A basket of herbs

"almost every Persian meal begins with a basket of fresh, unadorned herbs that are eaten with tangy feta-like white cheese and flaps of soft flatbread. It's a totally addictive way of starting a meal, as the fresh, vital flavours sharpen the appetite and you can't help but feel somewhat virtuous, munching on all that greenery."

Greg or Lucy Malouf

We have friends coming for lunch tomorrow and I was told not to do a big meal, so I at first thought to do spanakopita because I have lots of spinach and lots of dill. But my husband didn't really go for this, and so I found a recipe for a Persian omelette which used the spinach and dill and some meatballs to satisfy his need for meat, and then I thought to just do a series of small dishes. Oh aren't I trendy!

Anyway I thought I would start with one of my favourite things. I found this many, many years ago in Claudia Roden's A Book of Mediterranean Food the classic which, I think, started the West's love affair with Middle-Eastern food. It was so simple, so different and so infinitely variable. It depends on what herbs you have to hand and what vegetables too - some tomatoes, radish, cucumber. These are the sorts of things. As I say I fell in love with this dish and use it every now and then as a starter or a nibble before a meal and so I was absolutely blown away when, on our first trip to Dubai, and a meal in the hotel's Persian restaurant we were first presented with this very dish - not requested - it just came. And here it is with some of the delectable dips that followed it. It was one of our best meals ever I think. And nobody else was there.

I think the photo was taken when we had more or less demolished it. Anyway it just shows that it isn't just a cook book thing. it is actually eaten in Iran.

In fact Claudia Roden says that it's also an ancient custom for women to eat at the end of the meal with cheese to keep their husbands from a rival or potential extra wife.

The dish is called Sabzi khordan - sabzi means herbs and khordan means mixed.

It doesn't seem to be a dish that has been copied elsewhere. Yes there are salads of unimaginable variety but nothing like this that is just presented to you at the beginning of a meal. I guess the closest you come to it is the crudités of the French - but that's raw vegetables, not raw herbs. I wonder why because it's such a simple thing and so cheap and easy. Seeing those sugar snap peas on the crudités platter makes me think I might add some of them to mine.

Anyway - that's what I'm doing tomorrow - followed by various other little dishes that I haven't quite decided upon but think will be good.

Do try it some time.

"At first it may seem strange to eat this sort of salad without a dressing, but doing so really allows the flavour of each herb to shine through." Greg or Lucy Malouf