A few weeks ago, I was invited to participate in the Kahraman Cook Off at the Southern Sun Hotel in Abu Dhabi, which was held on Saturday. The theme: Middle Eastern cuisine. While I accepted the challenge, I was worried. I eat my fair share of regional food (too much, some would say), but I don’t cook it at home. I prefer leaving that in hands more capable than mine.
My fears were eased a bit when I learnt we’d be cooking in teams. I felt better knowing I could share the blame for mistakes that would surely be made.
The competitors were food writers and bloggers from Abu Dhabi and Dubai. There were eight of us – mostly strangers – who would not only need to cook dishes we'd never made before, but also figure out pretty quickly how to work together as a team. My team consisted of bloggers Abdulla Al Shaikh and Rachael Harrison, and Sawaiba Khan, a reporter from What's On Abu Dhabi. As we stood in our newly formed group, I was a ball of nerves while everyone else seemed to be relaxed, calm and having fun. Al Shaikh came up with the name Awesome Sauce for our team. Then he asked if any of us cooked at home. Of course I cook at home! "Then you should be the captain," he said. So here I was – a person who has never even made hummus – the captain of Awesome Sauce at the Great Kahraman Cook Off.
Set up in makeshift kitchens on the restaurant’s outdoor terrace, each team had to make two dishes in 60 minutes: lobster kibbeh and shanklish (homemade cheese balls that, until that day, I’d never seen before). We had five minutes to discuss tactics and divvy up the tasks. I opted to work on the lobster kibbeh with Harrison, while Al Shaikh and Khan tackled the cheese balls. Then the clock started ticking. I grabbed the pre-soaked bulghur wheat for the kibbeh, along with some sherry fish fillets, and ran to Kahraman’s kitchen where the meat mincer was. I minced the bulghur and fish together to form the kibbeh dough. I had no idea you could make kibbeh dough with fish. Four minutes in and I was already learning new skills.
We chopped, minced, measured, sliced, cooked and perspired our way through the next hour. We worked together with a surprising rhythm – as if we’d all done this before. For the kibbeh filling, we sautéed a mixture of chopped onions, leeks, carrots, mint, parsley, coriander and nutmeg along with fresh Canadian lobster, cut into small pieces. For the shanklish, the cheese team mixed feta cheese, zaatar, black sesame seeds and chilli powder together, formed that mixture into balls and rolled them in zaatar, chilli powder and black seeds. The cheese team also put together a lemon-marinated tomato, watermelon and cucumber salad to accompany the balls. Things were looking good. There was no shouting. There were no knife incidents. We were working well together. But each time I started feeling confident and perhaps a bit cocky, the master chefs would shout out how much time we had left and poke their noses into our workspace just long enough to make us nervous.
The final 10 minutes were excruciating. My heart was racing. We needed to win. But first we needed to get this food on the plate. I raced our three kibbeh shells and the lobster stuffing back to the indoor kitchen. As I began stuffing, I noticed one of the restaurant’s chefs eyeing our kibbeh with what can only be described as shock and horror. Something was wrong. He placed one of his own perfectly formed kibbehs in front of me. It did not look like ours. Our shells were too thick. They would take more time to fry than we had left.
I quickly squeezed, pulled and thinned out the shells, careful not to tear the fragile dough. I spooned the stuffing inside and dropped them in the fryer. “Six minutes, chefs!” This was so stressful. How do TV chefs do this week after week? I watched my hands shake and our kibbehs sizzle for the longest four minutes of my life. I whisked them back outside and finished plating with just seconds to spare.
As the captain, I walked the dishes the length of the terrace to our two judges (who were sitting on thrones): Kahraman’s executive chef Ahmad Awad Alfakier and the executive chef of the hotel, Manish Law. They said mostly positive things – they liked the presentation, the seasoning, the flavours. After tasting the kibbeh, Law said: “This is really good. I’m surprised.” Was that a compliment? I’ll take it.
After tasting the dishes, the judges gathered us to announce their verdict. The winner? Awesome Sauce. I was – and still am – filled with pride. I’m almost ready to do it again. But first, I need to add cookery competition to my bucket list – just so I can have the satisfaction of crossing it off.
sjohnson@thenational.ae
