Samira Cholagh at home
Samira Cholagh at home in the kitchen. photo by david reed the West Bloomfield school district, acknowledges that cooking is sometimes drudgery. “Cooking can be a chore when you have to feed your family,” she said. “But baking and making dessert, that’s a pleasure.” To order A Baking Journey, drop a line to scholagh11@yahoo.com. There will be a launch party at 7 p.m. on May 24 at Shenandoah Country Club with all proceeds benefiting Adopt-A-Refugee. Call (248) 790-0062 for tickets. from samira’s kitchen to yours a baking journey samira yako cholagh sweet sojourn Cholagh’s latest devoted to baking By Joyce Wiswell Samira Yako Cholagh still remembers the walnut cake her neighbor in Baghdad used to bring over to the house. Though she was only 10 or 11 years old, she wanted to make it herself. The neighbor gave her vague instructions. “I made it twice and it didn’t turn out good,” Cholagh recalled. “I finally figured out how to do it, and that’s when I knew I loved baking.” It’s been a lifelong love affair. Though she has already published two cookbooks, Cholagh’s latest, A Baking Journey: From Samira’s Kitchen to Yours, is the one closest to her heart. It is due to be released on May 18 in both hardcover () and soft (). Containing 520 recipes over 480 pages, Cholagh calls the book “the encyclopedia of baking.” She actually had to cut out 30 recipes to keep the book on the manageable side. It contains instructions on making everything from marshmallows to baklava — her personal favorite of which she makes 50 trays each Christmas. Baking is an “addiction,” Cholagh admits. While the other mothers gathered to shop or drink chai while their kids were in school, she stayed busy in the kitchen. “There is no way, nothing on the planet, that they were not coming home to something out of the oven,” she said. Cholagh did her first cookbook when she was a teenager in Iraq, carefully writing down recipes in Arabic in a special book. As word of her cooking prowess spread – both in Iraq and in Michigan, to where she moved in 1980 — she received never-ending requests for recipes, which she would dutifully write out or recite over the phone. Finally, in 1997, she published Mukhtarat Min Fenon El Tabekh (Selection of Cooking Arts) in Arabic. “It got such a good response that people said I needed to write a cookbook in English for the new generation,” Cholagh said. “Everyone knows the recipes but no one knows exactly what is in them.” In 1998, she published the English-language Treasured Middle Eastern Cookbook. Cholagh puts her scientific background as a soil engineer to good use, supplying precise measurements for dishes that are often described by longtime cooks as “having a pinch of this or a dash of that.” “I can’t take that much credit for the old traditional recipes, but I measured everything out and made some of them healthier,” she said. “Young people tell me that the book is so easy to use, and that makes me so happy.” The book’s listing on Amazon has received orders from as far as Alabama, Utah and Hawaii. And Cholagh’s fan base is growing as her “Samira’s Kitchen” cooking show on MEA gains popularity. New episodes air each Thursday at 7 p.m. and is rerun on Friday at 9 a.m., Sunday at 2 p.m. and Monday at 7 p.m. “I’ve been getting emails from people in Canada, California, North Carolina, Texas,” she said. “Every Saturday I sit down and answer my emails, and now it’s getting to be a lot.” Cholagh, a substitute teacher in Sesame Lace Cookies By Samira Cholagh Ingredients 3 tablespoons unsalted butter 1 cup powdered sugar 2 tablespoons orange juice 3 tablespoons honey 1 cup sesame seeds zest of 1 orange, grated ¼ cup all-purpose flour Directions Preheat over to 350 degrees F. Combine butter, powdered sugar, orange juice and honey in a medium saucepan. Place over medium heat, stir and bring to a boil. Remove from heat and add sesame seeds, orange zest and flour. Mix until well combined. Drop teaspoonfuls of batter on baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Place five cookies on each sheet, spaced five inches apart. Bake for 8 to 10 minutes until cookies fully flattened and are golden. Cool on baking sheet for 10 minutes. Transfer cookies to a wire rack to cool. Makes 36. 42 CHALDEAN NEWS MAY 2011
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