fat
all over our kitchen. We're not making a mess. That sauce has come up to a sputtering simmer there. So throw a cover on. We're going to let it simmer
for about 15 minutes on low, and we'll go make our meatballs. We've got half
our onion mixture, and that's got all those spices
and the garlic in it. And to this,
we're going to add breadcrumbs. So we're using panko, which is
a Japanese-style breadcrumb. It's very crisp, it's very friable,
and they're just convenient. You really don't have
to use panko for this dish. If you have any breadcrumbs
in the house, if you have
that stale lump of bread in the back of your breadbox, just grind it down
to breadcrumbs. It's going to work fine. So we're going to make
this panade with water. - A panade,
which is bread and some liquid, means that a hamburger
or meatloaf or meatballs, even if you cook it to a higher
temperature, remains soft. It doesn't get tough. - In this case, it just really
helps moisturize the meatballs, helps glue them together a bit. Okay, it's been about
five minutes, Chris. You can see how quickly that panko
absorbs all the moisture. We're going to add
a half-cup of chopped cilantro. We're going to add half-teaspoon
of salt, a whole teaspoon
of black pepper, and we're going to mix that up. Make sure
it's really combined well. So we're going to add one pound
of lean ground beef. You want about 90%. Otherwise, it's going
to turn the dish really fatty. We can add that to the bowl, and now we're going to just chop that up
and mix it in. So we're going to take this
mixture and divide it into 16 portions. It's about
two tablespoons a portion. We can use a handy-dandy scoop. How about I portion them out
and you roll them? Can you use your hands there? - See? - Nicely done, you're
not squeezing them too hard. You don't want
to compact them too much. We're going to finish
scooping these and rolling them. We're going to hopefully
end up with around 16. Then we're going to put them
in the fridge for about 15 minutes
so they firm up. If we put them
right in the sauce right now, they're just going
to fall apart. ♪ ♪ Ah, smells great.
- Does smell good. - So our pretty meatballs have
rest in the refrigerator for about 15 minutes. And you can see there's
a textural change to that meat after it's been shaped
and chilled for a bit. Again, we're not browning them. We're just going
to plop them in the sauce and let them cook through,
right in the sauce. Kind of space them out evenly
around the pan. - Actually, the whole idea
of browning meat, it's a very Northern European
thing. - Yeah, it's true, I mean, you look at cultures around the
world, and a lot of it is about limited resources--
and that, again, we go back to the heart
of how a tagine cooks. It really
is about maximizing heat and minimizing the need
for water. - Top back on? - Top back on-- 15 minutes. You want to make sure
the meatballs are covered. Then we're going to flip them,
cook them another 15 minutes, then we're just about done. This dish gets finished
with eggs. We're going to crack
a couple eggs in there. So think of it as like a really,
really hearty shakshuka. So let's make a little room
for those eggs. If we put them down
without any sauce underneath, they're just gonna burn
to the bottom. Make a little divot in
the center and just crack them. - So wait a minute,
is this dish for two? There are two eggs. Are we going to fight
over the eggs? - We might-- feel free
to add a couple of extra eggs. - Okay, just wondering.
- Can you put the lid back on? We're going to cook these
just until the eggs set. So while those eggs are setting, takes about four minutes, we're going to make the garnish;
now, the garnish is a mixture of olives and lemon. So we have a third of a cup
of chopped olives. Now, these are
the pimento-stuffed olives. We're looking for
a mild green olive. We're going to add
about two tablespoons of grated lemon zest. You can just grate it
right over the bowl so those olives catch
that zest flavor. Those eggs are looking perfect. So we can just mix that up. So let's go ahead
and sprinkle our garnish. Another half-cup of cilantro. Then we can add our olives. Okay, Chris, dinner's here. Tagines are not something
you eat with couscous. We may think you may want
to put some couscous underneath, but really it's about eating
this with a soft, flat bread. - Mm. - That's really good. - Well, the meatballs are
tender. There's a lot of
different flavors going on, but none of them
are overpowering-- even the garlic. And the tomato with the
cinnamon, it's interesting. Great dishes are dishes
where, the first bite, you go, "Oh, what's that?",
and then on the eighth bite, you're learning something new. So a dish that many of us
are not familiar with, which is a tagine from Morocco,
but it's a meatball tagine. Lots of spices, lots of flavors. It is absolutely fabulous. - Oh, thank you. ♪ ♪ - Preserved lemons
are my favorite ingredient in the kitchen,
and I'm a very curious cook. I will try anything. I have very few favorite things, but preserved lemons are it. They're traditionally Moroccan and a staple of the Moroccan
pantry, used in tagines,
like you saw earlier. However, I also use them
in salad dressings, to dress root vegetables. I use them in cocktails--
I even use them in my desserts. Lemons in Morocco
have a thin skin. They're doqq or boussera lemons, very close to the Meyer lemon
here in the United States. However, after making hundreds
of batches of preserved lemon, I've actually found
that I like them best with the common Eureka lemon that we can find
in grocery stores. First, you start with a jar--
you take your lemon, and you want to see if it fits into the mouth of your jar
without cutting it. If that's the case,
which mine do, thankfully, you cut them into little tulips. So here's the stem end. From the blossom end, you cut them all the way down to the stem, but not through it. So that they open up into little flowers. If your lemons are too large to fit in the mouth of your jar, don't worry. You can cut them into quarters. This is fine--
don't worry about it. Salt, our only other ingredient. You want to put
two tablespoons... ...of salt in the bottom
of your jar. Then into your little tulip, you put around two teaspoons. So less than a tablespoon
of salt. You sort of pinch it together, so now you have a salty tulip. And you put it
right into your jar. So you can put other things
into preserved lemons. Often, they have dried chilies or cinnamon sticks. If you know that you always use your preserved lemons
in the same way, I highly recommend
seasoning the brine, because then
they're ready to cook. You don't have to get
those ingredients out later. However, if you're like I am, and you might use them one day
for a cocktail, the next day for a tagine, and the next day
for vinaigrette, I like keeping them more neutral so that I can adapt them
to what I'm using them for. So second tulip. In it goes. Should be using a tool--
I use my hands. Then you can get them
into one layer. And as you push down on them, you see they're starting
to release their own juice. Then a little sprinkle of salt. And we do the whole process
over again. So preserved lemons--
what do they taste like? Preserved lemons are
much more savory because they're fermented, and have less acidity
and more sort of funk. They have so much going on, you hardly actually need to add
other ingredients to, for example,
salad dressings. So I'm going to continue
layering lemon tulips and salt
and squishing them down. And then when I'm done, I'm going to show you what to do if your lemons don't release
quite enough juice. ♪ ♪ Like anything
you're going to ferment, you want to make sure
that the top of the final layer of lemons
is covered with juice. So I always have a little
fresh-squeezed juice ready to go
in case I need a little more. Leave a little headroom, because your lemons
will continue to exude juice as they ferment, and you don't want it
to bubble over. Once you have enough lemon juice
in there, we add one final tablespoon
of salt, sometimes a little extra
for good measure. And you put the top on. And these stay
in a cool, dark place, but at room temperature
for about a week. And periodically you do this. It helps get the salt
evenly distributed. It just helps
move things around. And then you put them in
the fridge and you let them sit. They're ready
in about three weeks. They'll have enough savoriness
to be great. But if you let them go longer, they get more
complexly flavored, and they get better and better. They're fine up to a year. And actually, a year is my
preferred length of time to let them ferment. Okay, here are some beautiful
preserved lemons. Look at this color. These have been fermenting
for about a month. And you can see
it's much softer. The rind, you can even see, is starting to get
a little translucent. The insides you save
and you cook. They often want a little heat, but the rind you can dice, it can be the garnish
for a drink. It can be diced up
and put into a cake. Or you add them at the end
of a dish for a little texture, but also that same
savory lemon pop. And then this pulp
you would finely mince and let it have some cook time. So you might add it
to the onions after you've sweated them for the base of a stew
or a tagine. And then they would cook
and get even mellower. And then you would
finish the dish with your beautiful
preserved lemon rind. And again,
don't be afraid to let them ferment for quite a long time. After a couple months,
six months, nine months, everything just gets
more delicious. ♪ ♪ - Shakshuka was developed
in Northern Africa, but it has taken off
all over the world. There are lots of variations
of it, anything from green shakshuka,
red shakshuka. I developed a version here at Milk Street
that's completely pantry-friendly,
but it's the kind of dish that you can use fresh
vegetables from your garden, herbs-- anything that you like. So to start, I'm going
to thinly slice a bell pepper and a red onion. But if you don't have
a fresh pepper, it's okay. You can use roasted red peppers. These jars are great
to keep in your pantry. So now it's time
for the tomatoes. I have a 28-ounce can
of whole tomatoes. I'm just going to crush these
by hand. So I think
I have these all crushed and they're ready to go. All right, now I'm gonna add
the vegetables to the skillet-- I heated
a few tablespoons of oil. I'm going to add
a little bit of salt, and I'm going to let these go
for about five minutes until the onions
are golden-brown. (sizzling) And now I'm going to add
my tomatoes, along with a little bit of
water to thin out the sauce and two tablespoons
of harissa paste. I'm going to bring this up
to a simmer and let it cook until the vegetables are soft,
about six minutes. This sauce is looking great,
so I'm going to add my eggs. Creating a well makes it easy
to nestle the eggs in. I'm going to season each egg
with some salt and pepper. I'm going to put on the lid,
and I'm going to cook these anywhere from
five to eight minutes. I'm going to rotate the skillet
so everything cooks evenly. The eggs look great. The whites are set and the yolks are still runny. There's a lot of ways
you can garnish this. I'm using parsley and feta, but I think olives would be
great on this. Capers, any kind
of cheese that you like, Different herbs-- I think
dill would be great on this. Also love to serve this
with yogurt. And a nice drizzle
of good olive oil. So this is our recipe
for shakshuka. All of these ingredients
you probably already have in your pantry, so I hope
you'll give it a try. ♪ ♪ -<i> Macroona mbakbka</i>
is a one-pot pasta dinner that is also arguably
the national dish of Libya. Now, Italian pasta made its way
into Libyan cuisine when Italy colonized the country just in the 20th century,
so recently. And in this dinner,
we combine that new addition to the Libyan pantry
with some much older staples, like harissa and spices
and tomato paste. You just saw Rose use harissa
when she made shakshuka. This mixture of peppers
and tomatoes and spices means that we can put together
a one-pot meal with a short ingredient list that still has a ton of flavor. To get started,
we're going to heat about three tablespoons
of olive oil until it's just smoking. While that heats up,
we're going to add the harissa
to one-and-a-half pounds of boneless,
skinless chicken thighs that we've trimmed
a little bit, but not too much. The fat's good,
it's part of the dish. Now, about the harissa. There are a lot of different
varieties, and the heat varies quite a bit, so have a taste. If it seems a little mild, add the full tablespoons
or a little more. If it seems kind of spicy, maybe err
on the side of one tablespoon. So I like a dish
with a little kick. I added a full
two tablespoons of harissa. And we're going to add one
quarter-teaspoon of salt and mix this up. We're not looking
to create a lot of browning on our chicken,
but if you want to test to make sure the oil's hot
enough, you can put in just one piece. And you want to hear
a little sizzle. (pan sizzling softly)
Perfect. (pan sizzling) Keep the bowl. We're not going to cook
the chicken all the way through. We want to get the pink color
off the surface and some gentle browning. We're actually going to develop
the most flavor later with our aromatics. So we've gotten the pink color
off the outside and we're going
to use a slotted spoon to transfer it back
into the same bowl. We'll continue cooking
the chicken later when we are cooking the pasta. So it's not cooked
all the way through yet, but it will be, don't worry. We also want to leave the fat
from the chicken in our pot, which is why you want
to use a slotted spoon. That's going to become
our flavored cooking oil for the next steps. All right,
so into this now delicious mix of olive oil
and chicken fat and fond, we're going to add
a third a cup of tomato paste. We're going to brown our
tomato paste to create a nice, rich base to this pasta while still keeping the overall
effect lighter than if we browned
all the chicken. (sizzling) Tomato paste is another
essential ingredient to have around--
you can brown it, like we are here,
to develop more robust flavors. You can keep it lighter, but still have that nice
savory base. All right,
so you know it's browned when it leaves
a little vegetable fond on the bottom of the pan, but also the tomato paste
sort of starts to separate. And we are there now--
we're going to add one diced yellow onion. We're going to stir this all up, get the onions nice and coated
with the tomato paste, and add one quarter-teaspoon
more salt. The salt's going to help
draw out water, so that these onions will get
soft and sweet, but not too rich or caramelized. ♪ ♪ Our onions are nice
and translucent and sweet, so I'm just going to create
a little hole in the middle. And into that little hole, I'm going to put
four cloves of garlic that are finely chopped. And the only other spice
we need to add, because the harissa
had so much in it already. We're adding three-quarters
of a teaspoon of allspice. We're going to stir that around
in its little hole until it's aromatic. And you want those aromas
to come up to you. You don't have to lean over
to smell them. It's done when they reach you when you're standing up
straight. We're ready for our chicken
to go back in the pan, with all the juices
that accumulate in here-- that's flavor. Don't want to waste it. And then we like to add
green beans as a vegetable. I like to stir this up
so everything is coated. Add in one pound of shells. All right,
and now the one-pot magic. As long as your water
is boiling, you can make a really quick
sauce and cook the pasta
at the same time. So we're going to add
three cups of just-boiled water. What the hot water does
is, it helps the pasta release its starches
right away, and you get a nice,
velvety, thick sauce. Stir that up and add in one more teaspoon of salt. We're going
to bring this up to a boil, increase the heat
to medium-high, and then cover it and let it cook
until the sauce thickens and the pasta is cooked
al dente. Our pasta is cooked, and there's just
this velvety sauce enrobing every little shell. I'll let those combine while I finish picking
and chopping some fresh mint. You could also use parsley, but you want a fresh
final pop with this pasta dish. This is my most elegant way
of rough-chopping herbs, but it really works, is,
you just make a little ball in your fist, and then run a knife through it. That not-so-pretty ball of herbs
means that you make tidy work
on your countertop. I'm going to stir this in. I can already smell
the fresh pop that that mint's going to bring
to this pasta dish. Let's give it a try. It's the harissa
that makes this dish. There's so much flavor
in that one condiment. And then the technique
of cooking it all in one pot with that boiling water means that the sauce really
brings together all the different elements,
and you have a quick, weeknight dinner that delivers
a big punch of flavor. You can get the recipe
for this harissa-spiced pasta and all the other recipes from this season of<i> Milk Street
Television</i> at MilkStreetTV.com. - Recipes and episodes
from this season of<i> Milk Street</i> are available
at MilkStreetTV.com, along with shopping lists,
printer-ready recipes, and step-by-step videos. Access our content anytime
to change the way you cook. - The new<i> Milk Street Cookbook</i>
is now available and includes every recipe
from our TV show, from Pad Thai with shrimp
and no-fry eggplant parmesan to Korean fried chicken and
salty honey browned butter bars. The<i> Milk Street Cookbook</i> offers bolder, fresher,
easier recipes. Order your copy of
the<i> Milk Street Cookbook</i> for $27,
40% less than the cover price. Call 855-MILK-177
or order online. - Funding for this series
was provided by the following: - Introducing Hestan ProBond, crafted from the resilience
of cold-forged stainless steel. We collaborate with top chefs
to redefine cookware and the kitchen experience. Italian craftsmanship meets
innovation with Hestan ProBond. ♪ ♪ ♪ ♪
