Saudi Arabia - Kabsa

Alright! We are getting through these posts fairly quickly now! All it took was a long train ride for me to get my act together. Still got a few more hours on the train to go, so lets see how many more we can get through!

We're midway through June now, which is when I made this traditional Saudi chicken dish called Kabsa. This fairly simple dinner of chicken and rice was absolutely delicious and I was very happy with how it turned out. A lot of the spices and methods used to make this dish actually reminded me a lot of the Indian butter chicken I made way back in the second week of this challenge. Obviously there are significant differences between the two dishes, but it was kind of cool to find something familiar in a cuisine that I don't know much about. There are so many delicious flavours coming together in kabsa- sweet and savory spices, a little spice, and quite a lot of citrus from the lemon. There's quite a lot going on in this dish, but it all works, and none of the flavours overpower the others. I was glad I made quite a large amount of this particular recipe, because I was able to have delicious leftovers for about a week, and even had enough for a couple co-workers to try some as well. This is yet another recipe I think I would try to make again.

Since June marks the mid-point in the year, this might be a good time to take stock of the project so far. Overall, I've been really enjoying this challenge, and I'm very happy with the results so far. My goals starting out were to experience new types of cuisine I might not know much about, to expand my cooking skills in general, and to encourage myself to cook more. I've certainly learned quite a lot about styles of cooking around the world, and as I progress through the challenge I'm finding the recipes getting a little easier as I can build on things I've learned in past weeks. Most importantly though, I have been cooking a lot more since I started, and not just the special meals I make for this project. I've been able to use the things I learn here and apply them to my everyday cooking, and it's given me an appreciation for cooking in general. It's become a bit of a stress relief and has made me generally more happy and healthy. All of that considered, I would say that even just half-way through the project, this has been a very successful experiment, and I'm excited to see what else I can learn as the year goes on!

FIRSTS THIS WEEK:

• Learned about Saudi cuisine
• Used garlic ginger paste as a rub for chicken

RECIPES I USED:

• Kabsa: https://marocmama.com/saudi-arabian-kabsa-chicken-and-rice/