Arab cuisine

Arab cuisine ( ar, المطبخ العربي) is the cuisine of the Arabs, defined as the various regional cuisines spanning the Arab world, from the Maghreb to the Fertile Crescent and the Arabian Peninsula. These cuisines are centuries old and reflect the culture of trading in baharat (spices), herbs, and foods. The regions have many similarities, but also unique traditions. They have also been influenced by climate, cultivation, and mutual commerce.

Medieval cuisine

Breads

The white bread was made with high-quality wheat flour, similar to bread but thicker, the fermented dough was leavened usually with yeast and "baker's borax" () and baked in a '' tandoor''. One poetic verse describing this bread:

"In the farthest end of Karkh of Baghdad, a baker I saw offering bread, splendidly marvelous.
From purest essence of wheat contrived. Radiant and absolute, you may see your image reflected, crystal clear.
rounds glowing with lovely whiteness, more playful than gorgeous singing girls,
They look like crystal trays, and were they indeed so, they would have served us as plates.

bread was made in two varieties, (soft, thin flatbreads) and (dry, thin bread flavored with tamarisk seeds).

Sauces

Numerous recipes for sauces () have survived from historic Arabic cookbooks. The 10th-century written by Ibn Sayyar al-Warraq gives several recipes to be served with roasted fish, attributed to the various sources.

To Ibrahim ibn al-Mahdi are credited two recipes, one prepared by adding rue, caraway, thyme, '' asafetida'' and cassia to the mustard sauce, and another made by mashing vinegar-soaked raisins with garlic, walnut, mustard, vinegar, and seasonings like ''asafetida'' and anise.

From the seventh Abbasid caliph Al-Ma'mun's recipe collection comes a made with whey, walnut, garlic, olive oil and murri.

There are similar recipes meant for poultry dishes prepared with seasonings like ginger, pomegranate, spikenard, and cloves.

A surviving poem about is attributed to Caliph Al-Mu'tamid:

The concept of is so subtle that none other than the smart can fathom.
Walnut and garlic with yogurt whey are the most you may need for it.
Or make it with vinegar, , and coriander. But with it will be even better.
If not, then mustard and garlic mixed with and onion, equal parts, will make your relish.
Or with just vinegar and onion eat your fish and it will still be a tasty dish.

Sweets

Described as the "food of kings" and "supreme judge of all sweets", '' lauzinaj'' was an almond-based confection that had entered medieval European cuisine by the 13th-century from Andalusian influence, returning Crusaders and Latin translations of cookery books. There are two versions of the dish known from medieval texts:
# or "drenched ", this dish is believed to be an earlier version of the Ottoman dish ''baklava''. It was made by filling thin pastry dough with a mixture of ground almond (and sometimes other nuts like pistachio or walnut), rose water, and sometimes luxury flavorings like mastic, ambergris, or musk.
# was made with ground almonds cooked in boiling honey or sugar until reaching a taffy-like consistency. The raw version, closer to marzipan in consistency, was made by blending the almonds with sugar and flavoring with camphor, musk, and rose water. The finished confection was molded into animal or other shapes, or cut into squares and triangles.

Vegetables

Vegetables include leeks, endive, melilot, fenugreek, onions, purslane, Jew's mallow and radish. Boiled asparagus is served with olive oil and '' murri''. The cooking water may be sweetened with honey and seasoned with cilantro, rue, anise and black pepper, and used as a beverage either by itself with honey, or added to wine.

Some vegetables are consumed raw, but the following are usually boiled: asparagus, cauliflower, white soy beans, leeks, orach, a variety of mushroom known as , chard, cabbage, carrot, turnip, fresh fennel and eggplant.

Some vegetable dishes are served cold. One example of such a dish is eggplant with fried onion, fresh herbs and olive oil dressed with fermented sauces, vinegar and caraway. There are several cold eggplant dishes that are similar, some made with smoked eggplant, adding nuts like ground walnuts or almonds, and sometimes different seasonings like saffron, cassia, and ''galangal''.

A dish for fried carrots with fresh herbs, dressing and spices was described by the poet Kushajim:

Dinars of carnelian and gold in a vessel so delicate, it may almost melt and flow.
All radiating with luster like carnelian shimmering on pearls.
In the vessel harmoniously combined, here together and there disperse.
The spices emitting fragrance like wine mingled with sweet breeze.
On top are pearls and silver decked with gems,
Which the cook delicately fashioned, a gorgeous dish with flavor and perfume.
The scattered rue is flowers of turquoise gems, vibrantly green,
Jiggling with murri and olive oil, ebbing and flowing with sheen.

Diet and foods

Arab cuisine uses specific and unique foods and spices. Some of those foods are:
* Meat— lamb and chicken are the most used, followed by beef and goat. Other poultry is used in some regions, and fish is used in coastal areas including the Mediterranean Sea, Atlantic Ocean and the Red Sea. Some Christian Arabs eat pork.
* Dairy products—widely used, especially yogurt, buttermilk and white cheese. Butter and cream are also used extensively.
* Herbs and spices—amounts and types used generally varies from region to region.

:Herbs and spices include: sesame, saffron, black pepper, allspice, turmeric, garlic, cumin

HOME


Content is Copyleft
Website design, code, and AI is Copyrighted (c) 2014-2017 by Stephen Payne


Consider donating to Wikimedia



As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases