Synopses & Reviews
Ziryab: Authentic Arab Cuisine is a food-lover's version of Scheherazade's famous T
housand and One Nights collection of stories. Writing in the voice of Ziryab a 9th-century arbiter of taste forced to flee his native Iraq and settle in Cordoba, Spain Farouk Mardam-Bey draws upon a wealth of culinary and historical research, complemented by his formidable story-telling powers, to provide an erudite yet practical introduction to Arab gastronomy.
Ziryab draws together the food traditions of the Arab world from the Near East and Iran to the North African Maghreb, enriched by culinary lore, historical anecdotes, literary quotes and travel notes. The book opens with an exhilarating gastronomic voyage across the breadth of the Arab world, presented as a celebration of 17 fruits, vegetables, nuts, spices and grains essential to authentic Arab cuisine. Introductions on the history and uses of each ingredient set the table for more than 80 recipes typical of specific countries or regions in the Arab world.
Mardam-Bey establishes the cultural and historical context of this culinary voyage with an extensive section titled "Logbook." Here he profiles the role that specific countries have played in the evolution of Arab gastronomy and their characteristic dishes and ingredients, including both present-day Arab states and nations such as Spain, France and Greece that have been influenced by Arab culture.
The book concludes with the "Gourmet Lexicon," an A-to-Z listing "in which Ziryab mentions other fruits and vegetables, as well as dishes, beverages and historical characters which every gourmet should know about." From "A for Asparagus" and "B for Baqlawa" through "Y for Yogurt" and "Z for Ziryab," the author provides a whimsical reference guide that displays both his encyclopedic knowledge of Arab foods and his profound appreciation for Arab cuisine.
Ziryab offers a fascinating introduction to Arab gastronomy, its many facets and manifestations, from ancient Persia to present-day Morocco and it leaves the reader intrigued and inspired to taste the magic of authentic Arab cuisine.
About the Author
Farouk Mardam-Bey was born in Damascus, Syria, in 1944. As a food critic, his culinary chronicles and discourses on Arab cuisine have been published over the past decade under the pseudonym "Ziryab" in
Qantara, the quarterly journal of the Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris.
Ziryab: Authentic Arab Cuisine represents a compilation of his
Qantara articles into a single volume. He is also co-author with Robert Bistolfi of
The Treatise of the Chickpea (Sindbad-Actes Sud, 1998).
The historical Ziryab who is Mardam-Bey's culinary inspiration is a 9th-century native of Iraq whose erudition and influence with the caliph stirred resentments leading to his forced exodus to Cordoba, a seat of Islamic culture in Spain. Renowned as an extraordinary musician, poet, geographer and astronomer, Abu al-Hasan 'Ali ibn Nafi' nicknamed "Ziryab," or blackbird also gained a reputation as a gourmand and a leading arbiter for a new art of living. Ziryab taught the people of Cordoba the most elaborate recipes of Baghdad's cuisine, as well as the sequence of plates for an elegant meal. Ziryab inspired courtiers and city dwellers alike to transform the way they dressed, furnished their homes and cooked their meals.
"Knowing all that, I must have been very presumptuous... to have signed my modest culinary chronicles with the pseudonym Ziryab," Mardam-Bey writes in his introduction. "Now that I am taking the risk of compiling them into one book, I would like to thank Qantara... and all my readers for not holding this against me."
Table of Contents
Praise
The eggplant
The fava bean
Saffron
The apricot
The olive
The date
The squash
The tomato
The fig
Couscous
Rice
Bulgur wheat
The grape
The artichoke
The apple
The chickpea
The pistachio
Logbook
Gourmet Lexicon