Stuffed vegetables — mahshi — are the patience dish of Levantine cooking, appearing at feasts and family gatherings throughout Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, and beyond. The technique of hollowing and filling vegetables with spiced rice and meat, then cooking them in a tomato or yogurt broth until both filling and vessel are completely tender, is thousands of years old.
Vegetables (courgettes, aubergines, peppers, vine leaves, onions) hollowed, filled with a mixture of rice, minced lamb or beef, allspice, cinnamon, pine nuts, and herbs, then slow-cooked in a covering liquid until both the rice filling and the vegetable are simultaneously tender.
The flavour of mahshi is allspice, cinnamon, and slow-cooked meat — warm, sweet-savoury, deeply comforting. The vegetable vessel adds its own sweetness (courgette, pepper) or bitterness (aubergine) as a counterpoint. The cooking liquid, enriched by the filling's drippings, is as important as the stuffed vegetables themselves — it should be served alongside.
- The rice in the filling must be raw — partially cooked rice will over-cook to mush during the extended braise - The filling must not be packed tight — it needs room to expand as the rice absorbs cooking liquid. Fill to two-thirds maximum - The cooking liquid must be sufficient to cover — the filling cooks by steam and absorbed liquid, not direct heat - The pine nuts must be toasted separately before incorporation — raw pine nuts remain pale and flavourless in the filling [VERIFY: light golden in dry pan or butter] - The allspice and cinnamon quantities are generous by Western standards — they are the flavour of the dish
OTTOLENGHI JERUSALEM — Technique Entries OT-01 through OT-25