The Story of Pita Grill on Watchmen Hill
We were very lucky: instead of a honeymoon, we had a “honey year” in the Land of Milk and Honey. We celebrate our anniversary around the same time Israel celebrates its birthday (though we’re not married 75 years, yet). We married at 21, took a year off (to the dismay of our parents), packed our bags, and went to study in Jerusalem, a very special place indeed.
Hebrew University was founded on an ancient hill called Har HaTzofim, the Mount of the Watchmen, those who keep watch from high above. Members of the Israeli Youth movement, “scouts” in English, are called Tzofim in Hebrew.
We lived in the oldest and dingiest dorms on campus. There were no rooms for married couples, of which there were two in my group. We tossed a coin to determine who would take the room on a girls’ floor, and who on the boys’. We got the one on the girls’ floor, I think we won. Our room had been uninhabited by humans for months prior to our arrival but very much enjoyed by the infamous Israeli roaches. They flew, crawled, and hid everywhere. We diligently sprayed the whole space with killer bug spray and left for the weekend. Its strong distinct scent perfumed all of our belongings, and I still get a surprising whiff of it when I accidentally stumble upon a notebook or a folder from those days.
Ten or so rooms shared a kitchen and a shower with a bathroom. And a sunken common area in the middle that no one used but for sweeping dirty water, after cleaning the floors Israeli style. When I think about it today, I don’t know how we did it. Especially the shower. How it was allowed. Back then, it didn’t even seem unusual, let alone inappropriate.
My husband and I fought a lot. Our first year was hard. Sharing the room, learning each other’s habits, and moods, studying together, making friends. But we loved a lot too. Each other, and our friends, and Israel. Our dorm neighbors — not so much. Right across from us was a blond girl who made very loud ughm noises so often and so late at night that we had to call security to calm things down, we couldn’t sleep. At all. There were also Arabic girls, who started cleaning their rooms at 6am in the morning on Shabbat, with music blasting and water swooshing. But! They showed us how to warm up pita bread. First you buy it fresh and fluffy at the shouk, or Middle Eastern market, and gobble up as much as you can on your bus ride back to the dorms. But if anything is left over you just drop it on the open burner and char it a little on each side. So good. This was an education I couldn’t have gotten anywhere else.
Another ritual we adopted was to walk from our hill to the nearby French Hill on Friday, before Shabbat, and buy groceries. We would treat ourselves to a fresh baguette and Israeli spreads: a creamy one with garlic & dill, called shum-shamir, hummus, babaganoush and hatzilim b’mayonnaise. These two are made with roasted eggplants and tahini or mayo. I have many fond memories of that year in Israel, but ripping off a piece of baguette and dipping it into the spread right in front of the supermarket on a sunny Friday morning is among my favorites.
It’s been 17 years since our year in Israel. My Hebrew is rusty, I hire professionals who make sure I live a roach — free life, and I no longer toss a coin to determine my lodgings. I’ve been to Israel many times. I fight less with my spouse; I know his idiosyncrasies and he knows mine. We have two kids, and a four-burner stove, and an outdoor grill.
My love for Israel, Watchmen Hill, and slightly burnt pita with eggplant spread remains steady. Today my husband is there, representing Dallas Jewish Community and our family, while I’m making eggplant dip at home in the USA. But we’ll see each other soon and raise a toast with pita and mint lemonade!
Eggplant Dip with Pita
The Magic Ingredients
- 2–3 medium eggplants
- 2–4 cloves of garlic
- Juice of half a lemon
- 3–4 table spoons of mayonnaise
- Salt & spices to taste
- Pita bread
- Olive oil
The Method
- The beauty of this dip is that it has numerous variations, both in prep and ingredients. I personally love to char my eggplants on the open fire of my gas stove top, it gives the vegetables incredible smoky flavor. But if you don’t want to use this method (it smokes up the kitchen), you can grill, microwave or bake your eggplant. I’ll explain how.
- To char your eggplants line the stove with tinfoil, for a very easy clean up after!
- Wash the eggplants, pat them dry.
- Turn the gas burners on, one per eggplant, and place your vegetables directly on the burner.
- If you want to roast the eggplant, heat the oven to 400F, line baking sheet with foil, poke the eggplant with a fork and roast for about one hour, turning periodically, till soft. you can also use broil feature to char it.
- To cook it in the microwave, cut lengthwise, place on a safe dish and cook for 6–10 minutes until soft.
- Grilling is similar to charring, preheat the grill and cook turning, till soft.
- Since I had one small-ish eggplant, it took me about 10 minutes to char it, rotating it every two minutes or so.
- The skin should blacken, and it should feel soft to the touch in the thickest part. Eggplant is ready! The bigger ones might take up to 20 minutes on the stove top.
- Using tongues carefully transfer the eggplant to the plate and let cool. This is probably the longest and hardest part of this recipe: waiting.
- It is usually recommended to have it cool completely, but I rarely have patience to wait that long, and besides I like my hatzilim warm.
- While the eggplant is cooling prepare the rest of the ingredients.
- Peel & dice or press the garlic. Don’t like garlic? Don’t add it. But we can’t be friends, nothing is better is thoroughly garlic-y dish to my mind. I’d say one clove per eggplant, maybe two.
- Because I’m lazy, I mean efficient, I have these frozen garlic cubes on hand. They work like a charm, and what’s more, they are imported from Israel, so it’s perfect. I used one cube.
- Squeeze half a lemon. It gives much necessary acidity to the dish, and deepens the flavor.
- Once the eggplant is cool enough, scoop it out into the blender.
- Like thoroughly scoop it. I personally don’t mind little pieces of skin in my dip.
- Cooked eggplant is very easy to scoop in its entirety.
- If you don’t have a blender, food processor, or chopper, you can just mash or chop your eggplant with for or knife. It will be chunkier, but no less tasty. Some say even tastier!
- I like adding salt straight to eggplant, but cautiously, mayo is salty too. You can omit this step, or fix salt to your liking in the end. I added about quarter teaspoon to that one little eggplant.
- As for the spices, add what makes you happy.
- I always bring a variety from Israel, and add a little bit of everything.
- I’d say smoked paprika is a nice touch, to deepen the smokiness, but it’s really up to you. You can make it spicy with pepper, or tajin, add herbs, whatever your heart desires!
- As for mayonnaise, people usually harbor very strong feelings about it. I personally love the combination. I added two heaped table spoons.
- If you don’t like mayo, try experimenting with sour cream, or Greek yoghurt. Or mix 1:1 with mayo!
- Of course you might just as well switch mayonnaise for tahini altogether, thus making a better known Middle-Eastern dip called babaganoush. Lots of recipes online. But unless you buy already made tahini sauce, it’s a bit of extra work to mix up tahini, and “ain’t nobody got time for that!”
- With a few swirls, you are done!
- More blending — smoother dip.
- I personally like it a little chunky. If I had more eggplant, I’d leave a bit and just chop it in.
- The moment it’s blended to your liking the dip is ready. It really takes much longer to type it up, than make it.
- Garnish with what you like: garlic chips, parsley, even pomegranate seeds.
- I just drizzled some olive oil.
- When you are ready to eat, crank up that heat again, and place pita directly into the flames.
- Just a few seconds on each side, we don’t want to burn it, just warm up.
- The top might start inflating, it’s ok, it’s the air inside the pocket!
- It is ready to serve!
- Of course it could be used as a starter or an appetizer, or a dip with drinks and chips, it doesn’t have to be served with pita.
- Or you can do a full Israeli feast with falafel, or shawarma, Israeli salad, hamutzim (pickled vegetables), hummus, chicken schnitzel, couscous, and so on so forth. Now I’m making myself hungry.
- But even on the minimalist side, nothing beats the pleasure of dipping warm pita into the fresh hatzilim b’mayonaise dip! So satisfying, as my daughter says!
