With many of us enjoying the luxury of a few days off thanks to the Eid holiday, now is the perfect opportunity to spend a bit of extra time in the kitchen preparing a meal to share with friends and family.
But not all of us can just eat anything that is laid out, food intolerances are becoming increasingly more common across the world, so we have put together a spread that caters to everyone.
It includes a mezze-style grazing starter idea that doesn’t contain any nuts and seeds, a gluten-free twist on a classic main and ideas for desserts made without dairy and gluten.
The dishes do of course work equally well on their own, depending on the dietary preferences of those you’re cooking for.
Nut and seed-free mezze
A mezze-style grazing platter is a fabulous way to begin a meal - it looks both abundant and appealing - while feeling informal.
Inviting guests to help themselves to the food encourages conversation and interaction, and thanks to the array of little dishes, there should be something for everyone to enjoy. Apart from those with a nut or seed allergy, you might think. After all, from pretty toasted pine nuts tossed through fattoush to tabbouleh dressed with pistachios, bowls filled with muhammarma (red pepper and walnut dip) and dukkah-dusted labneh, mezze items are often abound with nuts and seeds.
While preparing a nut- and seed-free mezze platter is a tricky – and very serious – undertaking, it is possible. For anyone with a seed or nut allergy, store-bought or restaurant-prepared hummus is off the menu. This needn't be the case for a home-made version though.
Although tahini (ground sesame seed paste) is regarded as a key ingredient in hummus, it's entirely possible to produce a smooth, creamy, delicious variation without it. What now becomes imperative is that the rest of the ingredients are top notch - which means using really good quality olive oil, super-fresh lemons and ideally, just-cooked chickpeas. Tahini provides the hummus with an earthy, slightly bitter flavour and adds to the creamy texture.
To make up for this, add a little baking soda to the water that you both soak and cook the chickpeas in, as this helps them to soften and breakdown. When you blend the mixture, pour in a couple of extra tablespoons of olive oil (for a really silky-smooth end result, try coconut oil) and puree for a littler longer than you think necessary.
Add variety to your nut- and seed- free mezze offerings with dishes of smoky, grilled aubergine slices, bowls of homemade sumac-spiced crisps and marinated olives and roasted red peppers blitzed with feta and olive oil to make a creamy dip.
A gluten-free take on chicken with freekeh
There are plenty of great things about the firm, chewy wheat grain known as freekeh: it is high in protein and fibre, inexpensive, easy to use and versatile. The popular Middle Eastern dish, freekeh with chicken, is a great dinner party main course: it's tasty, feels celebratory and the preparation and most of the cooking can be done in advance.
Now this is all well and good, unless you're following a gluten-free diet or preparing a meal for someone who is. Before you discard the idea of serving juicy, poached-then-roasted poultry on a spiced wholegrain base, consider simply following your usual recipe (checking the ingredients for gluten of course), and swapping the freekeh for a gluten-free alternative. Fluffy, toothsome quinoa and nutty red rice, or a mixture of the two, work brilliantly.
For this variation, both grains can be treated the same as you would freekeh: sautéed in butter or oil with spices and chopped onion and then simmered in stock until tender. Traditionally, the cooking water that the chicken was earlier poached in, is used here.If you skip this step and opt for ready-made stock do double check that it is gluten free.
Free-from dessert options
If you’re looking to make a gluten-free dessert with plenty of Middle Eastern flair, consider polenta. Although most commonly used to make a creamy, buttery, herb-flecked accompaniment to savoury dishes, finely ground polenta has a crumbly, slightly grainy texture that’s akin to semolina and is gluten free. It cooks in a similar way to semolina, making it an good substitute. So look up a favourite basboosa recipe, sub in finely ground polenta, and the little squares of syrup-drenched cake will taste just as good. Do note that while most basboosa recipes don’t call for flour or baking powder, if yours does, you’ll need to use a gluten-free version.
For those who must forgo dairy, dessert is one of the hardest courses to navigate. Thanks to the likes of cream-filled qatayef, kunafa oozing strands of melted cheese and little bowls of muhallabieh jauntily dressed with rose petals and chopped pistachios, this is particularly true of traditional Arabic sweets.
There is an alternative to be found in the form of naturally dairy-free coconut milk. The likes of muhallabieh, Umm Ali and roz bel haleeb (rice pudding) can all be made using full fat coconut milk, with the added bonus being that the desserts take on an additional exotic flavour.
The really clever trick here lies with making whipped coconut milk - leave a can of coconut milk upright in the fridge for several hours. When you open the can, the solid and liquid will have separated. Carefully scoop the solids into a bowl and add a little sugar, a drizzle of rose syrup or orange blossom water or the seeds from a vanilla pod. Beat with an electric hand whisk until thick and fluffy, then use to fill qatayef and kellaj, to ice cakes and puddings, and as an accompaniment to the polenta basboosa mentioned above.
