Halloumi skewers from the grill
Years ago, I went through a 1 1/2 year phase in which I lived vegetarian. During this phase, I visited my family in Lebanon because my sister was getting married. I was actually very happy from a culinary point of view, as Lebanese cuisine includes a lot of vegetarian and vegan dishes. But once you’re grilled, you can forget it as a vegetarian and have to make do with the delicious salads. Until I showed my family that you can also make perfect barbecue skewers out of halloumi.
“What, you don’t eat meat?!” gushed my aunt. She was visibly irritated and stared into the air for a few seconds, replying “No problem, I’ll do it with chicken then” before going back to her work. I shook my head. “But it’s chicken! You don’t eat that anymore either? No?! Would you rather have something with fish?”
The perfect alternative to meat on the grill
Then one day when we were having a barbecue, I ran an errand in the shop next door beforehand and came back with some halloumi. “Ah, would you like to wrap a bride with halloumi and cucumber?” In Arabic, that’s actually what they say when someone makes themselves a wrap with pita bread. But I didn’t want a wrap, I told her it would make barbecue skewers. She smiled. When I had finished the Halloumi skewers, she smiled again, patted me on the head and deposited them directly on the other barbecue skewers – the ones with meat. Wonderful!
Halloumi is a perfect alternative to meat, not only as a barbecue skewer and not only for vegetarians. Try the Halloumi skewers with bulgur salad and hummus. Delicious! You get a special kick when you put some za’atar butter on the skewers after grilling.
Recipe for grilled veggie skewers
Equipment
- Grill skewers
Zubereitung
- Carefully cut the halloumi into cubes. The cubes should be about the size of the cherry tomatoes.
- Halve the courgettes lengthways and then cut into finger-thick half-moons.
- Carefully thread the halloumi, tomatoes and courgettes onto the skewers one after the other. Caution: Halloumi tends to break.
- Brush the halloumi skewers with a little olive oil and grill on all sides for approx. 1 minute. Then sprinkle with a pinch of za'atar.
