Ever since the pandemic cooped us up back in March, beautiful, generous flurries of fresh, soft, fragrant herbs have felt like an antidote to everything awful. My kitchen windowsill has become a garden; next to the pots, lemongrass sprouts and flourishes in a vase. When I can make it to Sara’s Market and Bakery, the wonderful Middle Eastern grocery in Richardson, I come back with armfuls of dill and tarragon and cilantro. From nearby Good Fortune Supermarket, or Jusgo in Plano, or Super H Mart in Carrollton, I bring back ridiculous volumes of shiso, Thai basil, mint.
Because I’ve developed an acute fear of running out, I just installed an LED-powered hydroponic AeroGarden outfitted with dill, spearmint, thyme, parsley and two kinds of basil.
Toss a handful of fresh herbs on the plainest dish — potato salad, grilled zucchini, hummus, as this story in Cooks Without Borders explains, and it instantly becomes gorgeous, alluring, uplifting and even life-affirming.
So why not just eat herbs? That’s the idea behind sabzi khordan, the platter of herbs and accoutrements that anchors every Iranian table. “It’s essential to any meal we have, always” says Nilou Motamed. Like just about everyone I know who cooks, the former editor-in-chief of Food & Wine, current Top Chef judge, global food and travel guru and co-founder of Story Collective has been planting herbs profusely.
“Our entire fire escape is an herb garden,” she says, “something we’ve never done before.”
Motamed, who was born in Iran, grew up eating Persian food at home even after she moved with her family to New York when she was 13. Because of that, fresh herbs have always played an outsized, aromatic role in her life.
She fondly remembers spending time back in Iran at her father’s family house in an orchard (“bagh” in Farsi) in the town of Hamedan, amid groves of sour cherry, apricot, plum, almond and walnut trees. They’d lay down a Persian carpet outside under a big shade tree and picnic on kebabs made from a just-slaughtered lamb.
“Coming from the mountains, there were these qanat that run through all the countryside — mini mini mini streams — and all these herbs, the mints and watercresses would grow there,” Motamed says. “We’d pick the herbs and put our bottles of Coca-Cola in the ice cold water and drink it with the kebab. There’s something about herbs that makes you feel like you’re connected to your environment.”
Maybe that’s why herbs are speaking to us so sweetly just now — we need them to connect to the natural world.
They’re celebrated lushly on the sabzi khordan platter, which generally includes tarragon, dill, parsley, mint, cilantro and reyhan (a family of basils that includes Thai basil), along with scallions, radishes and/or Persian cucumbers and feta cheese. Sometimes walnuts are there to nibble on, or it could be served with kebab.
“On Friday, every family does kebab,” Motamed says. “It’s very basic; we don’t use a ton of spices. It’s beautiful grilled meat, very plain rice, the meat basted in butter and saffron, a great cut chargrilled on aromatic wood, and then with the sabzi khordan, you can do whatever you want to create the flavors.”
But serve it with freshly baked nan-e barbari (Persian flatbread), and sabzi khordan can also be a meal in itself.
I know what you’re thinking: Where are we going to get nan-e barbari, especially during a pandemic?
“I cheat and make it with pizza dough,” Motamed says. “If you use a pizza stone, it’s amazing, and it’s so easy to make.” Five minutes to pull and stretch the dough onto the pizza stone or baking sheet, press in some grooves, brush with a yogurt wash and sprinkle on nigella and/or sesame seeds, then 20 to 25 minutes in the oven and you’ve got barbari.
I tested her recipe using a couple of different brands, including Trader Joe’s, and it turned out stunningly well — absolutely dreamy with a platter of herbs, radishes, walnuts and Bulgarian feta — which I also picked up at Sara’s. Find the recipe here.
Once you’re at the table — with your splendid sabzi khordan and your golden, crisp barbari bread — the idea is to create the perfect bite for yourself or a tablemate. There’s even a word for that bite: loghme. “You put some feta cheese in the bread, and then whatever your perfect complement of herbs is — whether you’re a dill or a tarragon person, or you like both, maybe the little tail of a scallion.”
Treat yourself to one sabzi khordan fest, and you may find yourself hooked. The herb habit is truly addictive; if you’re anything like me, you’ll find yourself scattering herbs over all kinds of dishes with abandon. Untreated, you may even turn into someone like Motamed, who will “literally buy bushels of herbs, and spend way too much time stemming and freezing. If you dry everything really well, and freeze them in Tupperware containers, they stay fresh. I’m like my own Jolly Green Giant.”
Go ahead. Treat yourself. Live a little. I’m pretty sure that even if the fix is fleeting, it’ll make you feel better. For the feta, Bulgarian is preferred. “We’re super snobby about our feta,” says Motamed. “French feta is dry, and Greek is too salty.” But any decent supermarket feta will do in a pinch.
Former Dallas Morning News restaurant critic Leslie Brenner, now a restaurant consultant, writes about cooking at Cooks Without Borders and about the food world at the Brenner Report.
Sabzi Khordan (Persian Herb Platter)
1 small bunch dill
1 small bunch tarragon
1 small bunch parsley
1 small bunch cilantro
1 small bunch mint
1 small bunch Thai basil (or other basil)
1 bunch scallions, trimmed but left whole
1 small bunch radishes, trimmed
2 or 3 Persian cucumbers, sliced into 1/4-inch rounds
4 to 8 ounces feta, cut or broken into a few pieces
1/4 cup to 1/2 cup toasted walnuts (optional)
Carefully wash and dry the herbs. Remove any thick or tough stems, but otherwise leave them whole, and arrange them on a platter, keeping each bunch together (rather than mixing them up like a salad). Lay the scallions on one side, and arrange the radishes, cucumbers and feta pieces wherever they look good (again, keeping them together). Find a spot for the walnuts, if using. Serve with freshly-baked barbari bread.
Makes 4 servings.
SOURCE: Leslie Brenner, Cooks Without Borders
