Credit: The Hampstead Kitchen

Welcome to our new series with Saima Khan at The Hampstead Kitchen. Saima has cooked for the likes of Bill Gates, Warren Buffet and The Obamas. Her signature cuisines include Mediterranean (mainly Spanish, Italian & Greek), Scandinavian, Nordic dishes, to plates from the Middle East and Persia. Saima will be joining us on Amaliah over the next few months with recipe ideas for dinner parties, busy weeks and lazy days.

Aubergine, Chickpea & Chargrilled Halloumi Stew 

I’ve made this stew twice this week, due to the cold weather. This dish is so simple and nutritious way and can be made in the same time it would order from deliveroo. This is a hug in a bowl, and also easy with the shopping list so simple, its easy to grab these few ingredient on your way home. Put on some soul music and just enjoy the simplicity of this lovely stew.You can make this as a hearty stew for one, or double up the ingredients and make for 4 people. You can also reduce down to make as a side dish to serve with the roast chicken dish too. To make this a vegan dish,  just serve without the Halloumi.

Credit: The Hampstead Kitchen

PREP TIME: 10 min

COOK TIME: 20 min

TOTAL TIME: 30 min

THE SHOPPING LIST

• • 1 large aubergine
  • 1 red pepper
  • 1 can chick peas
  • i bag spinach
  • 1 pack halloumi
  • 1 small can of passata – served tomatoes
  • fresh parsley
  • garlic – add 3 to 4 cloves and slice as thinly as possibly
  • a pinch of sea salt
  • 1 pinch of baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon cumin powder
  • 1 teaspoon smoked paprika
  • good glug of olive olive

HOW TO COOK IT 

• Dice the aubergine into 1cm chunks add to olive oil, fry on a shallow heat.
• Once this begins to soften , add the sliced garlic & stir
• Dice the red pepper and add to the aubergines. We add this later as this much softer and take no time to cook.
• Add all the spices except the baking soda
• Once softened add the can of chick pea including the water – never drained that water its magic for soup and stews.
• Add the passata & reduce the heat and cook on a low heat and simmer
• Meanwhile slice the halloumi lengthways into about 3 to 4 and chargrill both sides and leave to one side chunky strip
• Add the baking soda you should it explode into white clouds of foam. This helps to soften the chick peas & gives the illusion overnight slow cooking.
• Add the spinach and chopped parsley and stir in well
• Get a lovely bowl, spoon the chicken and vegetables then add the soup on top. Lay the halloumi on the top, sprinkle more parsley a glug of good olive oil. I sometimes add some crushed red chilli to this too

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What a awesome & busy week of private events, and it’s full on Christmas party mode from now until 26th December. We managed to find time to collaborate with our dear friends Sonia & Heyat from @llscafe this week too. We had a chance to create a truly amazing vegan sharing feast and meet the beautiful Hampstead community we both love to serve and feed. We’ve been wanting to do this for over a year and a half and we managed to find the one date that was crazy busy for us both but made it happen. Our businesses are a success because of so many reasons but mainly because of the love and support of our local community and other local businesses that have been in the area for years. No matter what products or business plans you have it’s nothing without your clients appreciating what you have to offer and the service you provide. So a huge thank you to all of you who came and for all the love. See you soon we will definitely be doing more of these with a charitable angle. This events proceeds and donations will be passed onto @trusselltrust in Camden our local food bank for all the great work they do especially around Christmas time. In the month of November we’ve been to Lake Como to create a Persian sharing menu for a rather special client. We’ve been to Paris for a Christmas Dinner to Frankfurt & Geneva for a Banking dinner. It’s been epic, rewarding but hugely challenging. So many exciting projects for 2018 being put into motion right now, but will share in the new year as and when they happen. Our branding and business development side of the business is going from strength to strength & whilst we call it branding it’s more focused on menu development, business plans, creating the right product & service to maximise & create different revenue streams. (I had to use my banking knowledge somehow). Sadly with all the above there is hardly time to create my own content as most of our events are private, so here’s a dish we’ve been making a lot for our vegan clientele which is roasted butternut squash with za’atar infused kale, black lentils, with tahini dressing scattered of course with pomegranate seeds. 📷@aboutthatfood

A post shared by Private Chef & Catering (@hampsteadkitchn) on Dec 2, 2018 at 12:42am PST

SERVE WITH 

Enjoy alone or with a swivel of greek yogurt, labneh, toasted mini pita or even spooned over simple boiled rice. Enjoy!