For me, both occasions will be a mixture of joy and sadness because while I love every minute of watching my children grow up, I also miss the days when they were really small, especially since it means they are moving further away from me.

Letting children go is hard, and the occasion is also bittersweet for me: my elder daughter is the first of my five children to graduate from college.

With five kids, three still in the house, this daughter has never had it easy trying to secure her education, and she tells me that getting it was harder than I could have ever imagined. Even though she paid for most of it herself, her education was always a family affair because for four years we all helped her in one way or another. So this week we celebrate not only her, but the fact that we all worked together to help her get through.

And  that sounds like a great reason to have a feast ! Although we’ll have a full-blown celebration for her at a later date, on the day she graduates we’ll have a small reception for her at home with immediate family, her close friends and lots of comfort foods. My daughter wants an eclectic menu with a Southern/Mediterranean flair. My shish kabobs aren’t traditional, since I don’t have a grill and my oven is broken, so I cook the meat,  onions, carrots, mushrooms and peppers  and then spear them onto the sticks and serve with dipping sauces on the side.

Dij’s Delights

Assorted fruit, red grapes and cheese platter

Bread, breadsticks and crackers

Crudités with hummus

Chips with salsa and guacamole

Angel-stuffed eggs

Barbecued lamb or chicken shish kabobs

Grilled salmon

Couscous with yellow raisins, scallions and dates

Pasta salad

Arugula with beets and shaved parmesan in a vinagrette dressing

Strawberry/peppermint lemonade

Cake with fruit compote and chocolate sauce

Teriyaki/ barbecued lamb kabobs

Ingredients

2 dozen wooden shish kabob spears

2 lbs boneless leg of lamb, cut into 1  ½ -inch cubes, marinated and dredged in flour

¼ cup virgin olive oil

1 clove finely minced garlic

Salt, pepper, onion powder, Sazon to taste

2 lbs medium button mushrooms

1 lb baby carrots

1 lb small heirloom tomatoes

Four yellow and red peppers, quartered X 2

Directions

Brown lamb with 1/2 of the oil on high heat for 7 minutes. Add garlic when nearly done and  turn on all sides, then set aside.

In separate pan, heat olive oil and  sauté  vegetables until they are just past crunchy.

When ingredients are cool enough to handle, put them on the sticks.

Serve near couscous with your favorite dipping sauces.

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In Islam as well as Judaism, very specific laws govern the slaughtering of animals and they are very similar. Thus, a person who is Jewish and keeps a Kosher kitchen or a Muslim who eats only Halaal meat can eat each other’s meats. In brief, Muslims are required to eat Halaal meats, which means that the animals are slaughtered mercifully.

Instead of an animal being herded through a conveyor belt  like at big commercial farms, a butcher is required to say specific prayers over it before is slaughtered and to slit the animal’s throat quickly from ear to ear, releasing the blood before it is cured. This is to make sure the animal feels the least amount of pain when it is killed. Muslims are also forbidden to drink the blood of any animal. The meat also tastes much better.

Judaism follows similar traditions in the slaughtering of animals and many only eat certified Kosher meats. For Christians, many people offer the choice of lamb or ham for the Easter dinner, the latter of which I personally will never touch because we don’t eat pork.

In our house, lamb is always considered a real treat, especially since getting a good cut of the meat requires a trip to the butcher, and it’s very expensive.

My mother celebrates Easter and we’ll prepare a feast for her. Since she is close to 80 years old, I usually give in to most of her requests as long as they don’t go against my dietary principles, like pork does. So she wants lamb, which is easy enough and will please almost all of my children. My mate, however, won’t touch it so he will get salmon.

Boneless leg of lamb with rosemary sauce and roasted vegetables

Preheat oven to 475 degrees

1 boneless leg of lamb (3-5 lbs), butterflied by the butcher

• One head of fresh garlic, washed and peeled
• 8-12 red small potatoes, washed and skinned
• 1 lb baby carrots
• 3 red onions, skinned and quartered
• 2 yellow peppers, seeded and cut into 8ths
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 1 tsp onion powder
• 1 tsp ground cumin
• 3 sprigs fresh rosemary, one diced, the other 2 whole
• 3 tsp virgin olive oil
• Butchers string

Directions

- Have the butcher de-bone the lamb, roll it and secure it with a string

- At home, unroll the lamb out flat and discard the string

- Rinse and pat dry with a tea towel

- Place 3-5 cloves of garlic on the lamb, and sprinkle with other seasonings

- Roll it tightly and secure with fresh string and season the other side. You can also stuff it with bread stuffng or herbs before you roll it.

- Rub the outside with olive oil

- Place on a roasting rack with a pan underneath  to catch the drippings

- Brown the outside of the lamb, turning on all sides (for about 15 minutes)

- Set drippings aside and place lamb in roasting pan

- Turn oven down to 325,  and surround the lamb with all of the vegetables and drippings and cover with foil

- Bake for 20-30 minutes per pound (depending on whether you like it rare or well done)

- Baste the lamb with the drippings throughout roasting to keep it moist

- Make sure all of the veggies are soft

- When lamb is cooked almost to your liking, remove it from the oven and let it rest

***Always take meat from the oven a little bit before it’s done,  because it will continue cooking after you’ve removed it.

Serve with fresh steamed asparagus and rice or with couscous and salad

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The Menu

Roasted turkey breast

Collard greens

Sweet potatoes

Chicken wings

Lamb (Bourguignon). My adaptation of Julia Child’s Beef Bourguignon

Macaroni and cheese

Beets sauté

Arugula salad

Yellow rice with mushrooms

Pound Cake

Sweet Potato Pie

My kids wanted lamb. So after watching Julie and Julia, the movie about Julia Child’s life as seen through the eyes of a bored woman named Julie who blogged her way through the great chef’s first cookbook, Mastering The Art of French Cooking, I was inspired to adapt the Beef Bourguignon recipe  to lamb, minus the bacon.

My daughter Khadija brings her own special artistic flair to any food she is working with, and on this occasion it was beets. I had brought them for my salad of arugula, goat cheese, walnuts and cranberries. But Khadija had very different ideas about what to do with the beets, so I handed them off to her. She sautéed them in butter along with julienned onions and thinly sliced mushrooms and a dash of nutmeg. They were exquisite.

One of the most misunderstood foods around is the beet, and as a child I hated them with a passion. They were served regularly at my grandfather’s house and his wife, our Aunt Lena, insisted that we eat every thing that she put on our plates. One of her favorites was Beet Borscht, which she served to us cold in the summer. Fast-forward four decades later and beets have become one of my favorite foods. For one thing they are one of the healthiest root vegetables around and have loads of health benefits.

Whenever I go to a juice bar and order carrot juice, I always mix it with beets and celery because both are great for fighting high blood pressure.

Beets are also wonderful for nourishing pregnant women. 

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