ECA Testimonial: Professionalism is What Truly Counts

How do you feel you benefited from membership in the ECA?


The ECA is what has allowed me to accomplish my level of professionalism, as a working chef; and professionalism is what really counts in the cooking field in general. Chef Markus always emphasized the importance of know the basics. He always says: “Know the basics and then build on that!” Chef Markus and Mirjam and the entire ECA team have led the ECA Competitions. Competitions allow us to come together with  many other chefs for instantaneous growth and exchanging ideas!! I have an idea and he has one, at the end of the day you’ve come across 300 new ideas.
The workshops also are very valuable, as they allow the chef to be academically well-versed in know-how; so generations can be grounded in and professionalism. Finally ECA has taught me that every lettuce leaf has value, we must not throw anything in the kitchen. It has taught me to love everything in the kitchen!

Chef Atef Ibrahim
Executive Chef
LSG Sky Chefs Catering Egypt SAE 

ECA Tesimonial: The Joy of Cooking with ECA

One of the joys of life is cooking. It is a journey through a meal that you should always try to enhance, enrich and diversify. The Egyptian Chef's association (ECA) offers many ways to help you achieve this either through the library they have, the hobby chef club that helps you meet new chefs and amateurs that are seeking new experiences or even through their consultation process. I have been lucky to meet different chefs from whom I learned a great deal. I also find the ECA a channel between the WACS and me, through the magazine and website, where I can find new info all the time about what is new in the world.

Thanks for all your efforts!

Chef Heba El Azab

Street Food with a Twist

Cairo Kitchen is a wonderful new addition to the very limited amount of books available on Egyptian cuisine. It is fun to read and to cook from and, although not specifically written for vegetarians, they will find plenty of inspiration in this book. With its beautiful photography, it is a great gift for anyone who loves cooking, Egyptian food and Cairo Kitchen restaurant.
Do not expect a solid cookery course in Egyptian food preparation, because Cairo Kitchen is more of a fun cookbook to browse through for inspiration. Beautiful photographs and short introductions to each dish make you want to try new things, just like the chefs at Cairo Kitchen do. Yes, we all know Tahina, but why not try the Carrot Tahina or their all-time bestseller, Beetroot Tahina? The dishes featured in Cairo Kitchen are as vibrant in color as the restaurant itself, adding to the joy one gets from trying out new flavor combinations. All dishes have their roots in tradition, but many are presented here with a little contemporary twist, making them often healthier and less fatty than their authentic version.
While the photos of food are beautiful, it seems there would be an opportunity for Egyptian food stylists and photographers to go into this growing field. A drawback of the book is that it seems to be written by good cooks who love what they do, rather than professional cookbook writers. This leads to some confusion when it comes to the order of the chapters and explanations. Sometimes a culinary term or dish mentioned earlier in the book gets explained in detail only much later. For instance, there are different chapters for breakfast, mezze and street food items, while many dishes such as fuul and ta’meya could be placed under all of these headings. This sometimes causes a repetition in explanations, which could have easily been avoided by adding a short glossary or an explanatory introduction to the cookbook.

Culinary terms and ingredients are not always correctly explained either. Couscous is described as tiny dough balls and the author suggests that you can substitute Gibna Rumi (Rumi cheese) for Parmesan cheese, which would make Italians for sure shake their heads in disbelief and any professional chef or gourmand for that matter! Also, the words taste and flavor are used interchangeably throughout the book. Somehow it feels like the book has been published in a haste, while it would have benefited from another good round of proofreading.

Reviewed by Mirjam van IJssel