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Spotlight on: Plums

The plum (Prunus domestica) is part of a family including apricots, peaches and cherries. The origins of the fruit have been lost in the mists of time, but it is likely that its cradle is to be bound in the southern and eastern Mediterranean. The earliest references to the use of plums in culinary recipes are to be found in Apicius’ cookery book, where Damascus plums (so named because they were imported from Syria), are an ingredient some sauces served with meat (crane, duck, chicken, lamb).

In Arabic the plum is known as ijjāṣ (إجّاص) but in some dialects (e.g. Syria) this denotes pears (كمّثرى, kummathrā), with plums being called khawkh (خوخ), which is the usual word for peaches. In Andalusian and Maghrebi Arabic plums were known ʿayn (plural: عيون, ʿuyūn) al-baqar (عين البقر, ‘cow’s eyes’), sometimes abbreviated to ʿabqar; according to the 13th-century botanist Abū ’l-Khayr al-Ishbīlī, they were ‘so called because the fruit resembles in size, brightness, and moisture the pupils of cows’.

The same scholar distinguished a number of different types, including yellow (أصفر/aṣfar, also known as مشمشي/mishmishī, ‘apricot-like’), white (أبيض/abyaḍ; also شاهلوج/shāhlūj or شاهلوك /shāhlūk), red (أحمر/aḥmar), rosy (/مورّد/muwarrad) and pitch-black (أسوج حالك/aswad ḥālik). Other scholars referred to green, red, black and white plums, whereas the best fruits were said to be those from Qumis (Iran), Halwan (Egypt), and the Armenian variety.

In the medieval Arabic culinary literature, plums are conspicuous by their absence from Syrian and Egyptian cookery books, and were used only sparingly in Abbasid sources, where they are called for in a chicken stew, and as the key ingredient in a few syrups. There are also a few recipes for stews in 13th-century Andalusi treatises, with the author of ‘The Exile’s Cookbook’ stating that they were imported from ‘the land of the Christians’ (northern Spain). They mainly occur in sweet-and-sour stews, such as one with veal, or with lamb. The latter was known as muruziyya (مروزية), which, according to another cookery book, was said to be the food of Tunisians and Egyptians. In present-day Morocco, murūziyya, refers to lamb tajine with raisins and almonds, but sometimes also includes plums. 

In the medical literature, there was a consensus that plums had limited nutritive value, but were useful loosening the bowels and cooling the body. Large, sweet plums were thought to be more effective as laxatives and less cooling, while sour kinds are less laxative but more cooling. The fruit is particularly effective when its juice is strained and mixed with sugar or honey. However, it weakens the stomach, which can be corrected with julanjubīn (جلنجبين), a rose-petal conserve.

The physician al-Isrāʾīlī (9th-10th c.) held that the shāhluj was slow to digest, harmful to the stomach, and only slightly laxative, and should be eaten only when very ripe and large. The black, ripe, sweet plums moisten and relax the stomach and loosen the bowels. He, and many others, condemned green plums both as food and medicine as they are unpalatable and indigestible. Al-Isrāilī concluded that the best plums were those that are fleshy with thin skins, slightly bitter, and gently astringent. They should be eaten about an hour before meals, on an empty stomach.

plums in an Arabic translation of Dioscorides’ Materia medica (Bologna, Biblioteca Universitaria)
plums in Ibn Faḍl Allāh al-Umari’s (d. 1349) Masalik-al-absar fi mamalik-al-amsar (مسالك الأبصار في ممالك الأمصار). (University of Pennsylvania, Lawrence J. Schoenberg Collection)

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Spotlight on: Broad beans

The broad (or fava) bean (Vicia faba) has been called the most important legume in human history and for millennia was the most important bean staple in Europe, Western Asia and northern Africa, until it was supplanted by the haricot bean, an import from the Americas.

In ancient Egypt, so the historian Herodotus tells us, beans were avoided by Egyptian priests. In ancient Greece, they were eaten raw, boiled and roasted, and often accompanied drinks, very much like our present-day tapas. The Greek philosopher Pythagoras forbade them for his disciples allegedly because the beans were generated by the same putrefactive material that generates human beings, or because he thought that the souls of the dead dwell in them.

In Arabic, broad beans are known as bāqillā (باقلى), fūl (فول) and, more uncommonly, jirjir (جرجر), from the Persian girgir (گرگر). They do not appear very often in the medieval culinary literature as this reflects an elite cuisine, and broad beans were primarily part of the common people’s diet. When they are mentioned, it is in stews (known as fūliyya/فولية), boiled in broths, gruels and porridges, or in tabahija (طباهجة) recipes, a dish made with fried slices of meat. The highest number of broad bean recipes is found in 13th-century cookery books from al-Andalus, which contain the oldest recipe for baysār (بيسار), a porridge made with dried ground broad beans, as well as meat. This is the ancestor of the modern Moroccan and Egyptian favourite, biṣāra (بصارة), which is usually known as bissara or bessara in English. According to the tenth-century traveller al-Muqaddasī, the dish was already an Egyptian speciality, though he also encountered it in Greater Syria. It is very likely it originated in Egypt since the name can be traced back to the Coptic pesouro. In Morocco, it is made with garlic, olive oil and spices, and is often eaten for breakfast.

Scholars usually identified two varieties: Egyptian, and Nabataean (Nabaṭī). Ibn Sīnā also referred to an Indian variety and only applied jirjir to the Nabataean one. Medically, broad beans were considered slow to digest and highly flatulent (according to some, no other grain equals them in this regard), though this could be counteracted with lengthy cooking or roasting. The Nabataean variety was thought to be particularly constipating, as were the husks, and for this reason unpeeled broad beans cooked in vinegar were prescribed against diarrhoea and vomiting. Other negative effects include nightmares and headaches. On the plus side, broad beans were said to be useful against ulcers (if cooked with vinegar and water,), freckles and coughs (when and cooked with almond oil and sugar and drunk lukewarm).

Broad-bean flour was also used to make bread, which, however, was also frowned upon due to its flatulent properties; one should eat it with a lot of salt and accompanied by a murrī dip, and avoid drinking cold water after it.

broad beans in al-Ghafiqi’s herbal (12th century), where they are described as “fābish al-yūnānī (‘Greek fava’), which is bāqillā”.

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Syrian Lamb Pilaf

This is a variant of a dish known as fāʾiziyya (فائزية) from 13th-century Aleppo, which requires boiling and cooking lamb. While the meat is on the hob, pound and strain sour cherries (an alternative to medlar or cornelian cherry) with mint. The resultant juice is added to rice as it is being cooked in the meat broth, and then sweetened with honey or sugar to taste. The rice is further cooked with some sheep’s tail fat (ألية, alya) until the mixture thickens. The lamb is served on a bed of the rice and cherries.

The Arabic culinary term for pilaf was aruzz mufalfal (أرز مفلفل), literally meaning ‘peppered rice’, in reference to the appearance of the grains of rice as separate grains. Pilafs are particularly associated with Mamluk cuisine, from both Syria and Egypt.

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Medieval Syrian poppy-seed drip pudding

Another variation, from 13th-century Aleppo, on my favourite medieval dish, the jūdhāb (جوذاب; also jūdhāba/جوذابة ), which was Persian in origin but was already popular in Abbasid times and travelled all over the medieval Muslim world, as attested by the number of recipes in cookery books from Egypt, al-Andalus and Syria. It came in many guises but usually involved a chicken being roasted over a pudding made with layered bread, fruit, nuts, and sugar.

This particular recipe is quite unusual in that it is made with poppy seeds (خشخاش, khashkhāsh), which are mixed into a sugar syrup, alongside pistachios and saffron — one can add some honey as well (I didn’t , since one pound of sugar was quite sweet enough for me).

When the mixture has thickened, it is placed in between thin flatbreads – ruqāq (رقاق) – which are placed in the oven underneath a roasting plump chicken (also coloured with saffron), whose juices suffuse the pudding. The recipe calls for a tannūr (clay oven), but it is just as easy – and delicious in outcome – to use a conventional kitchen oven.

The contrast in both texture and flavours of the pudding with the chicken really ties things together.

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Sparrow’s Head Broad Beans

This 13th-century Andalusi recipe from The Exile’s Cookbook is a rather unusually named preparation of fresh broad beans; after topping and tailing the beans, they are fried in olive oil, and served with the very distinct Andalusi spice combination of pepper, cinnamon and salt. The name of the dish — ‘the sparrow’s head’ (رأس برطال, ra’s bartal) — is somewhat mysterious. It could refer to the shape of the beans, or perhaps it is linked to the high-pitched sound they make when they’re being fried? This recipe can, according to the author, also be made with sprouted broad beans.

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Andalusian Beef tharida

Though originally hailing from the Muslim East — though the oldest recipes in fact go back to ancient Mesopotamia, the tharīda (ثريدة; also tharīd/ثريد) was extremely popular in the Muslim West, and it is in Andalusian cookery books that we find most recipes for this bread soup.

This recreation from ‘The Exile’s Cookbook’ calls for beef, gourd (use bottle gourd if you can), onion and aubergine, with seasonings including salt, pepper, ginger, coriander, saffron, cumin, garlic, citron leaves, fennel., and (unpeeled) garlic. The gourd and aubergine are cooked separately before being added to the pot with the meat and the spices. Once everything is done, some vinegar is added and then the stew is poured on crumbled bread.

Before serving, add a sprinkling of ginger and cinnamon. The recipe ends with a highly original instruction; one should blow in the bones and strike them repeatedly to expel all of the marrow, which should be spread all over the dish. The perfect comfort food!

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Spotlight on: Chickpeas

Chickpeas (Cicer arietinum) are one of the oldest cultivated pulses of the Near East with the earliest evidence going back to Palestine 8000 BCE. They were cultivated in Egypt at least since Pharaonic times and the flour was used to make bread.

In ancient Greece, chickpeas were served (green, roasted, dried or boiled) as a snack eaten with alcohol. Chickpea soup was a popular street food for the Romans.

In the medieval Arabic culinary tradition, chickpeas (himmaṣ, himmiṣ with hummus being the usual dialectal form) a number of savoury dishes (stews, omelettes), condiments and pickles. In Mamluk recipe collections we already fine modern-day favourites like qaḍāma (roasted and salted chickpeas) and what is possibly the most famous dip – hummus. The historical ancestor of the latter can be found in a number of mashed chickpea recipes – most of them from Egypt, but a few more from 13th-century Aleppo. cookery book, was known as mashed chickpeas) and though the ingredients are a bit different, there are enough similarities (including the use of tahini) to establish a clear ancestral link.

All of the recipes start with boiled chickpeas mashed into a paste (sometimes sieved for smoothness), with textures ranging from soft and spreadable to firmer paste-like consistency. In terms of fat source, olive oil predominates, but some recipes use rendered sheep-tail fat or nut oils (walnut, linseed). Most variations contain nuts — usually walnuts, sometimes added with almonds, pistachios and hazelnuts (which are used as garnish as well). Common herbs used in the recipe are rue, mint, parsley and thyme, with leeks and celery being added in a couple of recipes. The spices generally include caraway, coriander, and cassia/cinnamon, while the more expensive galangal and saffron occur in only one recipe each. Vinegar is used in all of them, sometimes balanced with lemon juice or salt-preserved lemon. The fermented condiment murrī is also frequently used.

The pharmacological literature distinguishes between white, red and black chickpea varieties, all of which were said to cause bloating and difficult to digest, but highly nutritious. Roasted chickpeas were thought to be less bloating than fresh chickpeas, while drinking water immediately after eating them increases their bloating effect. The water in which chickpeas are cooked with cumin, cinnamon, and dill is beneficial for phlegmatic illnesses, bloating, and back pain. Chickpea flour was reportedly useful against testicular tumours, scabies and freckles, and a soup of the flour and milk was said to be beneficial for people with dry lungs and weak voices. Chickpeas, especially the black variety, were widely known as a diuretic, emmenagogue and powerful aphrodisiac, often linked to the bloating effect which also manifests itself in the veins; this stimulates desire and increases semen. For this reason, black chickpeas were fed to breeding male animals (especially horses and camels). Interestingly enough, the same variety, when taken by a pregnant woman, could cause miscarriage.

The aphrodisiac effect is allegedly strongest when chickpeas are soaked in water and eaten raw on an empty stomach. Scholars held that chickpeas were particularly effective in increasing sexual potency because they combined three basic qualities: creating coarse winds, high in nutritional value, and moderate in heat. If one does not wish to engage in sexual activity after eating chickpeas, so al-Samarqandī (12th century) tells us, one should eat them with thyme, salt, and pennyroyal

Chickpeas in an Arabic-annotated manuscript of Dioscorides’ Materia medica

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Mamluk date pudding

The origins of this recipe for a jamāliyya (جمالية) from The Sultan’s Feast go back to pre-Islamic times and it is related to a sweet pudding, known as hays (حيس) made by Bedouins with dried curds, clarified butter and dates.

In the Mamluk version (14th-15th c.), the dates are cooked down to a paste in butter, after which breadcrumbs are added. It is served with a sprinkling of castor sugar and pistachios. The consistency is reminiscent of a sticky toffee pudding, and the taste is just as addictive!

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Medieval Syrian sour cherry chicken

This is a recreation of a simple, yet delicious, 13th-century dish from Aleppo, made with sour cherries, known in Arabic as qarāsiyā (قراصيا, قراسيا), a borrowing from the Greek kerasia (κεράσια), though the word could also refer to the cornelian cherry (Cornus mas). They were reported to grow in Syria and Egypt, and so it is no surprise that dishes requiring them are found in cookery books from those regions.

In this recipe, the chicken is not stewed as in the case of the very popular fruit stews (made with, for instance, quince, sour oranges or apples). Instead, it is fried in sesame oil before being added to the boiled cherries that have been thickened with sugar.

The use of some fresh mint adds a cooling lift, enhancing the aromatic complexity and bringing a refreshing final note. The sweet-and-sourness of the dish is typical of Aleppine cuisine, with the rich meatiness of fried chicken balanced by a tangy cherry glaze and enlivened by mint.

The sourness of the cherries is not too harsh, and the addition of sugar turns them into a syrup redolent of sour plum sauces like the Italian agrodolce or the Persian āloo sos (سس ألو). Today, qarāsiyā refers to a kind of plum in some dialects (e.g. Syria), while in Standard Arabic, the word for cherries is now karaz (كرز).

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Spotlight on: Poppy

The opium poppy (Papaver somniferum) is a member of the plant genus Papaver and is native to the western Mediterranean, spanning Spain, Italy, and North Africa. It was cultivated in prehistoric Europe and spread widely through Eurasia. Although best known today for its opiate derivatives, poppy leaves, the seeds and their oil are non-narcotic and have long been incorporated into both medicine and food. The common poppy, Papaver rhoeas was also grown for oil.

Classical and medieval sources distinguished between several types: the white, cultivated poppy, which was preferred for culinary use due to its low narcotic properties; and black –often wild variety.

The poppy was already used in cooking by the Romans and Greeks, and the seeds were commonly poppy seeds sprinkled on bread before baking. Their status as a luxury ingredient is evidenced by their use is in a dish of dormice rolled in honey and poppy seeds, which was on the menu at the famous ‘Trimalchio’s Dinner’ (Cena Trimalchionis) in Petronius’ picaresque novel Satyricon (1st century CE), which describes the extravagant cuisine of the upper classes in Rome. Galen describes their use alongside sesame seeds, praising the whiter seeds for their taste and soporific effects, although he notes they are nutritionally negligible and difficult to digest.

In Arabic, the term for poppy is khashkhāsh (خشخاش) and in medieval Arabic cuisine, the seeds (both ground and whole) — especially the white variety— were widely used, especially in Mamluk (Egyptian) cookery books (some thirty recipes). Poppy seeds are called for in a variety of recipes, for instance in sweets (puddings, candy, biscuits, and halva), meat stews (e.g. with dates, raisins), judhabas (drip puddings), pickles, and beverages. In one gourd-based sweetmeat, the author explicitly recommends adding as many poppy seeds as possible to cause sleep, revealing both culinary and pharmacological intent. Sometimes the seeds could be toasted and used as garnish.

In the medicinal literature, where the black poppy was preferred, the seeds were used in a variety of recipes, as in the famous formulary by Sabur Ibn Sahl (9th c.), for robs (ربّ, rubb; syrups), lohochs (لعوق, la’ūq; lick medicines), pastilles (قرص, qurs), powders (سفوف, safūf), poultices (ضماد, ḍimād), and decoctions (مطبوخ, matbūkh). The conditions are very varied, ranging from coughing and pains in the kidney and bladder to hepatic fever), and even consumption. Maimonides considered poppy seeds non-harmful when used in moderation, and cautioned against head heaviness and excessive consumption, which induces drowsiness. Physicians held that poppies provide little nourishment, and cause constipation. However, when taken with honey, it had aphrodisiac properties since it was thought to increase semen. This also explains why poppy seeds often co-occur with honey in recipes.

The poppy in the Vienna Dioscorides codex