Za’atar Spice Blend

The drive to Morehouse. August. The day I have been preparing for since Marcus was eleven and tired of cereal, since the grits at 5:47 AM, since the first week of this blog when I stood at the stove and made breakfast for a boy who didn't know yet that he would become a debater and a cook and a man who carries a Folgers can to college.

I packed his car. Not Derek — me. I packed every box because packing is caring and caring is control and I needed control on the day I was losing it. His books (four boxes now). His clothes. His toiletries. His cast iron skillet, wrapped in newspaper. His Folgers can, wrapped in a towel, tucked beside his pillow. The suitcase of inheritance. The dorm room will smell like garlic before he's fully moved in. Good. Every room should smell like garlic. Every kitchen should start with a can.

Derek drove. I sat in the passenger seat. Marcus sat in the back, headphones on, reading (the boy reads in cars the way Curtis naps at parties: automatically, without consideration for the social context). The drive to Morehouse is forty minutes from Cascade Heights. Forty minutes. My son is leaving my table and traveling forty minutes to a different table and the distance is both nothing and everything.

We unpacked. We set up the dorm room. The Folgers can went on the desk (no counter in a dorm room; the desk will do). The skillet went in the mini-kitchen shared by the floor. He hugged me. He is taller than me and bigger than me and the hug was the hug of a man saying goodbye to his mother and the mother being hugged by her son and the hug lasted fifteen seconds and in those fifteen seconds I said everything I couldn't say with words: I love you. I fed you. I taught you. Go. Cook. Argue. Change the world. Come home for dinner. The table will be set.

I cried in the car. Derek drove home. I cried for forty minutes. Forty minutes of tears for forty minutes of distance and the math was exactly right. One tear per minute per mile between my kitchen and my son's first kitchen that isn't mine. The house was quiet when we got home. Six at the table instead of seven. The space was the shape of a boy who left and the shape was both empty and full — empty of his body, full of everything he carried. The can is at Morehouse. The line extends. The table holds.

The skillet went to Morehouse wrapped in newspaper. But a skillet is only as good as what you season it with, and I wasn’t about to send my son forty minutes down the road with bare iron and good intentions. I tucked a jar of this za’atar blend in alongside his Folgers can — a recipe I’ve made so many times my hands do it without me. It costs almost nothing to make, it keeps for months, and it turns a plain egg or a piece of toast into something worth eating alone in a dorm room. That’s the whole point. You teach them to cook, and then you give them the spice.

Prep Time: 5 minutes | Cook Time: 3 minutes | Total Time: 8 minutes | Servings: About 1/2 cup (12 servings)

Ingredients

3 tablespoons dried thyme
2 tablespoons ground sumac
2 tablespoons toasted sesame seeds
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Instructions

Toast the sesame seeds. In a small dry skillet over medium-low heat, toast the sesame seeds, stirring frequently, for 2 to 3 minutes until lightly golden and fragrant. Remove from heat and let cool completely before mixing.
Combine the dry ingredients. In a small bowl, stir together the thyme, sumac, oregano, cumin, salt, and pepper until evenly combined.
Add the sesame seeds. Fold in the cooled toasted sesame seeds and mix well.
Store. Transfer to a small airtight jar or container. Store at room temperature away from heat and light for up to 3 months.
Use it on everything. Shake over fried or scrambled eggs, stir into olive oil for dipping bread, dust over roasted vegetables, or press onto chicken before it goes into that cast iron skillet.

Nutrition (per serving)

Za’atar Spice Blend — What You Pack When You Pack Everything