PicoBlog

Growing up in a small town in Maryland (shoutout dville), we didn’t have a huge Persian community. Our closest Iranian relatives lived in Massachusetts and we usually only saw them once a year, during summer vacation.

For me, cooking Iranian food and celebrating the Persian New Year, or Nowruz (sometimes spelled Norooz), has always made me feel closer to my dad and that side of my family (of which I have only visited in Iran once and have met only a handful of times).

Typically falling on the vernal equinox or first day of spring, Nowruz means “new day” in farsi and it’s a celebration filled with symbolism. The weeks leading up to it are spent cleaning and the two weeks following it are spent visiting family and loved ones.

We set the haft-sin, a table with seven different things all placed on the table to represent something and all beginning with the letter “S.”

Coins (wealth and prosperity), a book of poetry by Hafez, a mirror (for self reflection), flowers (usually hyacinth), and eggs are also typically found on the table. My family also usually puts out dolls to represent my sister and I.

My dad makes a big meal (with a ton of stews, rice, and shirazi salad) and sometimes we have friends come to join us, but sometimes it’s just the four of us, which is really nice, too.

Living in New York, I have a much bigger community of Iranians here than I did back home in MD, many of which also work in food, and I find it incredibly comforting.

Nilou Motamed, former EIC of Food and Wine, global food guru, and judge on Chopped, Netflix's Iron Chef: Quest for an Iron Legend, and Top Chef (dang, she a busy lady, right?), is one such friend. She recently came over to cook with me (although, truth be told, we spent most of the time catching up and cackling). We made her version of kookoo sabzi, an herbaceous egg frittata.

My dad often made this dish, but Nilou’s version is different than his. Not only does she add barberries and walnuts, but a touch of flour and baking soda as well. I asked her some questions (with her answers below!) and she shared her recipe, too. I’m not going to say that it’s better than my dad’s, but it definitely is my new favorite version. Wrapped up with yogurt, feta, vegetables, and herbs in a piece of lavash, it makes for a very nice sandwich, too.

FS: How do you celebrate Nowruz and what do you usually cook / eat for it?

NM: I’m pretty classic when it comes to celebrating Eid: sabzi polo mahi all the way. Fresh herbs for the sabzi polo and fried white fish. It’s a chance to spend time with family and friends and overeat all of my favorite Persian treats. I love setting a haft sin with lots of fresh flowers, and quince or cherry blossoms. I mean, if I can celebrate with some caviar, I’m never upset about that either. You can take a girl out of Iran but...

Here’s my mom’s sabzi polo recipe, which we ran in Food and Wine. In fact, we did the first-ever Norooz feature I’ve ever seen in a national magazine, including a guide on how to set a haft sin. 

FS: Why add baking soda to kookoo?

NM: Baking soda aerates the kookoo a bit. It makes it a tiny bit fluffier. I think lowers the PH of the eggs but I also might be making that up. I like that it’s so little baking soda that it doesn’t leave a chemically aftertaste. 

FS: Why add flour?

NM: It’s so little flour but just to create a little backbone/structure to the kookoo. It’s definitely not mandatory and could easily be done without if you wanted to make the kookoo gluten free. 

FS: Why add romaine? (I remember that you mentioned that it makes it fluffy and adds lift to it!)

NM: More than making it fluffy, it makes the kookoo moister. We didn’t add any additional oil to the batter and it was still very moist for the fact that it was just herbs (which don’t have a ton of moisture) and six eggs. 

Kookoo Sabzi Sandwiches Recipe

Serves 4 (as a sandwich)
Prep time: 30 minutes
Total time: 1 hour

INGREDIENTS

for the kookoo:
⅛ teaspoon crushed saffron threads
⅓ cup barberries, picked, rinsed, and drained
2 bunches young parsley, chopped 
2 bunches fresh coriander, chopped
1 bunch fresh dill, chopped
1 bunch chives, finely chopped
3-4 leaves of romaine lettuce, finely chopped
6 large eggs, beaten
1 tablespoon vegetable oil, plus more for greasing
1 teaspoon all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon kosher salt 
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon ground turmeric
½ cup chopped walnuts
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 teaspoon granulated sugar

for the sandwich:
lavash or pita bread
mast-o-moosir or mast-o-khiar
fresh mint 
fresh tarragon
feta cheese
sliced Persian cucumber
sliced red onion
scallions, halved lengthwise and sliced into 2-inch pieces

DIRECTIONS

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