I was wandering through the Seminary Coop Bookstore some time ago and saw something that I often have spied on the shelf near the information desk: a beautiful book about food. This time, it was Scents and Flavors: A Syrian Cookbook. The book cover is an incredibly beautiful dark dark blue with much of the typography in a lighter more turquoise blue. And, th typography is both roman alphabet (is that what we call the alphabet used in American English?) and beautiful (and incomprehensible to me) arabic. I have no idea if the latter is arabic for sure but assume so based on remarks in the introduction. In any case, this is a particularly beautiful book qua object. Here is a visual of the book for all to see:
Yes,beautiful -- and equally beautiful inside the covers. Published by New York University Press, in their Library of Arabic Literature collection, edited and translated by Charles Perry and Reviewed by David Waines, the book includes both an opening section of historical and contextualizing information (including commentary on the processes used to transliterate Arabic terms following various accepted protocols) and page upon page of recipes. In the latter regard, the left page has the original and the right side english translations.
On the historical and contextualizing introduction, a few comments. The book is mid-13th century Syrian in origins and written in middle Arabic. The introductory discussion opens with a very short precise of the history of cookbooks, noting the importance of Arabic examples to that history, including the book presented here, which was an early (medieval) version with 635-700 recipes (depending on the manuscript version form which one translates). The cuisine is notable for a variety of reasons, including (memorably for me) an explanation for why the "cookbook" focuses on scents as well as flavors. (Turns out there is a whole protocol involving scented washing prior to dining, and the religious washing protocols are thee in part to ensure that one's own scents do not interfere with one's enjoyment of the meal and its scents and flavors. The book is presented in the rough order of a banquet of the era, with its pages long table of contents moving from perfume to beverages to tail fat to chicken dishes and then sautes and related dishes (much of this long chapter devoted to lamb), to sweets and baked goods, to pickles of various sorts and then to hand washing powders and soaps and "distilling waters and perfuming the breath." In describing the characteristics of the cuisine, the author reminds us that in "those days" and in that culture or set of cultures, folks ate with their hands, meats were not terrible well preserved, and more than we might imagine was made from processes of fermentation. He also comments on various ingredients with which his reader might not be familiar -- and also absences given the region for which the cookbook was intended (most clearly the absence of fresh fish). The final section of the introduction focuses not the history of the book -- including the various editions (with varied lists of recipes and interpolations of various sorts), the unknown author, and conventions used in recipe books of the era. After the introduction, there are notes on the translation and related matters.
I should note: I found this all fascinating.
On the recipes: At some point in history (and yes, I once knew it, but have forgotten) the format people in the US assume for recipes was created -- a list of ingredients and directions for how to cook, laid out in step by step precision. This was long after this cookbook was created -- and so the many many recipes here are neither presented in that format nor, I have to admit, entirely clear to me. Neither the length of cooking nor the heat to be used nor quantities are always specified. The recipes kind of read like "get some meat, boil, add parsley and mixed spices, continue to cook til done." (YEs, I made that one up and, hence, it is a little shorter than some. Add a few completely unknown=to=me ingredients and voila!).
Having said this, I find this book really interesting to read slowly, paging here and there, trying to figure things out. I imagine dishes that . . . I cannot imagine.
In some ways this is a totally frivolous and useless luxury purchase for me with no utilitarian value. And yet, I am increasingly fond of the book. Yes, I bought it for its beauty. I admit I also bought it as a tiny nod in the direction of the horrifying politics surrounding Syria and, in particular, Aleppo. It is not enough, not even faintly enough. but learning a bit is always one way I try to resist the political nightmares of our time.
You can always borrow my copy. But do return it!
For some other views of the book, try here for pre-publication comments and for the cook in you, click here. Most crucially, if you, like me, want to figure out how today's foodies can help us make sense of this amazing book, try this site where Food and Wine "looks inside the best selling cookbook of 13th century Syria."
