Culinary Adventures with Camilla

  This month, I am hosting the French #Winophiles to explore French grapes that crossed continents. You can read my invitation here . If you are reading this early enough, feel free to jump in on our live chat. We'll be on Twitter on Saturday, September 17th at 8am Pacific time. Follow the hashtag #Winophiles and be sure to add that to anything you tweet so we can see it. Here's the line-up of the articles for the event - French Grapes that Crossed Continents. These will all be live between Friday, September 16th and Saturday, September 17th before the chat... A Cinsault-Heavy Blend from Lebanon - Château Musar's Bekaa Valley Red Hochar Père et Fils 2018 - Craves a Garlic-Heavy Dish or Three by Culinary Adventures with Camilla A Great Burger on Homemade Pretzel Hamburger Buns paired with a Malbec from Argentina  by A Day in the Life on the Farm Africa and France: A Cab Franc by Carmen Stevens and a Rich Pork Loin Dinner by Our Good Life Feeling French in Paso Roble...

I am sharing my version of Pandemonium Noshery's  Iraqi Lamb Stew  today for our monthly Eat the World event which is a fun blog swap. Here's the line-up... Pandemonium Noshery: Ottolenghi’s Burnt Eggplant Salad   Evelyne at Cultureatz: Gromperekichelcher: Potato Fritters from Luxembourg   Sneha’s Recipe: Baytinjan   A Day in the Life on the Farm: Hadgi Badah iraqi cardamom cookies   Culinary Adventures with Cam: Iraqi Lamb Stew Eat the World's 2021 It's hard to believe that we are at the the end of 2021. Crazy. So, welcome to the December installment of our #EattheWorld project, being spearheaded by Evelyne of  CulturEatz . Here's  her challenge . This month we are doing something a little bit differently. Instead of Evelyne picking a country from which we all cook, the Eat the World crew is doing a blog swap, giving some love fellow bloggers and making one of their previous #EattheWorld recipes. Before we get to that, here's a recap of this past...

For  May's Wine Pairing Weekend event, Wendy of  A Day in the Life on the Farm  is inviting the blogging group to look at Middle Eastern wine pairings. So, after a bit of back and forth about what constitutes the Middle East, I landed on a Lebanese food and wine pairing.  I know that some of the group had trouble sourcing Middle Eastern wines, so Wendy opened up the field to include Middle Eastern inspired-dishes with whatever wine we wished. I do see in the titles that at least a few of us found wines from the region. If you are reading this early enough, feel free to jump into our live Twitter chat on Saturday, May 8th at 8am Pacific. Just follow the hashtag #WinePW and be sure to add it to anything you tweet so we can see it. Here's the line-up of articles from the crew... Robin of Crushed Grape Chronicles is Celebrating Sauvignon Blanc Day at the Table with St. Supéry and Easy Middle Eastern Dishes . Pinny of Chinese Food and Wine Pairing is  Drinking...

This month, Sue of  Palatable Pastime  told the Baking Bloggers that for February: "Share your baked Middle Eastern food with us, sweet or savoy. It can be a main dish, dessert,  pastry, anything as long as part of it is baked." Here's the #BakingBloggers virtual Middle Eastern bakery... Apricot Pistachio Cake from Food Lust People Love Basbousa Cake from Pandemonium Noshery Cottage Cheese and Veggies Borek from Sneha's Recipe Easy Middle Eastern Puff Pastry Cheese Bourekas  by Fatih, Hope, Love & Luck Survive Despite a Whiskered Accomplice Laffa Bread from Making Miracles Lebanese Sesame Cookies from Culinary Adventures with Camilla Mana'eesh (Palestinian Flatbread) from Karen's Kitchen Stories Parda Pulao - Iraqi Parda Plau from The Schizo Chef Roast Chicken Shwarma from A Day in the Life on the Farm Umm Ali from Caroline's Cooking Lebanese Sesame Cookies  Given that I could go sweet or savory for this challenge, I was...

I'll be honest: this was made as an after-thought for one of my best friend's birthday dinners. D was spicing the meatballs and I realized that I wanted them to be a little bit more fancy.  T oum , I declared! "What's toum?" Garlic deliciousness. "Daddy doesn't like garlic that much. His inner vampire gets upset." Too bad! Help me peel these cloves, please. "All of those?!? Daddy really isn't going to be happy." Yes, all of them. "That's a lot of garlic." When we served this with the meatballs, Pia called it "garlic frosting." I love it! That's my kinda frosting. Emulsification Tips When I posted the photo, a friend commented that he was looking forward to my tips as the one time he tried, he lost the emulsification. Okay. Got it. Tips. Hmmm... There are definitely some things I do to ensure success as much as possible. It's important to make sure that everything is dry. Even...

As we continue on with our May  Foodie Reads Challenge , I wrapped up  Jasmine and Fire: A Bittersweet Year in Beirut by Salma Abdelnour .* I suppose if I had to pick my "usual genre" it would certainly be a foodie memoir. And this one definitely qualifies. On the Page... For one year, Salma leaves New York where she has a career as a successful food journalist, a steady boyfriend, and an established life. She sublets her apartment, packs her bags, travels to Lebanon, and moves into her family's apartment in Beirut. While she's there, she explore the sites, sounds, and tastes of her childhood. She gets reacquainted with family members and childhood friends; she also vividly details her love affair with Lebanese food. And, as a food writer, h er descriptions of food are lush and positively drool-worthy - baked goods from all over the city, festive foods from holidays and countless parties. We are immersed in her retelling of the texture, flavors, colors, and aro...

Wine Pairing Weekend - #winePW - happens on the second Saturday of the month. And this month I'm hosting. "We're celebrating the new year with a new country, new varietal, or new vintner," I wrote in this month's #winePW invitation (click to read the invitation:  here ). Here's what the #WinePW Bloggers poured... These are listed alphabetically by post title and I'm excited to see new vintners, new countries, and wines from Turkey, Croatia, and even Lebanon. A New Vintner for #WinePW by  A Day in the Life on the Farm Exploring English Sparkling Wine by  Confessions of a Culinary Diva Something New for #winePW: Faire la Fête + Dinner to Go by  Pull That Cork It's Time to Wine Something New by  Dracaena Wines Lubyee Bi Lahmi + Château Musar Jeune by  Culinary Adventures with Camilla Middle Eastern Chicken Orzo and Croatian Wine by  Cooking Chat Out with the Old, In with the New by  Rockin Red Blog Wine and Dine: Tur...

When we traveled, via tabletop, to Lebanon this week, I told the boys a story. "This dish was one of your Daddy's favorites when he was little. And when Daddy and I were getting married, Aunt Jenn had a party for me...called a 'bridal shower.' She asked guests to give me copies of their favorite recipes. And because Grandma knew that Daddy loved this dish, she wrote out the recipe and sent it to me." So, while most of the time, my culinary adventures have no point of reference for any of my boys, this was competing with fond foodie memories from Jake's childhood. Thankfully, he deemed it "really close." I'll take that. I did sub beef for lamb, fennel for onions, and mushrooms for kidney beans. 1 lb. lamb  beef, cut into 1/2" cubes (I subbed beef for lamb because my mini boys are huge lamb fans...yet) 3 T olive oil 1 onion  fennel, finely chopped (not traditional, but I used what I had) 1 can white kidney beans  pound sliced c...