Ghormeh Sabzi by Kamran

Ghormeh Sabzi

Ingredients:

3/4 cup dry kidney beans (or small red beans)

1 tbsp olive oil

1 pound beef stew meat

1/2 tsp turmeric

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp freshly ground black pepper

1 large yellow onion, chopped

2 bunches flat leaf parsley

1 bunch cilantro

1 bunch chives

3 bundles green onion, dark and light parts

1 bunch spinach

4-5 dried Persian limes

1 tbsp dried fenugreek

5 cups filtered water

Basmati Rice

1 cup basmati rice

3 cups filtered water

1/2 tbsp kosher salt

1 tbsp olive oil

It was the day my grandmother arrived from Illinois. My grandmother lives very far away and visits very rarely. My family wanted to greet her with a very special Iranian dish called Ghormeh Sabzi. I started with washing the vegetables. Then I started working on the Basmati rice. I first started rinsing the rice under cold water and I thought about my favorite moment with my grandmother feeding fish in the pond bread and watching them jump. I realized I was too lost in my thoughts and had poured too much water into the bowl and it had overflowed. After fixing my mistake, I placed the water, salt and olive oil into the rice cooker and set it to cook the rice. While the rice was cooking, I started on the stew. I added oil, the stew meat, and all of the vegetables into a slow cooker. I turned the cooker on and realized that most of the work had been completed. A few minutes later, as I was very quickly preparing the table in the dining room, I noticed that a very nice, lively aroma was wafting through the house through the kitchen. The smell brought me a feeling of nostalgia as I thought back to the long weekends when I used to live closer to my grandmother and she would cook ghormeh sabzi and it would smell just as green and delicious as my kitchen now. As I smelled this, I knew that this stew would be the perfect way to welcome my grandmother. I snapped back to reality and realized that the timer for the slow cooker had been going off, indicating the vegetables and meat had just finished cooking. I had gotten distracted again! The pleasant aroma had been distracting me. there were just 10 minutes left until my grandmother would come home so I rushed back to the kitchen and got 6 bowls and quickly and desperately filled them with the rice. To my surprise there was also some perfectly cooked crunchy rice at the bottom called tadik that I thought might be a nice surprise for my grandmother. I was so surprised by the lucky event that I had forgotten what I was doing, leaving me with less than 30 seconds until my grandmother was supposed to arrive. As I had finally placed the stew into the bowls, I stepped back and admired my work. During the meal, my family continuously commented upon how amazing and lustrous the meal turned out to be and I realized that despite the stress that had transpired throughout cooking the meal, it was worth the amazing moment when I was finally able to enjoy a well deserved weekend with my entire family.

Deana Larkin Evans. “Ghormeh Sabzi (Persian Herb Stew) & Basmati Rice | Gluten-Free, Dairy-Free.” The Weekly Menu, 5 May 2022, theweeklymenubook.com/2022/05/05/ghormeh-sabzi-persian-herb-stew-basmati-rice/.