Omani Cuisine

 

Here is a quick recipe for a good sandwich for big gatherings, it should not take you a long time to prepare and it requires a very small number of ingredients. BB, or Black Beautify, is a reference to the balsamic vinegar and Worcestershire sauce   used in it.

Ingredients (for 6 sandwiches): 

• 4 medium chicken breasts (diced into cubes)
• 5 sliced cloves of garlic
• 3 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
• 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 6 buns of white bread
• Salt/black pepper

Method

1. Wash the chicken cubes and then drain them well. Put the chicken cubes in a bowl, add the Worcestershire sauce, the salt and finely crushed black pepper.
2. Mix the chicken with the ingredients well and leave the bowl in the fridge to marinate for 30 minutes minimum. You. Then take them out of the fridge 15 minutes before you use them.
3. Put a frying pan on a medium flame, add the EVOO and the garlic to it, then as soon as the oil starts to sizzle, add the chicken. Sauté the chicken until it turns white and then add the balsamic vinegar. Keep sautéing the chicken until it is done. If the chicken is still not cocked well you can add small amounts of water or chicken stock to help cook it.
4. Slice the buns and fill them with the chicken. You can add cheese or any kind of sauce you like. It can be served with chips or fries.

Cafe Glacier is a very old coffee shop in Zakher Mall in Al Khuwair. It is, just like Darcy’s Kitchen, a unique Omani franchise. It has two branches, the main one in Al Khuwair, and the second smaller one in Markaz Al Bahja. Even though it opened in 1995, I’ve never actually been to it before last year.

Glacier of Zakher Mall is not the most spacious of restaurants, there are less than 10 tables inside and a couple outside the cafe in the mall side. However, the place is not tight in space at all, and I think that smoking is prohibited inside the coffeeshop. I’ve only been to Glacier around lunch time and the place did not seem busy at all during any of my visits.

Glacier’s menu is made up of a long list of cold drinks and juices, ice creams, pancakes and waffles, but in addition to these they also serve rolls and sandwiches, salads, and snacks such as burgers and different types of stews.

On 99.9% of the times we have Glaciers we always go for the club sandwiches. Glacier’s club sandwiches are one of the best in town, if not THE best. The club sandwich meal comes with potato chips and is very filling. The reputation of club sandwiches at work is unchallengeable, it is our definitive take away lunch ever.

On the remaining 00.1% of the times we order at Glacier we usually got for the Sate Maison that comes with peanut sauce. I enjoyed it when I had last time, even though that must’ve been really ages ago.

Toasted sandwiches such as the club sandwich cost from RO 1.700 to 2.600, salads cost from RO1.400 to RO 3.200, snacks cost from RO 1.500 to RO 3.400, cakes cost around RO 0.800, ice creams around 2.500, and pancakes and waffles cost from 1.100 to 2.100.

I didn’t really try a lot of things at Glacier, but I really can’t recommend the club sandwiches enough, I think that it is the perfect office lunch for those who want to have something simple yet delicious at a place that is not crowded at lunch time!

We are not dead!

We apologise for not making any posts for the whole of October. The Omani Cuisine never really stopped during that period, but for various random reasons we never managed to sit down and write what we have been up to. We promise that we will make up for this with regular recipes and reviews from now on. Our latest kitchen adventure is, as we like to call it, a meat ball sub, very fun to make and to eat.

Ingredients (To make four subs)

• 0.5 Kg of pure minced beef
• Handful of chopped shallot
• I teasp of chopped mint
• Handful of chopped coriander
• I tsp of Dijon mustard
• 3 crushed cloves of garlic
• Mozzarella cheese
• 2 teasp of cinnamon
• Crushed red chili
• Salt/pepper
• 1 tsp of flour
• Balsamic vinegar
• 2 chopped medium sized tomatoes
• 1 chopped medium sized white onion
• 1 Lemon
• Bay leaves
• Cardamom
• Cloves
• Tomato paste

Method

• Mix the minced meat with the shallots, mint and coriander in a bowl.
• Add the Dijon mustard, garlic and cheese to the bowl mix.
• Add 1 tsp of cinnamon, crushed chili, salt, pepper and flour and mix these with all the ingredients well together.
• Divide the mix into medium sized balls and put them in a fridge for half hour.
• In the mean time, boil some water (about 1 L) in a pot. Add the remaining cinnamon to the water when it starts boiling. Wait 5 minutes and then add the tomato paste, and the zest and juice of the lemon. Stir the water mix and leave to boil for another 10 minutes. Filter the water to get rid of the hard ingredients and leave the water to be used later.
• Using another pot, fry the onion in some oil until the onion turns to golden. Add the tomatoes and stir. When the tomato starts drying up add some of the water mix we made in the earlier step(don’t put much water, as it only to make sure the tomato and onion don’t burn). Stir and repeat for a period of 20 minutes.
• Heat a frying pan and put some butter on it. Get the balls out of the fridge and fry them on the pan while turning the balls around to fry all the surface of the balls. Once the whole surface of all the balls is fried add the vinegar and continue turning the balls around.
• Start adding some of the tomato/onion mix and the liquid to the meat balls. Keep this process for 15 minutes to fully cook the meat balls.

The meat balls can be served with any kind of plain pasta or to be served as a sub sandwich with chips on the side

Prior to the launch of the Omani Cuisine, we attempted to make a burger from scratch, but the experiment failed miserably, we recently gave it another shot after doing some research and some unofficial experimentation at other venues, and as a result the Champions Burger was successfully born at the Omani Cuisine – coincidently AC Milan won the Champions League on the same day.

Ingredients (To make six burgers)

• 600g of pure minced beef
• Coriander (كزبرة) finely chopped
• 2 small shallots (بصل أخضر), finely chopped
• 2 cloves of garlic, finely crushed
• 1 tbsp barbecue sauce
• 2 tbsp Thai chili sauce
• 1 tbsp flour
• Nandos mixed spices crush
• salt and pepper
• 1 big onion sliced into rings
• extra virgin olive oil (EVOO)

Method

1. mix the beef well with the coriander, shallots and the flour in a bowl.
2. add the garlic, barbecue sauce, 1/2 a spoon of the Thai chili sauce, the Nandos crush, salt and pepper and mix with the beef.
3. divide the beef mix into six equal portions to make six burgers. (you can cook them directly or keep them in the fridge to cook later)
4. heat some EVOO in a frying pan until it is screaming hot.
5. fry the burgers, each side left for six minutes.

Extra – Spicy Cooked Onion to be served in the bun along with the burger.
Leave the burger on the side and fry the onion in a pot with a little of EVOO, wait until it turns golden and then add the rest of the Thai chili sauce and some salt and pepper.

This was an experiment for making something different this week, the original idea was to make a club sandwich, but we ended up with the result you see above. The boring chicken sandwich was saved by the creamy sauce we added to it. This is a simple snack that you can make, check out the ingredients and method below.

Ingredients (4 sandwitches)

• 400g of chicken breasts sliced into small strips
• 1 medium sized onion minced finely
• 1 red capsicum sliced into thin strips
• 2 garlic clovers
• 2 green chillies
• Nandos crushed spices mix
• butter 1.5 tbsp
• half a mug of milk
• 1.5 tbsp of flour
• salt and pepper
• brown toasted bread

Method

1. In a small pot over low heat melt the butter.
2. Add the flour immediatly after all the butter melts – make sure to stir the mix while adding.
3. Add the milk gradually while stirring to ensure that the mix blends properly.
4. Add half a mug of water to mix and keep on stirring.
5. Add salt and pepper and stir.
6. keep stirring. (Now you understand why this is boring) Stir from time to time for a period of 10 minutes. You should get a thick white cream. You can adjust the viscosity of the cream by adding more water. Once done leave covered on the side.
7. Crush the garlic clovers with the chillies and the Nandos spices mix.
8. Melt some butter on a fraying pan.
9. Fry the minced onion and capsicum slices on the pan for four minutes.
10. Add the chicken to the mix and fry while stirring until the chicken turns white.
11. Add the crushed spices mix with one tbsp of vinegar to the chicken mix on the pan.
12. Add half a mug of water, cover the pan and leave for 5 minutes.
13. Remove the cover and wait for all the water to evaporate before adding the cream we made at the beginning.
14. Stir the mix until cream is absorbed by the chicken and the mix is creamy.
15. Take out and serve with toast as sandwitches.

Ingredients

• 2 medium white onions
• 4 capsicums (green, red, yellow, and orange)
• 3 garlic clovers
• 4 chicken breasts
• 4 Irani flat bread (or any type of wrap-able flat bread)
• 1 teasp lime
• salt/pepper
• chili powder
• cinnamon powder
• mixed arabian spices
• 1 teasp vinegar

Directions

1. Chop onion and capcicum into rings, crush garlic, and slice breast into long strips.
2. Heat the frying pan and add little of vegetable oil. When the oil is heated up put the onion and keep stirring until it gets golden.
3. Add the chicken to the onion until it whitens. Then add(while stirring) the mixed arabian spices, salt, chili, pepper, and little of cinnamon. Add the vineger and the crushed garlic to the mix and keep stirring for two minutes.
4. Add the chopped capsicum and the lime and stir until the chicken and the capcicum are properly cooked.
5. Once ready, spread the bread and put the chicken in the middle then wrap it well. Get a clean frying pan and dry fry the wraps until they go browny and crispy.
6. Preferred additional fillings with wrap ( sweet onion sauce )

Serve with potato wedges or chips, and marina sauce.