Adam Balic

Is this a traditional thing (eg. Some ex-house of Savoie "French" towns like Nice spoke Italian before the formation of the Italian republic) or more modern?

"First catch your Berber".

She already has made a contribution to this thread.

Seven is a mystic number for a lot of cultures. In the one of the Islamic traditions, there are seven levels to Heaven (and also to Hell, if you are Dante). An the world was created in seven days.

I know some French-Algerians that make Tabouli with cous cous. Is this traditional thing or a cheat?

I did wonder about that, but it is cooked and then dried again isn't it?

There are numerous different types of pancetta. I would sustitute petit sale (love this stuff) , but if the American recipe means a smoked pancetta, a lighlty smoked Alsacian bacon would be better.

Interesting. I sounds like a 'learning song' which are common to many cultures. Basically, in a largely illerate society it is a oral-tradition way of transmitting important information. There is often a bit about "If you don't cook me, I will give you tummy trouble" eg. I seeds with heat labile toxins need to be cooked before eating.

Any travel results in risk due to being exposed to a different bacterial 'flora'. Such a shame though as I would have loved to have tasted more of the street food. There was a baked sheeps head in the Marrakesh central market that I especially wanted. In the end I only just recovered enough to have one restaurant meal, in Casablanca of all places in Morocco and it was a French-Moroccan meal. A pancake of overlaping potato slices filled with duck confit (made with some Ras el Hanout) was particularly good, if not the street food I was after. We had a thread on the Cornell theory at one point, I had a few issues with it, although overall it sounded good. Many spices have very low levels of anti-bacterial action, the amount that you would need to use would be very high and some of the active componants are heat labile, so not cooking. Za'atar seems to be very effective though. I wonder if that is why they put it into the Smen?

These are all Old World pulses, I wonder if that is a clue? People can be very funny about their beans. Berbers have stomachs of iron. I have sen them cook bread by placing a very loose dough mix directly onto coals/ash. The charcoal content would be very high, I imagine they would be able to digest some quite toxic plants after a meal of this bread.

I use a Tuscan method for cooking beans. Minimal water, with covering of olive oil. It workedd very well, as the means soak up all the water, remain intact and are almost bean 'confit' due to the final slow cooking in the olive oil. No I know why it works so well. Strange that I have seen so few beans used in Moroccan recipes. Chickpeas, yes, Broad beans and possibly black eyed beans/peas. Maybe chickpeas are too popular.

I am slightly ashamed to admit that I didn't. I had this brilliant idea that I would like to try the street food. I ate something that was very delicious (a large liver sausage with some bread), but it made my tummy a little upset. In the two weeks I was there I mostly ate imodium and drank 'Hawai', one of the few soft drinks that has a fat content I did make a heroic effort to taste as many things as possible and I looked at as many food stalls as possible, but it wasn't the food orientated trip I was thinking it would be.

Then for cooking in a conventional western kitchen, on top of the stove may be better then in the oven? Blast, my tuscan bean pot is shaped like a fat pear. No shoulders, so my plans are undone. An excellent excuse to buy one of those lovely yellow glazed olive oil amphora from the South of France though!

I do not actually! And I do know that having coals on top of vessels was something done in other parts of India as well. Areas with minimal Persian/Arab influence. From this site it would seem that Dum Pukht dishes are relatively recent: Dum Pukht Tandoor is almost certianly related to the Arabic 'Tannur'. Dum Pukht maybe not. While many of these dishes, cooking techniques and cooking vessels are directly related to one another, in many cases I think that 'convergent evolution' plays a part.

I would say that Fez was the highlight of my trip to Morocco.

While travelling through Morocco I collected Ras el Hanout in every medina that we went though. All different. I prefer the one from Fez, no idea if there are regional styles of Ras el Hanout, as well as different shop styles. Majoun are easy to make and are a more interesting 'pick me up' then the Italian equivalent.

Sounds fantastic. And I want to learn more about this. .But you are right! Tangia is a pot that is used by men to cook food for men: soldiers, sheepherders, etc. The top is covered with oiled parchment and tied down with string. the whole pot is pressed into the hot ashes (usually acorns). I was wrong to suggest gastra in the grouping in my earlier posting. I should have mentioned the French dofeu which uses ice cubes to keep the moisture circulating. Thank you very much for your time and information

So much for amateur scholars then! And here I was developing a pet theory that Tangia were only cooked by men as it was a 'student' meal, and Tangia was derived from Tannar for similar reasons. Oh well. I assume the tangia isn't completely smothered in coals though, otherwise they would drop into the stew? When you cook "under the bell", the coals (in my family at least) are heaped around the sides of the vessel. My Croatian grandmother came from a very poor background. Photographs of the house she was brought up in (now a stable) show a central fire and a simple smoke hole in the roof. A cauldron on a chain was placed over the fire. If it was inverted it became a primative oven. Thank you very much for your time and information.

One of Edinburghs main Game Dealers sells Grouse for about 6 quid for a young roasting bird and slightly less for an old bird. From 6 to 28 quid sounds like a large price increase, is this typical?

I walked into a local store and noticed several different types of beetroot: Normal, white and golden. I bought three of each, now I am wondering what to do with them suggestions?

I have come upon a supply of Citron/Cedro. I would like to preserved these, will this work? They are about 20-25 cm long and 10-15 cm wide. The rind is up to an 3 cm thick. As they have very little juice I was going to use lemon juice to top up. While I am at it, could I use bitter/Seville oranges in this manner? I have been freezing them to use in some Arabic cooking, but my wife is complaining about loosing toes to small oragnge cannonballs shooting out of the freezer.

Well depending on the exact species and the exact time and location, yes or no. It depends. Mussels one the other hand are much more restricted species-wise commercially and they are rubbish when they are not full of sperm or eggs. In this case you can be more sure.

Depends on the oyster species also. Some are summer spawners, some are winter spawners.

I found this link which has a picture of a tangia and a recipe. tangia Another site which sells the pots indicates that it is a dish popular with Students in Morocco and that they take there Tangia to a public oven to cook the dish. Tangia = oven theory still alive, even strengthed due to the student link.

Yes, I thought that it was a variation on "Tagine", but after seeing the older arabic translation I questioned this. Tagine is derived from a the Greek word for 'dish' (which I can't remember) at the moment. The discription of the Tangia indicates a tall sided pot would be used (like a 'daubiere' I would guess), so quite a different cooking vessel.