SEATTLE — One of Seattle’s favorite voices is about to share one of her favorite ingredients with the cooking world.
Rachel Belle, host of award-winning podcast “Your Last Meal” and longtime local radio personality, can now add "cookbook author" to her resume.
Her first book “Open Sesame” features 45 recipes involving tahini and “all things sesame.”
"There are so many things you can make! I made a tahini feta queso," Belle said. "I don't know how many people have used tahini in desserts, and it tastes so good with chocolate because it's kind of peanut-buttery-esque.”
The Middle Eastern condiment has been central to Belle’s life since childhood.
"I grew up eating hummus in the '80's before it was a thing in the states,” she said. "My dad grew up in Israel and tahini is a very old Middle Eastern ingredient. It belonged to the Palestinians first and Saudi Arabians, people in Jordan, kind of all over the Middle East. I grew up eating the Israeli version of hummus and really loving it. Going to Israel a few times - it tastes different there, it tastes so much better. I learned that it's all about the tahini, because that's the dominant flavor."
She discovered the key is using generous amounts of tahini imported from Israel, because it’s made with a specific sesame seed from Ethiopia’s Humera region (considered the best in the world.)
One of Belle’s unique recipes also adds beets, resulting in a pink hummus that would impress Barbie.
"I want people to never buy hummus at the store again because once you taste it, it tastes so different,” she said. “And I hope people will have my (eye-opening) moment and be like, 'Oh, this is really good!'"
The cookbook also offers a funny and singular voice, because the publisher wanted Belle's personality to shine through.
"They really let me be myself - I wrote the word 'fart' in my cookbook,” she laughed. "I loved writing the book. I loved testing the recipes, I loved not sitting in front of a computer all day and standing in my kitchen and getting to be creative, and do what I love best which is cooking."
Each recipe offers a new twist on a centuries-old ingredient. Belle hopes readers will be open to sesame in ways they never imagined.
"It's always so satisfying to tell people what you love, and hope they love it as much as you. So I guess that is what this cookbook is. It's a bunch of recipes that I love and I hope other people like them, too,” she said.
“Open Sesame” comes out in November and is currently available for pre-order. It will also be carried in local bookstores and Williams-Sonoma.
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