Eat Love Laugh

Food is unquestionably visceral and powerful. But how in the wider world does a loving vibration around food bring us together, introduce us to and bridge cultures, empower and heal? In London, Yotam Ottolenghi and Sami Tamimi are the duo known for co-founding the Ottolenghi delis and restaurants, with food inspired by (but not confined to) their Middle Eastern roots. The collaboration is a success and all the more poignant given their upbringing: Sami was raised in Muslim East Jerusalem and Yotam in Jewish West Jerusalem. It’s a strong reminder that there is more that unites than divides us.

Says Ottolenghi: ‘Cooking and eating together – sharing bread, pouring wine, eating with your hands – is a very levelling experience, so that provides a platform upon which bridges can be formed. It’s not going to solve the world’s problems, but starting on a full tummy is, surely, no bad way to begin.’

Similarly, Shamil Thakrar, the founder of the popular London-based restaurant-cum-café Dishoom hosts celebrations during Muslim Eid, Hindu Diwali and Christmas with equal enthusiasm, while gender specialist Niki Kopcke has founded Mazí Mas, a social enterprise and roaming restaurant which employs women from migrant and refugee communities as chefs.

I took a friend along to the Albany Arts Centre in Deptford, London, for a Mazí Mas event. The lights were dim, a long, communal table had been set, Brazilian music played in the background and an array of Brazilian dishes appeared. There was a fish stew called moqueca, a kabocha and coconut casserole, guava and cheese canapés, bulgar wheat with mango, cashews and lime, and for dessert a passionfruit mousse. We all dived in, and pretty soon the strangers at this long table were chatting away like old friends. It was a warm, uplifting experience. As Mazí Mas’s Brazilian chef Roberta Siao said on the night: ‘Food is an excuse to sit together, share, laugh and love.'

This is a sentiment echoed by Yasmin Choudhury, who hosts Artisan Slow Wood-Fired Curry experiences in South London. She runs a venture called Lovedesh, showcasing all that is positive about Bangladesh, a country she feels has too often been associated with floods and famine. The culinary experience – getting people to roll up their sleeves and get stuck into cooking a curry, communally, as they might in a rural village – is one way of doing this.

However, it doesn’t have to be all about exotic ingredients and global awareness. At heart, food that heals will be food that is approached in a mindful way. And keen to share the benefits of eating in this way, Shruti Whittington, co-founder of Fairfield House Retreats in Somerset, offers Mindful Cooking weekends. ‘For me, this is a way of bringing my total attention into what I am doing in the kitchen – whether that is chopping vegetables, washing them, cooking, adding flavours, textures and colours,’ she explains. ‘In this way, cooking and preparing food becomes a meditation. And when so much awareness goes into the food preparation and cooking, the meal will taste delicious, no matter what.'

This is another chance to talk about what you did and to chat generally. ‘When people come into your kitchen they may feel intimidated because it’s a new space but, as with gardening, it’s therapeutic and the focus isn’t on them directly, so they are more likely to open up.’

JAPANESE GINGER AND CARLIC CHICKEN WITH SMASHED CUCUMBER

Diana says: ‘This dish has a great interplay of temperatures. The chicken is hot and spicy, the cucumber like eating shards of ice (make sure you serve it direct from the fridge). The cucumber recipe is adapted from a recipe in a wonderful American book called Japanese Farm Food by Nancy Singleton Hachisu. You can also make the chicken with boneless thighs and griddle them.’

Serves 4

Ingredients:

FOR THE CHICKEN:

3 ½ tbsp soy sauce

3 tbsp sake or dry sherry

3 tbsp soft dark brown sugar

½ tbsp brown miso

60g (2oz) root ginger, peeled and finely grated

4 garlic cloves, finely grated

1 tsp togarashi seasoning (available in Waitrose), or

½ tsp chilli powder

8 good-sized skinless bone-in chicken thighs, or other bone-in chicken pieces

FOR THE CUCUMBER:

500g (1lb 2oz) cucumber

2 garlic cloves, roughly chopped

2 tsp sea salt

2 tbsp pink pickled ginger, very finely shredded

A small handful of shiso leaves, if available, or mint leaves, torn (optional)

Method:

1. Mix everything for the chicken (except the chicken itself ) to make a marinade. Pierce the chicken on the fleshy sides with a knife, put the pieces into a shallow dish and pour the marinade over. Massage it in well, turning the pieces over. Cover and put in the fridge for 30–60 minutes.
2. When you’re ready to cook, preheat the oven to 180˚C/350˚F/gas mark 4. Take the pieces out of the marinade and put them in a shallow ovenproof dish in which they can sit snugly in a single layer. Pour over half the marinade. Roast in the oven for 40 minutes, basting every so often with the juices and leftover marinade (don’t add any leftover marinade after 20 minutes, it needs to cook properly as it has had raw chicken in it). Check for doneness: the juices that run out of the chicken when you pierce the flesh with a knife should be clear and not at all pink.
3. When the chicken is halfway through cooking, peel and halve the cucumber and scoop out the seeds. Set on a board and bang the pieces gently with a pestle or rolling pin. This should break them up a little. Now break them into chunks with your hands. Crush the garlic with a pinch of the salt and massage this – and the rest of the salt – into the cucumber. Put in a small plastic bag, squeeze out the air and put in the fridge for 10 minutes.
4. When you’re ready to eat, tip the cucumber into a sieve so the juices can drain away. Add the shredded ginger. You can add shiso leaves if you can find them (I can’t, I have no Japanese shop nearby). Nothing else really tastes like it, but I sometimes add mint.
5. Serve the chicken with brown rice or rice vermicelli (the rice vermicelli is good served cold) and the cucumber.

Try this with… edamame and sugar snap salad

Serves 4

1. Mix 2 tbsp white miso paste, 1 tbsp rice vinegar, 2 tbsp groundnut oil, 2 tbsp water, 1 tsp runny honey and 2cm (3/4in) peeled, grated root ginger.
2. Toss with 100g (31/2oz) cooked edamame beans, 100g (31/2oz) raw sugar snap peas, sliced lengthways, 8 sliced radishes and a handful of mizuna