Chef Joumana Accad Offers Up Middle Eastern Flavors For A Fragrant Easter Meal

Golden Cookies, Earthy Cumin and Tart Sumac Flavor Traditional Lebanese Family Recipes from "Taste of Beirut" chef Joumana Accad

With memories of her beloved "Teta" (Grandmother in Lebanese) filling her senses as she bakes delicate cookies and stuffs chicken with a fragrant spice blend, food blogger and Lebanese chef, Joumana Accad, creates an Easter feast and family history lesson in the same meal. A traditional Lebanese Easter meal includes:

Moghrabiyeh (Lebanese couscous with lamb shanks and chicken)

Kibbeh pie (Meat and bulgur pie stuffed with minced meat, spices and pine nuts) served with a yogurt and cucumber sauce

Spiced rice with minced lamb and spices served with a roasted (free-range) chicken and garnished with toasted almonds, pine nuts and pistachios.

Stuffed greens with lamb chops (similar to stuffed grape leaves with minced meat and rice) served with a yogurt sauce

Lamb in yogurt sauce served over rice and toasted vermicelli (ancient dish)

Baby eggplants stuffed with minced meat, onion and spices and served with a yogurt sauce and some rice

Kibbeh in a citrus sauce (traditional dish from Beirut and all the major coastal cities), served over rice and toasted vermicelli


Joumana has a passion for her native dishes and the family memories they evoke. This Easter Joumana will once again be making and sharing Ma'mouls, a traditional Lebanese cookie for Easter. These special cookies are made with semolina flour and flavored with rose water and orange blossom water and stuffed with dates, pistachios or almonds or walnuts. The cookies are round with a slight conical shape to represent both the crown that Christ wore on the cross and the sponge that was given to him when he asked for water.


"This cookie is my absolute favorite," says Joumana. "I learned to cook watching my grandmother in the kitchen. Today when I make these cookies I always feel she is beside me. When I serve them I like to share stories with my own children about growing up in Beirut." For Joumana, each dish reminds her of her family and brings back childhood memories of family celebrations.



Joumana brings this love of family cooking to home cooks across the U.S. through her website and blog, TasteofBeirut.com.

This Easter you can bring the savory and sweet flavors of Lebanon to your family table. To create Joumana's Lebanese Easter feast, the recipes are posted on her website, www.TasteofBeirut.com, through the following links:

http://www.tasteofbeirut.com/2010/12/kibbeh-bel-saniyyeh-kibbeh-pie/
http://www.tasteofbeirut.com/2009/11/spiced-rice-with-minced-lamb-hashwe...
http://www.tasteofbeirut.com/2011/01/stuffed-greens-with-lamb-chops/
http://www.tasteofbeirut.com/2011/02/laban-ummo-lamb-in-yogurt-sauce/
http://www.tasteofbeirut.com/2009/11/stuffed-eggplants-with-yoghurt-sauc...
http://www.tasteofbeirut.com/2010/01/kibbeh-with-citrus-sauce-kibbeh-arn...



About Joumana Accad



Joumana Accad was born in Beirut, Lebanon. She left the Middle East in 1975 and began an international journey. She moved to Paris in the mid-70s where she finished her formal education, returned briefly to Beirut before moving to the United States in 1979. Widowed at a young age, Joumana moved to Dallas, Texas in 1987, remarried and raised two children. She couldn't resist the call of cooking and she entered the Pastry Arts program at El Centro College in Dallas. Upon graduation, Joumana became a pastry chef for a German restaurant, worked as a caterer, and sold her decorated cookies and cakes. Whole Foods Markets asked her to teach classes on Lebanese cuisine at several of their local markets. Today she runs the popular food bl