Dukkah - quick and easy

In the spirit of being quick and easy - because our visiting English friends mean not a lot of available time for the computer - I thought I would give a quick mention to dukkah.

Yesterday in honour of our guests, we had a family barbecue - and I had no time to prepare elaborate antipasti. So I went to my store cupboard and retrieved my jar of dukkah. Dukkah is now very trendy and you can buy it in the supermarket but I do make my own from Claudia Roden's recipe (I halve her quantities and it still makes heaps, but it does keep if stored in an airtight jar).

500g sesame seeds, 250g coriander seed, 125g hazelnuts, 125g ground cumin, salt and pepper to taste. Roast all the ingredients separately. Pound them together until they are finely crushed but not pulverised. (Or do this in a food processor.)

She goes on to say, "Try mixing the ingredients to taste and improvise the proportions." I have seen versions with pistachios, chick peas (pre-cooked, salty and dried), and she also mentions a very simple version of crushed dried mint, salt and pepper.

So why dukkah? Well it is a very simple thing to serve as nibbles with drink. Place some in a dish, add two or three dishes of different kinds of olive oil - this gives you a chance to show off your collection of olive oil - and cut up small pieces of bread (any kind of bread will do). Dip the bread in the oil and then in the dukkah. It is very popular - we had to keep topping up the oil, the dukkah and the bread and my niece commented that she should make some.

You can also use dukkah to coat fish or chicken before frying or grilling.

It's wonderful. Try it.