Griessbrei (German semolina pudding) and recipe for pomegranate syrup



You are never ready when a loved one leaves you. Even though you know it is going to happen sooner rather than later because of age or health conditions, even though you think you are  prepared, you really never are.

This past week end my grandmother passed away. We called her Mutti, Mommy in German, because that is what she was for all of us, children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren alike, in one way or another.

Mutti, unlike my Nana, was a maternal, traditional grandmother.

 

...a heap of love...

 

We spent time with her every summer in Austria, where she lived when we were growing up. I remember watching her  darn socks by the kitchen window with a red and white sock mushroom, the flavor of her roast chicken with peas and freshly picked mushrooms and my sister's favorite, her Paprikaschoten, meat-stuffed peppers. I remember how she always soaked envelopes in water to peel off the stamps for my uncle's collection; how she came into our room in the morning, pulling the curtains and opening the windows, so the chilly morning mountain air and the chiming of the village church bells would abruptly wake us. I remember running errands with her: the smell of freshly cut wood curls at the wood carver's who made our Christmas crib; the pungent tang of fresh milk and cow dung at the barn where the farmer filled her milk can. I remember running my fingers along the smooth surface of the tailor's chalk while they chatted. We often walked to the neighboring town on small paths along cornfields and on a few occasions she pulled us into them to give us a scolding or a very rare spanking when we had really misbehaved.

 

Moroccan lamb stew with lemon and pomegranate couscous

Today my father in law came over to our house for lunch. He originally wanted to go out to eat couscous and lamb in a restaurant he had heard of, but when he tried to make a reservation it was closed.

My father in law grew up in Libya, a country we have heard of so much lately in the news, back in the day when it was an Italian colony. I love hearing stories of his years there, before the new regime confiscated everything they owned, of how he lived as a child on acres and acres of farm land to later move to Tripoli, then a bustling, cosmopolitan city, to finish his schooling and attend University. 

His parents had tried and failed to become parents several times before he was born and he came very late for the standards of those days. I wonder what it must have been like for his mother to live so far away from her family in Sicily and how lonely it must have been there without children to rear for so many years. I like to imagine the pride and joy she must have felt when she took a ship back to her hometown (the baby must be born in Italy!) to finally give birth to a healthy little boy, sorrounded by clucking sisters, aunts, cousins.

Despite being born in Sicily and living in Italy for most of his adult life, my father in law grew up speaking Arabic and soaking up the culture of his surroundings. To this day couscous and lamb stew are his comfort food.

How could I deny him this pleasure?

The ripe and juicy pomegranate I had bought last week as a part of my centerpiece for another dinner inspired me to look up recipes that included it. This recipe turned out to be the perfect combination of a fruity, fresh couscous and a fall-off-the-bone tender, fatty lamb cooked in a tomato-based stew filled with the warm flavors of North African cuisine.

Recipe adapted from BBC Food Recipes

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Food from the area in the coming posts. This is literally just what has been falling into our arms...

More soon!