Inspiration - roast and sides

potatos are missing from this scene, but I did make some mashed potatoes to go with the roast leg of lamb. Apart from the zucchini, all of these ingredients are quite western.

inspiration: fruit

I have always believed in the social power of food. Food brings people together, whether we are talking at the level of communities or to go along with the mingling of friends. I was with family the other day, having various discussions until pretty late at night, over trays of fruit. Various forms, all ready to eat. And what wrong can come from overeating of fruit? perhaps over the long run, some harm will come out of excess of anything, but we are typically deprived of fresh produce in our industrialized lives. Here was a chance for a collective packing of minerals and vitamins, along with some green tea and arabic coffee. A ritual that is one I am quite proud of, one that I truly enjoy. Cornucopia symbolizes the bountiful, the plentiful; this came pretty close.

inspiration: thai produce

This is usually how I start preparing for a meal. Go to the market, get what's fresh then just lay everything on the table and start grouping. I may have some ideas, some things that needed long prep times, but most of the dishes emerge as they're being put together. Here we have kale, bok choi, lemongrass, galangal, kafir limes, baby eggplants, oyster mushrooms, jelly fungus, mange-touts and kafir lime leaves (ascending order). Made a curry and some side dishes.

bresaola

I started liking bresaola when i was a teenager visiting my aunt in italy. Every time she comes back to kuwait, i ask her to bring me some really good parmesan, bresaola and pesto. to me, these are quintessential italian flavours. And as in most food in italy, you use the combinations of ingredients that have gone together for centuries. Here is how I learned to put together bresaola, and I typically don't like it in any other form, except maybe in a good panini or in the form of the salad on a good thin pizza. Bresaola + rocca + parmesan + oil + balsamic is the winning combo for me.

eggplant

My recent fondness for vegetables developed a particular liking for eggplant. A filling, tasty vegetable that can almost seem meaty if cooked in certain ways. There are so many kinds of eggplants from the big purple ones to the small thai green ones, which can be confused with peas and go really well with green curry.

Above is a very simple grilled eggplant salad / side that goes with almost anything. Lemon juice, olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic, dill.

gnocchi with taleggio

taleggio has become one of my favourite cheeses over the past few years. in kuwait, dean and deluca had some taleggio every once in a while, but as usual, they'd have a small quantity then nothing for months. then they changed their supplier and the taleggio they have now is pretty awful. carluccio's opened up and their deli has taleggio. i'm a happy man.

pictured above is a meal that took me no longer than five minutes to put together. gnocchi is one of the easiest, and quickest, pastas to cook. i make it myself sometimes, but this was from sultan in a packet. the sauce was basically taleggio, a spoon of milk, a couple of sage leaves, some nutmeg that i let melt in a separate pan. once the gnocchi started floating, i transferred it straight away and let it cook for a minute more, the sauce being absorbed by the potato and flour pillows. shredded some parmesan on top, done. didn't even add salt or pepper, it didn't need it.

taleggio isn't a very mild cheese, nor a very strong one either. it smells stronger than it tastes. but the complexity of flavour is what's great about taleggio - the strong aromas, the salty taste, hints of fruit maybe... i'm not really good at explaining these things. it's texture is also great. by my estimates, somewhere between a double- and triple-cream cheese, this cheese is made for melting. it doesn't need a strong temperature before the barely firm cheese turns into rivers of white, as i would imagine warm marshmallow in the factory before getting cut up into smaller pieces.

recently i had some taleggio and raclette that were going to be going bad soon, so I made some great grilled cheese sandwiches. just with some standard kuwaiti white bread, cooked in a pan with some butter. i though honey would be a good dipping sauce for it, and it was. this cheese also goes really well with leeks on some pastry. it needs that accent, either sweet or savoury, to bring out the subtleties of the flavour.

edit: yes, according to wikipedia, taleggio is 48% fat, which puts it right between double cream (40%) and triple cream (60%)

sides to go with everything

the eating experience should be a balance of tastes, textures, colours and aromas. sometimes you get a beautiful cut of meat and grill it, but you can't just have a steak without anything on the side. steak and chips, steak and salad, steak and vegetables. sometimes I want nothing more than a few of the freshest vegetables simply prepared. lightly marinated with some olive oil, salt and pepper as well as an acidic elements as well - vinegar, lemon juice, etc. in fact i could eat grilled green onions with every meal.

blood orange sorbet

As promised earlier, here is something I made with an ingredient that's been available for the last couple of weeks. i know i always talk in superlatives, but blood oranges really are one of my favourite fruits, definitely the most balanced citrus. You have to watch out, though, that sometimes they advertise pink oranges as blood oranges. the only similarity is the colour, although barely, but they taste like orange oranges. They are good, but not as good as blood oranges. The juice has to look like this...

All you really have to do is juice it, add about 50 g of sugar for every 250 ml of juice (put the sugar in a pan and put just enough juice to start dissolving the sugar into it) and then put the mix in the machine. Two ingredients, that's it. I could easily just have the juice by itself, but it's really nice in this form as well.

salt and coffee? blue cheese and chocolate?

Do you find some foods too bitter? Add salt. Try it: get a strong coffee, add just a bit of salt to it - not enough to taste of salt, a half a pinch. Taste it before and after. Add some more salt and try it again. You'll be surprised, this actually works. Try it with tonic water as well and you'll see that the bitterness reduces. Apparently, this can't be explained scientifically.

Also, since I had some leftover gorgonzola from my pasta I decided to make a quick dessert out of one of my favourite flavour combinations. Dark chocolate + gorgonzola. You won't believe it until you try it. Apparently, about two thirds of the compounds that make up the flavours of both ingredients are common, so what you end up with is a beautiful chocolate taste with the floral aromas but not the sharpness of blue cheese. If you don't like blue cheese then you probably won't like this, but if you do, then give it a shot. You won't be disappointed.

spaghetti pomodoro

Sometimes all I want is a simple plate of spaghetti and tomato sauce for lunch. Usually a few hours before I play tennis, i go for a portion of these delicious carbs to give me a boost of energy. With a side of simple salad with either a balsamic or lemon juice vinaigrette, this is the quintessential efficient lunch.

I make sure that I use spaghetti of a good brand, usually from Dean and Deluca, that is pressed through brass mould, as opposed to being pressed through a plastic mould. This allows the texture of the pasta to be slightly rough in order to grab onto the sauce, leaving nothing on the plate at the end.

The sauce is made with olive oil, garlic, salt, pepper, tomato puree and a couple of shakes of dried basil. I also put in a small piece each of carrot and celery that I take out after cooking - they add a nice aroma to the sauce.

Topped with some freshly grated parmesan cheese and it's ready. 

shanks and chips

Dinner tonight was lamb shanks and chips, one of my favourite interpretations of meat and potatoes. I let the lamb shanks marinade overnight and the result was a flavourful, melt-in-your-mouth experience. The marinade included mock-wine (grape juice and red wine vinegar), thyme, bay leaves, two heads of garlic and peppercorns. Before braising in the oven, I browned the shanks after lightly dusting them with flour. I then roughly chopped 4 big onions and let them caramelize in the juices of the browned meat over very low fire. Replaced the shanks, poured over the remainder of the marinade, covered with foil then into a moderate/low oven for a couple of hours.

The chips are cooked in the Heston Blumenthal triple-cooked method. The result is a chip that is fluffy on the inside and glassy on the outside. Yes, glassy. Heston explains that the state of any material when it reaches this state, extremely crunchy and can shatter into small pieces. To me it is the only way to cook chips. It's worth the wait and isn't really as cumbersome as many of his other techniques. First you run them under cold water for about ten minutes, then boil until just cooked all the way through. Placed on a wire rack over a tray, the chips should be allowed to dry out until cooled. After a while, heat oil in a pan until you reach 130 degrees celsius. Fry the potatoes until they look dehydrated, a light skin will develop and they will turn slightly yellow. Repeat the drying process, this time in the fridge. Let them cool down and then take them out to get back to room temperature before finally frying once again at 190 degrees. Each of the frying processes must be carefully controlled because if the oil gets hotter than the temperatures stated above, the chips may burn.

curry comfort

What is comfort food? Something I want to eat again and again. It doesn't matter if I had it yesterday, I could go for it again today. That to me is comfort food. It should have a taste that I never get tired of, it should put me in a mindset that's relaxed, content, satisfied.

Curry is one of my comfort foods. It's really not that hard to make. Just a couple of times to figure out how to get your blender to work the way you want it. Above are most of the ingredients that go into my interpretation of a thai red curry paste. On the plate in front are garlic, ginger (when I can't find galangal), lemongrass and cut up kafir lime leaves. Fresh green chillies, onion, in the mortar coriander and cumin seeds freshly roasted in a pan. Then I add paprika, soy sauce, some lime juice and some crushed dried chillies. I then put a bit of olive oil just to help it bind in the blender.

The resulting paste is the base of flavour in your curry. You should experiment with quantities and perhaps other ingredients until you get the flavour that works for you. I have an intuitive sense for these things and, more importantly, I taste as i go along... or smell in this case, because the paste is quite pungent.

This paste goes well with everything. Today's selection was a purely vegan affair. Zucchini, carrots, sweet peppers, diced potatoes...

As with any kind of curry you're making, the paste goes in the pan until it dehydrates a bit and the aromas are released. Then the vegetables go in and are mixed with the paste for a few minutes before pouring in coconut milk. As it cooks, taste and adjust. I usually put in a tablespoon or so of brown sugar. It works really well in contributing to the sense of harmony in the dish: salty, hot, spicy, aromatic, slightly sweet... Sometimes you need to add a couple of stalks of lemongrass to add more of that flavour - just break up the stalks without tearing them apart and let them seep in the stock while cooking. When the vegetables - or whatever else you're cooking - are done, then the curry is done. Serve with or over rice and enjoy.

This one's about the flavour!

sous-vide steak

 

It seems that I have been in the mood for steak lately. I satiated that need today with steak cooked the way I like it. I got the steaks from Prime Cuts in Salmiya. 

When I look for steaks, I like them to be marbled with fat to keep them moist while cooking. The fat also adds flavour to the steaks and, yes, sometimes you get a sense that the cows lived happy lives, eating the freshest grass off the field. So how do I get the feeling that I did the cow justice, that its life wasn't in vain? I cook it properly. I want a steak that has the same colour from as close to one edge as the other. It should also have a nicely caramelized, charred surface.

Sous-vide cooking involves cooking an ingredient in a sealed environment in a water bath. The item should be vacuum-packed in preparation for being placed in a body of water that is heated to exactly the temperature that you want the ingredient to be cooked to. Sometimes, additional flavouring can be added prior to vacuum-packing to infuse the ingredient with seasonings and aromas. I saw this technique used on Iron Chef about eight or nine years ago and thought that it was a show-off technique - at the time I was really trying to learn more about flavour combinations - however, a couple of years ago, I tried to do it myself. And I'm more than glad that I did. Honestly, I don't want my steak cooked any other way. While researching this technique for cooking, I found that steak, eggs (for poached eggs) and salmon are typically considered, ingredients that require very delicate cooking to ensure a desired effect.

While I do not own an automatically controlled water thermal bath, and I have been told they are sold in Kuwait in medical / laboratory supply shops, I have figured out how to regulate the temperature myself. It involves a large pot of water, an accurate thermometer and an adjustable stove-top. Luckily, I have both gas and electric hobs to work with, and today I started on the gas then moved to electric, with better and more consistent results (due to lower temperatures).

I like my steak cooked to medium-rare, about 130 degrees F. I have read on other food blogs that others tend to agree with cooking to that temperature. However, I would have to trust the source and handling conditions of the meat to be able to eat it at that level of doneness.

As it goes on, you can see the colour change. The cooking process for steaks as thick as I selected them, or any other steak really, is about an hour. What's good about this technique is that you can be flexible with the cooking time, as you cannot exceed the temperature of the water bath.

There is a limit, however, as excessive heating even at these temperatures will result in a denaturing of the meat and eventually turn it mushy. This limit, though, is several hours, so you place your steaks in the water bath about an hour before you intend to serve... and if dinner is delayed a little bit, you don't have to worry because all you have to do before serving is sear the steak. And it won't go cold while you're waiting. I do this on a very hot griddle pan so that you can achieve the crusting treatment that you want without heating the steak too deeply. I want the meat to maintain the same colour and texture from as close to the surface as possible.

After taking the meat out of the bags, I just cover with freshly crushed salt and pepper and then sear. With this particular cut of steak, I let the trim of fat go first and then sear each side until I see the sear lines that I like. What's nice about cooking the steak sous-vide is the consistency of doneness throughout the steak as well as having the fat cooked as well - it is quite juicy and edible rather than how it usually turns out with surface cooking.

I may consider placing a lifting device (maybe a steaming vessel) or something similar so that the heat of the bottom of the pan does not affect the steak. I have been fairly successful so far in maintaining the temperatures that I require without over-cooking my steaks, but I imagine a fully automated water thermal bath may give some ease of mind as I can just put my steaks in there and forget about them for a while. 

parmigiano reggiano

A couple of years ago I was given one of the best gifts I have ever received, a barrel of 36 month aged organic parmigiano reggiano from a boutique farmer in the region. Well, it was brought to me by a relative who lives in Italy and understands how fundamentally important it is to me. 

To this day, I remember the mature creaminess and flavour. What they say about this cheese is true: it imparts a sensibility of umami, the other sense of taste; it just lifts everything it touches with a beautiful aroma that seems to work with almost everything. When I am given 5 kilos of this delicacy, at first I think of how I could lavishly splurge with the ingredient. I could eat it raw, shaved and dispersed over a dish, or eat a dish in which it is a key ingredient in the cooking. I elected to, of course, eat the pieces that broke off as I was chiseling the barrel into portions for storing, but then I made one of my favourite dishes, parmesan risotto. So plain - rice, the aroma of the stock in the background and the parmesan and butter that are used to finish off the dish. To achieve this simplicity, you need two tools in your arsenal: proper cooking technique and perfect ingredients. Thankfully, this barrel provided me with the latter. 

Biological = organic.

This particular cheese reminded me of some kind of geological formation. With beautiful shards and crystalline-seeming arrangements, this cheese certainly didn't disappoint. It may have been slightly stronger than the "parmesan" we get in Kuwait (which is usually gran padano sold as parmesan). Gran padano is made in pretty much the same was as parmigiano reggiano, but because it's made outside of the designated zone it can't be called parmesan - however, it is more commonly available and seems to me slightly more mellow in flavour and aroma than this cheese.

vegan udon

It may be due to the weather, but I've been craving udon lately. However, not since my visit to Japan a couple of years ago have I had a worthy udon soup. There it was duck and green onion udon with the typical dashi (broth), and I had it several times. With my selection of ingredients, I wouldn't even try to recreate it. But, I did try a vegan udon soup today that turned out brilliantly.

Sultan centre has some of the ingredients that are key to making this dish work, including the noodles and miso paste. I got dried shitake mushrooms, sold as dried black chinese mushrooms, in a shop in the city.

First the broth. I covered the dried mushrooms with boiling water. I wanted to extract as much of the flavour as possible. It resulted in a beautifully golden broth that had such a nice aroma. Strained through a fine sieve and kept it on the side. In one pan, i boiled the noodles for 6 or 7 minutes until they were still a little al dente. In another, i sauteed some garlic and ginger in some sesame oil. Then added the vegetables (eggplant, fresh mushrooms, the rehydrated mushrooms, sweet red pepper, then the broth, about a tablespoon of miso paste, soy sauce and let it cook until the vegetables were almost done. Then I added some tofu and cooked for a couple of minutes more. To serve, I put some noodles in a bowl, poured over some broth and vegetables, then what you see above is what I got.

It was really enjoyable and a soup I'm sure I'll make again and again. If I could find some kombu (kelp) to give some extra aroma to the stock, I think that would perfect this dish.

durian fruit

I stumbled upon this one by accident today. I was going to eat futoor at a restaurant i've already reviewed and on the way, in the building, a smell emerged. A friend asked if it was a gas leak. I imagined rotten residue on plastic bags. Maybe pest control chemicals? I asked the waitress what the smell was and she whispered to me, "durian."

The durian fruit is something i've heard about several times from people who've tried it, who always say that it tastes better than it smells, and from some tv shows and other media. I knew that it smelled bad and it was banned from a few places, but nothing prepared me for the smell. As the food got to the table, either I got used to the smell or the smell of wading, but it really didn't bother me so much. But then the smell emerged again after the meal - i think the table of 18 were eating durian for dessert. Appetizer and dessert, same smelly dish.

"The edible flesh emits a distinctive odour, strong and penetrating even when the husk is intact. Some people regard the durian as fragrant; others find the aroma overpowering and offensive. The smell evokes reactions from deep appreciation to intense disgust and has been described variously as almonds, rotten onions, turpentine and gym socks. The odour has led to the fruit's banishment from certain hotels and public transportation in southeast Asia." [Wikipedia]

leftovers

When I make a nice roast, I always make sure I make enough for the meal itself and a lot extra for leftovers. That goes for the gravy as well.

There's nothing I like more than nice toast, some sliced roast, a bit of shredded lettuce, tomatoes, mayonnaise, dijon mustard and a good amount of gravy. Also, sometimes some cheese is nice. Classic sandwiches are classic for a reason. Like they say, if it ain't broken, don't fix it. Make sure you have some extra gravy to dunk the sandwich in.

celeriac

Also known as celery root, this is a vegetable I've seen used in many sources. When you first look at it, you'll find it kind of ugly looking, verging on the grotesque. But don't be fooled. It's a staple in french cooking in simple dishes such as shredded celeriac-mayonnaise salads to being using as a root vegetable in stews. It has a taste and aroma very much like celery but deeper and more mellow. It also works as a great element to add to mashed potatoes, giving it a nice mellow sweetness that gives great contrast to a nicely roasted joint of meat.

Celeriac has a very rough outer layer that has to be cut off... it's too thick of a skin to peel. On the inside, you'll find the edible mass of the vegetable. Be careful, though, as it browns fairly quickly. so if you don't return it to a ziplock bag as soon as possible, just rub with some lemon slices. It's got the consistency of a potato, but a bit more stringy. As soon as it's cooked, the stringy quality goes away. However, it can be eaten raw or cooked.

This is a simple beef stew I tried to make with the celeriac. I put the mirepoix, i guess, with the celeriac substituting for celery. I braised the stewing meat cubes along with the vegetables for a couple of hours and this is the stew I got. I may have put in some potatoes, since the celeriac, carrots and onions all became sweet after cooking in juices for a while, caramalizing nicely. I did offset with thyme and some cayenne pepper. It was a satisfying meal.

chabra jumla visit

 


The "chabra" is a universe of its own, a principal institution of Kuwaiti culinary development since 1976. Located in Shuwaikh industrial area, off the charcoal roundabout, this campus of fresh fruit and vegetable vendors supplies Kuwait with a great variety of local and imported materials.

My aim with this post is to start a monthly visit to the chabra in order to assess seasonality as well as interesting products and trends in the market.

My trip to Shuwaikh started at about 10:00 am and took me to a surprisingly active scene, for a Ramadan weekend morning. Once we found our way around, we came upon the "jumla," or bulk, section. It is connected to the indoor market, right after it on your right, after you come in from the main entrance. It is a world of fairly similar vendors selling fairly similar products. Quite similar to the way shops usually are in specialized shopping centres, they seem to be owned by a key vendors who simply have a plethora of small vendor shops, related to the modules established by the authorities that built the building at its establishment. Out of the similarity, however, you will find that one vendor cares more about his products and you buy from his because his product simply looks better. It's important to take a look around first then choose; eventually, you will train yourself into knowing which product to buy upon first glance. Apparently, the best time to go to the chabra is at 5 or 6 in the morning so that you can catch the latest deliveries from the chilled trucks. Especially in the heat of the summer and its natural ventilation into this chabra space, freshness of the products must always be considered. Professional vendors recommend that all ripened fruit and vegetables should be stored and handled at 4 degrees C until a maximum of two hours before final cooking or eating. Quite honestly, I would not recommend that you buy the eggs that are displayed on the periphery of the jumla section, facing the street, as they are directly exposed to and heated by the intense sunshine. I would hardly assume that these eggs are safe to eat.

One of the first things we noticed was the monopolization of garlic by chinese products. Not only are they dry, but they are also a lot more costly than before. Vendors had heaps of boxes of these sub-standard products. This is worrisome as we have to wonder where all the other choices went. I am afraid that this reduction in quality will become the standard.

Summer fruits were everywhere, mostly from Turkey, Lebanon and Syria. I remember in previous years how we used to get really nice fruit from Iran, including forms of melons that I'd never seen before, to which I still have fond memories. In the picture above, notice the prickly pears, the grapes and the figs. I purchased some of the prickly pears and the figs and I was quite impressed by their quality. However, I have to note that in most of the vendors' displays, much of the fruit was not properly ripened and required further storage until the right time. I assume this is a standard in the "jumla" trade. I will have to investigate the other market, where products are available at much higher per-unit costs, intended for individuals.

These Saudi lemons impressed me because they were rough, unpolished and contained various sizes. To me, this looks like a genuine effort of a natural farm. I appreciate the natural finish of agricultural products - they have let nature take its course and have not tried to industrialize the agricultural process by means of chemicals, waxes and forced growth periods. These sun-flushed lemons will work well, I hope. I was inspired to conduct two tests in the near future on lemons. I hope to collect a sample of at least three or four popular lemons in Kuwait while making lemon sorbet and lemon curd. I will also preserve the lemons, a process that takes 2-3 weeks, which I will document and submit to you upon completion.

As an homage to my previous post, I thought this wall of onions very interesting and combines my two main fields of interest: food and the physical environment.

By the time I came back to the herbs area, most of the vendors had gone to pray and so we decided to curtail our visit and return to investigate them in the future.

The economy of buying bulk vegetables showed its worth as we were leaving. 30 KD worth of vegetables could barely be squeezed into the boot of the car. We thanked the man who rolled around around our purchases as we perused the available products. I subsequently decided to visit a food outlet that contrasts completely with my chabra experience. I spent 37 KD on items that I could carry in one hand, although in 4 paper bags. I asked myself if it was worth it. For the most part, yes. While some vital items can easily be purchased at the chabra, others cannot. I have to indulge myself every once in a while by getting some of my favourite cheeses, breads, condiments and meats. Life is about balance, isn't it?

I must say that I was inspired by my chabra visit. I found some items that will be the subject of discussion and study in the coming month. I will have an updated chabra post this month that will cover the fresh greens - perhaps I will make a nice marag shabzy soon - and a search for better garlic. Although I was surpised and impressed by the chioce of three apparent types of potato, I was expecting more out of my critical discovery of the place.

A typical government-built building from the 70's, I quite like that the design of the shed, which is the literal translation of "chabra," relies on natural lighting and ventilation - the structural beams become light diffusers, bringing a harmonic and socially relevant demarcation of the public space.

Who monitors the products and who demands their quality? Why do I have distinct memories of much better fruit and vegetables in the past? I would like for a group of people to be interesting in raising standards in Kuwait. This really applies to all aspects of civic life in Kuwait, from our streets, the programmatic functioning of space to the food we eat on our tables. I feel as though if we continue to eat chinese garlic and humdrum tomatoes, we will be losing out on the potential of food in the regional market. Also, do we have any kind of independent markets of local farms, like a farmers' market of Kuwait? I am not aware of this, and I was hoping that I would make interesting discoveries at the chabra. But I was slightly disappointed.

onions

Onions are used in so many of our dishes. We often take them for granted and use them out of customary practice. I, for one, am a big fan of onions. Whether cooked, raw or to give an accent, onions just work. There are four major types of onions that I commonly use on an almost daily basis: the common bulb onion, the shallot, the spring onion, and the leek. Each offers a unique set of chemicals that do their job well.

Today, I will focus on the applications of onions more and name just a few key examples that rely on the onion to create one of the fundamental, but subtle, overtones.

As a solution to remove the edginess of onions, they should be cooked. If you want the most minimal amount of cooking, then blanch them for about 20 to 30 seconds and use them in salads, sandwiches and other applications when you need near-raw onions.

Onions have a natural sugar that caramelizes when heated. In the photo above, I quickly charred the cut ends of these small onions before putting them in a stockpot with other ingredients in order to give the stock a browner colour. It also seems to enhance the overall flavour of the stock.

I also like onions as a side dish to a steak. Sliced into large rings and cooked very slowly for a minimum of half an hour with some butter, with salt and pepper, this to me is a perfect dish on its own.

Leeks are also great to use. As above in this leek and taleggio pie with sprigs of fresh rosemary, the subtle sweetness and milder onion hints maintain their strength against the velvety cheese and softness of the homemade pie crust. Leeks can also be used successfully in soups and many other dishes.

Much of Western cooking uses a mirepoix, the "holy trinity" of onion, carrots and celery, as a core flavour. This is also the mix of vegetables I use under a carcass if roasting in the oven, later to be used to flavour the gravy. In this case, they hoist the ribs of beef and allow for the fat to be drained prior to incorporating the vegetables into the gravy.

When discussing onions, the topics are almost limitless, as they are such versatile root vegetables that have stood the test of time and are still as popular globally as they ever were. Also considered a healthy vegetable, the onion seems to be effective in this regard when eaten or used raw.