Prepared Ingredients

In Beirut, apart from traditional fennel and mint teas, they drink “zohorat”, a lovely tisane made with a mix of flowers, usually including chamomile, rose, linden blossom, verveine, and other plants.  Before I left Lebanon, my friend Fouad and his family and I drove to the Chouf mountains where he took me to a fabulous herbalist.  There, I picked my own mix of flowers and herbs and left with a big sack of zohorat, as well as bags of fennel, cloves, cinnamon sticks, whole dried ginger root and other spices. 

My brother loves star anise immensely. He will go to the extent of picking out every piece in a serving bowl! I decided to create anise-flavoured oil for him one birthday, and now I make it every year. The orange peel imparts a delicate orange colour so it makes a very pretty gift.  

I remember when I was newly married and had very little time in the kitchen, I learnt to cook up a huge batch of this base gravy from my sister-in-law and keep it in the refrigerator, using it through the week to make quick curries. It can be frozen as well. I still keep some in my freezer for rainy days.

I often find myself using up whatever nuts, seeds and dried fruit I have on hand when making this granola. A few hazelnuts make a tasty addition, as does large shreds of dried coconut. For this recipe I use extra virgin olive oil but untoasted sesame oil works well too. Whatever oil you use just make sure that it’s cold pressed and unrefined.

Since I like to keep sweeteners to a minimum, I often leave out the maple syrup but you can add more if you like a sweeter breakfast.