A Baghdad Cookery Book

by Muhammad b.al-Husan

For centuries, it had been the favourite Arabic cookery book of the Turks. The original manuscript, formerly held in the library of the Aya Sofya Mosque, is still in Istanbul; it is now MS Ayasofya 3710 in the Süleymaniye Library. At some point a Turkish sultan commissioned very a handsome copy, now MS Oriental 5099 in the British Library in London. At a still later time, a total of about 260 recipes were added to Kitâb al Tabîkh's original 160 and the expanded edition was retitled Kitâb Wasf al-Atima al-Mutada (my translation of it also appears in Medieval Arab Cookery); three currently known copies of K.Wasf survive, all in Turkey – two of them in the library of the Topkapi Palace, showing the Turks’ high regard for this book. Finally, in the late fifteenth century Sirvâni made a Turkish translation of Kitâb al Tabîkh, to which he added some recipes current in his own day, the first Turkish cookery book.

Genres: Food, Cookbooks, History, Cooking

127 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2005

Reviews

[Matt Kelland · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is not a recipe book, in the modern sense. It doesn't give you precise quantities or detailed cooking instructions for each dish. If that's what you're looking for, look elsewhere. This assumes you have some knowledge of basic cooking techniques, and that you're a good enough cook to work out what you need to do. These medieval recipes just give you the bare outline of how each dish is created, effectively explaining what makes each one different. They'll need extensive adaptation for a modern kitchen, but if you're interested in finding out about the flavor combinations and techniques used by the cooks of Persia, this is a fascinating read.
For me, one of the best bits was finding out how to clean the cookware in the days before detergent and dishwashers; first you scrubbed the pots with ash, then you polished them with a mixture of rosewater and crushed cinnamon, so that over time everything became suffused with an aroma and flavor of l and spices. I can't help wondering how much difference that made to the food.

[Eric · Rating 2 out of 5]

When faced with the choice between literal translation and some concession to clarity in the target language, err on the side of the latter. Only for diehard scholars of food.