This was my first exploration into exciting rice territory - and the result is a delicious, sweet substantial dish which I cooked with a little saffron chicken. Who would have thought rice would upstage everything else on the dinner table?

Shopping List (Serves 8!):

• 4 cups of basmati rice
  
• 1 free range corn-fed chicken  
  
• 1 1/2 large onions
  
• 1/2 teaspoon turmeric
  
• 400g dried green lentils
  
• 12 Medjool dates
  
• 400g brown raisins 
  
• 40g salted butter
  
• Oil
  
• Salt 
  
• Pepper
  
• Ground saffron

The ‘How To’

This recipe requires preparing lots of ingredients before bringing them all together at the end when you’re just finishing the rice. Start by prepping the chicken. Some people cook with the skin on, but I like to take off the excess skin and fat, remove the giblets and set aside to give to the cat. 

The chicken

 Thinly slice half a large onion and put it in a saucepan with a little splash of oil. Fry the onions until they start to soften, then chop the chicken into large pieces - with bones, sear in a frying pan and add to the saucepan of cooked onions. Add 1 cup of boiling water, 1/2 tsp of turmeic, salt, pepper to taste. Cover and leave to simmer for over half an hour.  

The lentils

 Add 400g of dried green lentils to a small saucepan, add boiling water to fully cover lentils and cook for 15-20mins, until cooked through - but not too soft. Drain and set aside for later. 

Prepping the rice

Wash the rice, add to the largest saucepan in your cupboard and fill with boiling water. Stir the rice occasionally, add a teaspoon of salt and allow to cook until the rice is just soft on the outside with still some hardness in the centre. When this happens, it is ready to sieve and rinse. 

The onion, dates and raisins

Chop 2 large onions into small pieces. In a frying pan, fry the onion in a little oil until they brown then transfer into a plate.

In the same frying pan, add 40g butter, the raisins and 1/2 cup of water. Then leave to gently simmer on a low heat for 5 mins until most of the water has evaporated and the raisins are plump.

De-seed the dates and chop them up into small pieces. 

So at this moment in time, you have the chicken simmering in one covered saucepan; the rice cooked and drained in another large open saucepan; your cooked onions and lentils on the side; dates chopped on the side and your raisins cooked, plump and ready for action. 

Then its time to bring all the ingredients together!

Just watched this on the iPlayer last night. 

BBC’s Iranian Affairs Analyst Sadeq Saba travels around his home country to get a taste of today’s Iran - its land, its people, and above all, its cuisine. 

Salad-e Shirazi is a summertime favourite in Iran. There are so many variations, but the recipe below is the most traditional version. Some people add extra colour with yellow pepper, or a clove of garlic for a stronger flavour. The traditional dish should contain no other herbs other than mint, and with only three veggies needed in this salad, the art is in the presentation. 

Shopping List:

• 2 cucumbers (or 5 persian cucumbers - the idea being that they are seedless)
• 4 large tomatoes
• 1 red onion
• 1/2 cup fresh lime juice
• 1 heaped tablespoon fresh mint - finely chopped
• 1 tablespoon of olive oil
• Salt and pepper

The ‘How To’:

The tomatoes, cucumbers and onion all need to be diced into small, equal-sized cubes. Time to remember those chopping techniques, click here for a few tips.

Careful not to add too much onion as we don’t want it to overpower the rest of the flavours. My tip is to cut the tomatoes last as this can be a little messy on your chopping board. 

Pop everything into a bowl with the salt, pepper and dried mint, then cover and place into the fridge for 20mins to allow the flavours to marinate.

In the meantime, add the lime juice and oil together, then add when ready. Then leave to marinate again for a couple of hours. 

Ideally if you want to use this salad in the evening, make it at lunchtime and allow the flavours to to marinate together. 

Hope you enjoy!

I tend to steer away from the lure of a greasy kebab at the end of a night, but there’s nothing like the real thing. ‘Kabab’ is essentially Persian in origin and word has it that the dish was invented by medieval Persian soldiers who used their swords to grill meat over open-field fires. I dread to think what meat they used, but I’ll be using chicken. 

Shopping List:

• 1Kg boneless chicken thighs 
• 2 large white onions 
• 2 cloves of garlic
• A pinch of saffron
• Salt & pepper to taste
• 1 small cup of lime juice

 The ‘How To’

Peel and roughly chop the onions and garlic, then add to a food processor. Add the lime juice and blend into a paste. Place the chicken in a bowl and add the onion and garlic paste, the saffron and some salt and pepper to taste. Use your hands to mix the ingredients together. 

Let this marinate for a few hours (at least 3 - overnight if you can) and skewer about 6 pieces (think about it…shish means ‘six’ in Farsi). Lay the skewers evenly on the grill/ BBQ and slowly cook. Try and turn every 5 minutes to ensure even cooking. Once cooked - about 20 mins later, this dish is traditionally served with plain basmati rice and tahdig. We had some sabzi polo (persian rice with herbs and broad beans) lying around so ate it with that instead. YUM!

We were a bit short of time so used canned beans, but this is traditionally made with uncooked pulses for a fresher taste. My dad loves this dish, we cooked enough to feed the 5000, but usually, you need about 1 can of each of the pulses for 4 people.

Make sure all the greens and pulses have been washed and rinsed before cooking and prep.

Shopping List:

• 2x400g can cooked kidney beans
• 2x400g can cooked chickpeas
• 1x400g can cooked white beans
• 2x400g can cooked green lentils
• 1kg of fresh spinach, chopped. If you buy it fresh, you can chop the stalks into the dish too - they need to be chopped very thinly though. 
• 500g fresh parsley finely chopped
• 2 leeks thinly chopped
• 200g dried white noodles (or spaghetti!)
• Half a bulb of garlic chopped
• 1 onion finely sliced
• 1 teaspoon turmeric
• 4 tablespoons of dried mint
• 200g greek yoghurt
• 150mls water
• 2 heaped tablespoons plain flour
• Oil 

The ‘How To’:

Although the ingredients list looks quite extensive, this dish is relatively simple. The most important thing is to KEEP STIRRING as it simmers. As this soup is so thick, it can easily start to stick to the bottom of the saucepan.

Add water to fill 1/4 of a large saucepan on full heat. Add the leeks, parsley and spinach, throw in a couple of pinches of salt and place a lid on top to stew. 

Once all the greens have been added to the pan, add the pulses to give some depth to the veg. Whilst this is ‘brewing’ remove any rogue large spinach stalks from the pan as these will not soften with the rest of the dish. The soup shouldn’t be too thick, so add plenty of boiling water to simmer the soup for an hour and half. 

In the meantime, fry the chopped onions in a 3 tablespoons of oil. Once the onions have started to soften, add the garlic and fry together. We add the garlic later as this frys and releases flavour very fast. Once the garlic has started to fry, add the turmeric, some pepper and mint. We don’t want the mint to burn, so turn the heat off as soon as its been added and set aside to add to the soup later. 

Beat the greek yoghurt with 100mls water in a bowl. This softens the yoghurt ready to add to the soup.  I learnt the hard way if you add the yoghurt without beating it prior, it will curdle in the soup. Set this aside too.

OK, so this dish’s appearance can be described as uninteresting at best - but don’t let that fool you. The resulting stew is succulent, mildly sweet, a little tart and creamily nutty - all in one bite! 

Shopping list:

2 onions, peeled

1 small cup of pomegranate molasses

1 organic butternut squash

1 Corn-fed fresh whole chicken with bones

1 heaped teaspoon of turmeric

1 1/2 cups of dried plums

3 cups of walnuts

Salt

Olive Oil

The ‘How To’:

Start by finely chopping the onions, or if you are lazy like me, pulse them in a food processor. Put the onions in a large saucepan, along with 3 tablespoons of olive oil and fry until they start to brown.

In the meantime, whizz the walnuts in the food processor until they have a slight paste-like consistency, but be careful not to over process them, or you’ll end up with walnut butter.

In Iran, New Year (the vernal equinox) is the most important festival, lasting for 13 days. On the last day of the celebrations, my family leave their city pads in Tehran and head to the mountains near the river springs to celebrate and have a party with close friends. The closest I can get to that experience is heading to Manchester Ship canal with a can of cider.

The traditional Persian New Year dinner consists of a special rice with fish, sabzi polo, and other herbs. I thought I’d put it to the test…

Shopping trip:

Rice:

3 cups of basmati rice

2 tablespoons of salt

2 large baking potatoes peeled and sliced into thick 1cm slices.

75g unsalted butter

Sabzi (I have a batch sent across form my family in Iran, but its basically)

• 1 cup chopped fresh dill, or 4 to 5 tablespoons dried
• 1 cup chopped fresh parsley, or 1/2 cup dried
• 1 cup chopped fresh cilantro
• Several fresh fenugreek sprigs, chopped, or 1 tablespoon dried fenugreek leaf

Fish:

6 pieces of filleted fish with skin (I used rainbow Trout because Tesco’s had a special offer!)

1 cup of plain flour

1 tablespoon of black pepper

1 tablespoon of salt

Oil

Sabzi Pollo with Tahdig

Rinse 3 cups of basmati rice in a large saucepan. Then add some boiling water - enough to comfortably cover the rice, then throw in 2 tablespoons of salt. 

Bring the water to a rolling boil, uncovered for 10-15 minutes until half cooked. Test it by picking out a grain and pressing. It should be firm in the middle, yet soft on the outside. When its ready, drain the water and rice in a colander, rinse with cold water and drain again.

Add the sabzi and fold into the rice.

Put a little butter (25g) on the bottom of the rice saucepan to coat it. Once the butter at the bottom of the pan has melted, take off the heat and place the sliced potato at the bottom of the pan to cover the base (like a jigsaw puzzle!). Once cooked, this will form our Tahdig.

Shopping List:

• 1kg Shoulder of lamb cut into small pieces with the bone
• 3 aubergines (peeled and sliced 1cm thick lengthways)
• 3 cups of  dried yellow split peas (soaked in water overnight or at least 2 hours)
• 3 medium onions (peeled and sliced thinly)
• 2 400g tins of chopped tomatoes or 3 tablespoons tomato paste
• 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice or 1 tablespoon of dried lime
• cooking oil
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 3 teaspoon turmeric
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper

The ‘How To’: 

Fry the onions  in oil until slightly golden in a large frying pan until colour changes. Whilst this is frying, place the meat in a large saucepan and with some oil, brown the meat to retain the juices whilst stewing.

 This is a quick simple dish which goes well served with sweet rice, with zeresh berries.

Shopping List:

• 2 Large onions (finely chopped)
• 1kg Whole chicken pieces (wing/ breast/ leg including all bones)
• 1 Yellow pepper (finely chopped)
• 1 Green pepper finely chopped)
• 3 Carrots (peeled and chopped)
• 1 tablespoon Tomato puree 
• 2 teaspoons Turmeric 
• 1/4 tablespoon Saffron

Getting started…

Grab your fryingpan. Throw the chopped onions and peppers and a little oil and fry off with a little turmeric (1/2 teaspoon). Once this starts to brown add 3 chopped carrots and put in a large saucepan.

 Add another teaspoon of turmic and stir with the chicken until its seared. Then add 1/2 teaspoon of salt and pepper and stir.

Had this at Beluga in St Johns Wood: Joojeh Makhsoos - A skewer of marinated baby chicken with
grilled tomato and a skewer seasoned minced lamb. All grilled on charcoal and served with saffron steamed basmati rice and salad (I still need to master that crust!)

I get these regularly sent over from Iran as they are difficult to find in the supermarkets here unless you know of a nice local specialist shop. 

Barberries: Tiny, tart, cranberrylike, and sold dried. Soak and use in rice dishes.

Dried Limes: Limu-omani, Persian limes (a low-acid variety) that are salted then dried, are sold whole and powdered, and are used to add a deep, musky, slightly sweet note to stews. Buy whole limes, remove the seeds, and grind in a food processor to avoid the bitter taste of the commercial powder.

Iranians pride themselves on cooking rice well, so here goes:

Shopping list:

• 1 cupful of dried barberries
• 3 cups of Basmati rice
• 75g butter
• 3 teaspoons of granulated sugar
• Salt

I like to add barberries to rice. Once I have mastered a good crust, I’ll post the traditional saffron rice recipe.

Firstly we have some zereshk berries, they are like cranberries but smaller and sweeter. Place them into a small saucepan and add cold water. Once they have been left to soak for 5 mins, spoon off the berries from the top of the water to sift out the dust/ dirt. Once transferred onto a plate, remove any stray stalks (this can be quite laborious but no one likes twiggy rice) . 

Wash the rice. Then fill another larger saucepan with hot water, add the rice and put it on a high heat, uncovered with 1/2 tablespoon of salt thrown in. This will be steamed later so it doesn’t matter how much water you add as long as it covers the rice well. 

Qormeh Sabzi is an Iranian herb stew, said to be Iran’s national dish. The main ingredients are a mixture of sauteed herbs. My mum loves to cook this and I have slowly started to cook variations of it myself, replacing the lamb with butternut squash, for a vegetarian option, and using different pulses instead of kidney beans such as butter beans and black eyed peas. Its really fun to mix with the textures in this stew.