Adam Balic

A mixture of eggplant types, including the odd scented yellow type. The red chiles are about six inches long (for scale).

I think that if you look at some of the Jewish cooking traditions/ingredients in Europe you can see that it can lead to quite big difference in cuisine (and these differences have been taken on by non-Jews). But the difference between variation on a theme and divergence is proberly a matter of degrees and while change from example to example.

Andrew - I am not sure to the answers to that latter (my guess would be yes, as non-Islamic neighbours like pig very much, it is even a status animal in some cases). But, if you think about it one use for pigs is a source of cooking fat. The use of pig fat v coconut milk v X fat for cooking has to effect the cooking techniques and therefore the end product. So in this case would not the dietry restriction lead to the difference in cooking styles and methods?

There are Islamic cultural/religious dietry restrictions and it is possible to contrast and compare in this case. Trival things like the difference between styles of satay in Malaysia and Singapore (i.e. non-pork v pork), but also in Eastern Asia where the pig is a common food item, Islam has brought across its restrictions on eating this animal (dislike of pig meat seems to be common in the middle eastern region and would seem to pre-date Islam and most many other extant religions). I assume that there will be similar ethnic groups that have radically different cuisines in the South East Asian region due to differences in dietry restrictions. I assume that the Jewish populations in China and India also showed marked differences in their cuisine compared to their non-jewish neighbours?

It is interesting isn't it. I wish I had more time to learn about everything, but one thing I would like to crack is what constitutes the definition of various cuisines. Everybody knows what "French" or "Thai" food is but both of these places are made up of numerous different regional/ethnic groups and their distictive foods. Maybe these broad definitions are invalid and only come about due to the actions of outsiders like me.

Good point, but I think that it is possible to take about the influence of pan-Islamic culture on world cuisine without forgeting the specific regional/ethnic foods of the indvidual countries involved. For instance Persia pre-dates Islam. Early Islam took on many aspects of the incoporated Persian empire, including food culture. Through this manner many (but not all) Persian food/cooking techniques were spread much wider afield. The Malay word "laksa" comes from "lakhsha", the Persian word for "noodle" (I think that the root meaning is actually "Slice". In a similar manner the Mughals Timurids-Mongolian dynasty of Turkish tribal origin introduced aspects of Persian culture into India. In some respects you have to talk about both specific Islamic countries and broader definitions as 'Islamic culture' encompasses so many different races and cultures that don't neatly fit into the catagorie of 'country'.

No you are right*, I am arguing from a position of ignorance. Just because the stuff about the Portuguese is correct, it doesn't follow that the stuff about the Muslim traders is without evidence. I will try to see if there is an information around though, becasue I think it is quite interesting. *Eek, I think this is a moment of 'personal growth'. Feels funny.

Pan - I think that the usual story for chiles being introduced in Asian* is: From central America and the West Indies to Europe via the Spanish. From Europe to India and some other parts of Asia via the Portuguese. Wider distribution occured via local traders and their well established trade routes. I would imagine that in regions that had a strong Islamic presence, either as a local population or due to trade that the chiles would have been introduced to consumers along with other 'trade spices' which are regulaly associated with Muslim/Islamic traders. Makes a nice story anyway:wink: . * This often causes problems. I think that due to my Australian origin my default for "Asian" is actually "South-East Asian". Sorry about any confusion.

Sam - is this not what I said? Maybe I didn't express it clearly. Lactose intolerance is well documented and understood (although people still insist on refering to it as an allergy), part of the issue with false positives is that while many people are genetically predisposed to lactose intolerance, it can also be an acute thing in people that normally wouldn't be. The lactase enzyme is on the surface of the small intestinal epithelial, if you have an upset tummy this enzymes get stripped off and it can take several weeks to get back to normal levels. During this period people will be lactose intolerant and it is not surprising that they consider this to be a permanent condition, even if normal levels of lactase enzyme returns. The MSG thing isn't understood at all. Harold McGee says that molluscs (excepting cephalopods) use high concentrations of amino acids such as glutamate and glycine to allow them to survive in seawater. I can and will eat a bucket of clams with not ill effects, logically there is no issue with glutamate. Very occasionally I get a tight face etc from a bowl of Pho, I often quote the Steingarten referenced study on "MSG syndrome", which is one of the few decent trials which shows now real effect at all. None. So what is happening here then? The only thing I can think is that it is a seperate phenomena entirely. If could just be something simple like histamine reaction to an allergen or potentially it is multi-factorial. I think that there is likely to be a psychosomatic element in many cases reported (for similar reasons to the lactose study) and I have seen peopleuse it as an excuse for parochial/racists comments, but I'm not convinced that these isn't some real effect in many cases as well. What I don't think think is that it is due to glutamate and Chinese restuarants specifically.

From the very little I know it would seem that Islam had an enourmous influence on world cuisine, possibly the largest infact. Pre-Islam cuisines have been communicated about the world by Islam. A clue to this would be the such things as Persian root words for food items connected food, from Siberia to Southern Asian to Europe. Islamic cultures in Spain and Sicily were instrumental for the introduction of both food stuffs and cooking techniques. Some of the early Italian cook books were infact translations of Islamic texts and in some cases kept there original names. Aside from these larger themes there is smaller stuff which is interesting, New World chiles were introduced into Eastern Europe (the bits under Turkish influence) via Islamic sources, not from Western Europe. I haven't seen any documentation of this but I would imagine that the introduction of chiles in Asian occured via Islamic traders. Two excellent books which look at these themes are Clifford A. Wrights "A Mediterranean Feast" and "Medieval Arab Cookery" by Maxine Rodinson and Charles Perry.

I like the usual European eggplant a great deal, I also use the variants (small and round, small and oblong, long and skinny types) of this type that are avalible in Middle Eastern food stores. On of the more interesting eggplant dishes I have had was a tapas dish in Cordoba. Slices of eggplant where battered and fried, them served with a honey sauce, very nice. This weekend I cooked some Thai dishes and I went a little eggplant crazy. Along with the large purple type I had a pea eggplants, apple eggplants and a type I have never seen before. Similar in size and shape to an apple eggplant, but a bright yellow/orange colour and most interestingly very heavily perfumed (sort of citrus/floral). I though these may be a colour variant on the apple eggplants, but they tasted very different. They were much more bitter then apple eggplants too, any suggestion on what these are and how to cook them would be appreciated.

I have certainly experienced the symptoms associated with "MSG Syndrone" (not MSG Allergy BTW, "Allergy" is a specific term) after eating some foods, as a Pho in one paticular restuarant, but I don't experience it after eating glutamate high foods such as hard cheese, soy sauce, tomato and shellfish or MSG enhanced snacks. Not sure what the deal is here. I assume that something is going on, but it may not be directly realted to pure MSG. As for "The is no such thing as a reaction to MSG, otherwise most of China will be walking about with migranes", well the next time an Asian person says they are lactose intolerant, it would then be logical to say "No, that doesn't exist or it is in all your head, otherwise most Northern Europeans would be walking about with squirty bottoms". I don't think so.

They do make amazing honey though. Similar to Tasmanian Leatherwood (not related), both are excellent in crepes with some fresh ricotta.

I am cooking a South East Asian-ish meal this weekend, while buying various bits an pieces I accidently bought a kilo of panko. What shall I do with this bounty of impulse buying? Obviously I thought of "shrimp" (actually I though "Prawns") but at that point the little light globe went out.

Parsnip is pretty sweet without added sugar, however. There are a bunch of sweet roots, and the most common ones plus some less common ones have already been mentioned here: Sweet potato, carrot, parsnip, beet, angelica (with which I was unfamiliar), ginger, etc. ← True, but at the time of this recipe sugar from Barbados made it's way into everything, however, the distinction between a sweet and savoury wasn't so absolute as in modern European cooking. Some of the dishes mentioned here, like the sweet spinich pie (also made with swiss chard in S. France) are random survivors of this period.

The definition of fruit as edible is a little strange, but I guess that most fruits are edible, maybe just not to humans. Some gourds are edible, infact the bottle gourd (Lagenaria siceraria) is consumed by some cultures and the a member of the same species ("Italian Squash" in the USA I think) is a relatively common vegetable. Some where I have a recipe for parsnip pie, which is sweetened, so we would most likely consider it a fruit/sweet, but at the time of the recipe this wasn't really true. Infact there are lots of these types of recipes.

Veg as a "sweet" is relatively common, but Veg as "fruit" doesn't quite work. The OED has this to say on "fruit": "The edible product of a plant or tree, consisting of the seed and its envelope, esp. the latter when it is of a juicy pulpy nature, as in the apple, orange, plum, etc. tree of fruit = fruit-tree. As denoting an article of food, the word is popularly extended to include certain vegetable products that resemble ‘fruits’ in their qualities, e.g. the stalks of rhubarb." So if you can get it from a plant and eat it is most likely a fruit. But, in the non-fruiting body fruit categorie, even potatoes (non the sweet type) are used as a dessert item, all a matter of adding enough sugar.

I didn't have an issue with the location, but possibly in Edinburgh this will be an issue, after all the appearance of the city is one of its major selling points? Certainly crap food in a good location, seems to sell better then better food in a worse location in Edinburgh. I went only once, about a month after it had opened. I though that the food was fine, but the service needed a lot of work. Our half full glasses of white wine kept being taken away (they looked empty in the lighting) and large amounts of 'extras' (potatoes, salads etc) kept appearing on the table without us asking for them.

Moby - I used a traditional Italian method, when to the butchers (Gaioli in Chianti in this instance) and handed over money. Then smuggled it back into the UK. The problem with is was is that pork and 'fatty' pork is a little of a no-no in my group of friends. That combined with the toes freaked them out. I had foolish though that as they eat legs of lamb with no problem, this wouldn't be and issue. Imagine the scene, everybody having fun, much laughter, I put down the majolica platter heaped with streaming lentils and surmounted with a stuffed pigs trotter. Dead silence (except for small gasps and maybe some muffled crying). Even when I sliced off the toes, there were very few takers and much polite pushing it about the plate. For some reason people confused the gelatinous skin with pure lard, no amount of discussion could alter this and at one point a guest actually took food of my plate to bin (for health reasons). Much yelling on my part (I had also cooked a leg of wild boar, so dinner wasn't a complete fuck up, but is was a terrible night). I am cooking for fish eating vegatarians next week, I was going to do Singapore Fishhead curry, thankfully this post has reminded me that I am an idiot and not to even think of doing this.

I haven't really had any bad meals, bad food yes, but in these instances it has been cooked by people that have put a lot of effort into the process, but don't know how to cook. In fact if I was to think about it what I would say were the worse meals were the ones where people have bought some very expensive pre-prepared meals and served that. Thanks for the effort. Effort is important to me and I think that if I ever found out the people had pre-eaten before a meal I had possible spent several days on, I don't think that they would ever get a second invitation. Having said that I know that I have served several friends their worst meal ever. For New Years Eve last year I made Zampone con Lenticchie. People freaked, it wasn't pleasant. Also the worst meal of my life.

Not sure that they will taste all that interesting, they seem to have been a status dish in the UK until they were hunted a little too much. I would cover the breast and legs in slices of back fat (or fatty bacon) then plain roast for as short a time as possible. That way you will actually get to taste the bird, which would be the point of eating an odd beasty no? If you plan on sharing I would inform your guests ahead of time as there is a good chance they will freak if just served without warning. White Storks are rare in Europe and consequently symbols of beauty etc etc. While in Morocco I saw plenty and they were basically acting like very large feathered rats. All perspective I guess.

It occurs to me having seen the carrot air that the IB could be used to make syllabubs, would be interesting to bring these desserts up to date.

From the description it is unlikely to be a quince.

Sometimes. Previous discussion on the very topic

Some more information on Medlars. There are several different types, some with more rounded fruit, some with flatter fruit. They taste similar. They also make a very attractive specimen fruit tree, growth similar to a quince (which is is related to, as well as apple/pears etc), with very attractive flowers. Japanese Medlars/Loquats are quite common in Australia as well, completely different thing.