Review of North African Recipes on Food Network's Website

I probably should have started these reviews a long time ago. After looking at many of the recipes available online I can see how certain stereotypes about North African cuisine have developed and why I am sometimes asked what I consider to be odd "cultural anthropology" kind of questions.

I'm a bit surprised to find that quite a few recipes spice dishes much more aggressively than I do. Certainly variations in spicing and quantities occur between Algerian/North African cooks. So, I'm not using that as a gauge for "authenticity" or "good taste". Taste is subjective and changes like fashion. I tend to prefer my dishes to be more subtly spiced or just "perfumed" with spices.

Chicken Tagine with Olives and Preserved Lemons recipe courtesy Boujemaa Mars, La Mamounia, Marrakech.

Ingredients:

Rock salt
1 whole large chicken, cut into 8 pieces
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
5 tablespoons olive oil
1 large bunch fresh cilantro, chopped
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon real saffron
Pinch fine salt
1/2 pound onions, chopped
5 cloves garlic, chopped
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon turmeric
1/4 pound gizzards, optional
1/4 pound chicken liver, optional
1/4 cup mixed olives, pitted
3 small preserved lemons

This is certainly a real North African recipe. But I think it's really more for people who are already familiar with North African cooking, not a recipe for the uninitiated.  The addition of liver and gizzards is quite nice, but for an inexperienced cook the look of the dish could turn out rather unappealing.

One way to make the dish more visually cleaner would be to saute the liver and gizzards separately in a dersa spice paste, sprinkle with chopped herbs and use it for a garnish around the chicken .

The chef's recipe includes 3 small preserved lemons, it could be that the chef meant a type of very small lemon we have in North Africa, they are about the size of limes which would be the equivalent of an average to large American supermarket lemon .

If he meant lemons that are small American supermarket size then I would add a note for a non-North African audience to a recipe like this, "This recipe is definitely for lovers of preserved lemon. In North Africa there are cooks who add several preserved lemons to tagines to cater to locals who really love the briny lemony flavor. But this can be inaccessibly salty for those who aren't accustomed to the flavor. Since North African cooks prepare dishes to suit their personal tastes, reduce the amount of preserved lemons to suit yours".

Tyler Florence's version of chicken with preserved lemons

I know, I know, I know it's Tyler Florence. Who would prepare his tagine recipe if they were interested in any kind of "authenticity" or about North African cooking techniques? I don't say that because he's not North African, I say that because Tyler Florence mostly does a kind of broad American fusion kind of cooking. And that's what this recipe is.

Ingredients:

1 cinnamon stick
1 teaspoon whole black peppercorns
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 teaspoon sweet or hot paprika
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1/4 teaspoon whole cloves
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for frying
4 cloves garlic, sliced
1 teaspoon chopped fresh ginger
1 handful fresh cilantro leaves, chopped
2 bay leaves
1 large pinch saffron
1 (3 1/2 to 4 pound) free-range chicken, cut into 10 pieces
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 medium onion, coarsely chopped
1 preserved lemon, recipe follows
1/2 cup cracked green olives
1 cup chicken stock

"In a skillet over medium heat, toast the cinnamon, peppercorns, cumin, paprika, red pepper flakes, and cloves until they start to smoke. Remove from the heat and grind in a spice grinder"

First of all he calls for toasting the spices. We don't do that in North African cooking. That's a South Asian technique that he borrowed and incorporated into this North African style dish. Toasting intensifies the aroma and flavor of spices. We're quite sensitive about the use of spices in North African cooking and this is too strong.

The closest we come to toasting spices in North African cooking is a dry or wet spice marinade for meats, the spices being "toasted" when they hit the heat source, a dersa spice paste sauteed until fragrant before the other ingredients are added to the pot, or sprinkling spices on top of sauteed aromatics such as garlic or onions before adding other ingredients to a tagine. Another thing we make are spice infused oils.

Tyler marinates the chicken in the toasted spices and then browns the marinaded chicken which toasts the spices yet again.

Chicken stock in a recipe that includes bone in chicken? Unnecessary. Bone in chicken makes it's own stock for the sauce during cooking. It's true that some contemporary North African recipes for soups call for a bouillon cube when there isn't that much meat or poultry in a dish. But this dish has enough flavor and it has enough other seasonings, actually I think it's quite assertive. I see lots of American and British tagine recipes calling for chicken stock and mostly I see it has an automatic addition, more habitual than necessary.

No comment about the instant method of cooking couscous he uses since I've already written about that extensively. The addition of dried fruit too so many couscous recipes that are supposed to accompany a tagine is something that I see as a recipe writing habit. It turned into a kind of derivative trend here and I'm not sure why. Maybe, I just figured it out- derivative trend. These kinds of recipes are developed (I use the word loosely) after researching existing recipes. I think there are about a dozen tagine recipes that get recycled again and again.

How do I think this recipe will taste? Besides the toasted spice part, which probably doesn't matter to someone who's not North African, I think it will taste fine, if too strong for my personal tastes. I wouldn't eat the instant couscous though.

Chicken Tagine with Tomato Chutney recipe courtesy Brahim Hadj-Moussa

The website makes it clear that this is chef's recipe, i.e. a restaurant preparation. According to this article Hadj-Moussa is the owner of Barbary Fig restaurant and he is from Algiers.

The North African-South Asian fusion makes sense considering historical connections through trade. I myself have prepared chicken and rice in the style of Oran with basmati rice because I know it's available in Oran and basmati rice is my favorite type of rice. However in that recipe I simply substituted basmati rice for parboiled rice in much the same way an Algerian femme de maison might. Urban Algerian women (in Algeria the realm of domestic cooking is very much female dominated which possibly accounts for my popularity with the sisters. A man who cooks!) like to experiment with new ingredients just like women allover the world.

Tomato Chutney:
5 cups water
4 cups chopped Roma tomatoes
1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons grated fresh ginger
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Salt

Basmati Rice:
2 tablespoons finely chopped onion
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 cup basmati rice
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon turmeric
1 1/2 cups chicken broth
Salt

Chicken Tagine:
1/3 cup chopped onion
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into strips
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 cups chicken broth
1 zucchini, cut into julienne strips
1 leek, cut into julienne strips
Salt and pepper
1 teaspoon black caraway seeds, for garnish

We do serve salsa tomatish as a table sauce as often as we served harissa, so the chutney makes sense in this context. I won't repeat my comments about chicken stock, here an Algerian home cook might add a bouillon cube since it is a meatless dish. Meat is expensive in Algeria, actually in lots of parts of the world where meat is expensive cooks utilize bouillon cubes and flavor extracts. It may not seem as "gourmet" as real meat stock, but it is an inexpensive way for people with limited economic resources to add welcomed flavor.

The chicken tagine recipe is neither a tagine or a "curry". For a restaurant chicken tagine preparation I would choose a half-roast chicken type of plating, more bistro style. The flavor will be North African, with a more international restaurant style plating.

Boneless chicken breast with a julienned vegetables in a quick cooked sauce is not a North African chicken tagine. We like bone in meat, usually whole chicken or whole cut up chicken. If chicken parts are used it's from the legs.

I have no idea if the chef gave this recipe because he thought it would be easy to make. Either way, it's obvious from reading the components of the dish that it is a chef's fusion dish. My point in reviewing this dish is to respond to cook worm's question about how dishes can be modified to the point that they lose "their spirit".

Chicken Tagine

Recipe courtesy: Padma Lakshmi
Show: Melting Pot
Episode: Padma's Passport: Moroccan Feast

First, the reference to Moroccan (or North African) feasts is as stale the old sock I found in my car trunk the other day.

I promised to look at the target audience for the recipes and to be fair the recipe is from an episode of Melting Pot and that's exactly what this and the other "Moroccan" recipes from this episode are- "melting pot" type recipes such as wild mushroom couscous and raita (cucumber and yogurt salad).

Padma's recipe is a chicken soup, the boneless skinless chicken breast meat, well, no need to comment. Keep the bone in and lose the bouillon cube. To make a boneless chicken chorba (soup) I'd rather make a light chicken stock, take the meat off the bones and use the stock for this soup.

Her wild mushroom couscous recipe just has too much going on. This is a criticism I have of quite a few North African recipes written for American and British audiences. They have too much stuff going on, too many spices, everything with dried fruits and nuts, etc...  Algerian cooking in particular, is about a variety across a range of dishes and not "dump all your North African ingredients" into every tagine you make. But I digress...

Her recipes may taste OK, but the spirit of North Africa is not there for me, neither does she claim that it is as far as I can tell. These are "Padma's take on North African for a mainstream American audience" and that's fine. These are the kind of preparations I expect to find in the prepared food section of Whole Foods Market.

Chicken tagine:

3 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 pounds skinless boneless chicken breast, cut into strips, and patted dry
1 1/2 cups sliced onions
1 1/2 cups coarsely chopped (about 1-inch pieces) green bell pepper
1 1/2 cups thickly sliced carrots
1 1/2 cups thickly sliced celery
3 cloves garlic, peeled and left whole
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1/2 teaspoon ground coriander
3 bay leaves
2 cups cubed (about 1-inch pieces) firm, ripe plum or other tomatoes
2 cups cauliflower florets
6 cups water
1 chicken bouillon cube
1 lemon, cut into slices, or to taste
2 cups couscous
1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon Harissa paste 

Sara Moulton's recipe for lamb tagine with prunes and apricots from "One dish wonders"

That's exactly what many tagine recipes are, "one dish wonders" or casseroles. Her recipe is fine, it's a tagine that I would certainly recognize as being a tagine. She offers a clever truc for people who don't like bone in meat in a casserole, she removes the meat from the bone, but adds the bone to the dish for flavor and removes them before service.

2 pounds (1-inch thick) lamb shoulder chops
1/2 tablespoon vegetable oil, plus 1/2 tablespoon
1 large onion, chopped
1 1/2 cups water
Pinch saffron threads, crumbled
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 1/2 large carrots, cut into 1/4-inch thick rounds
1 small sweet potato, peeled and cut into 3/4-inch pieces
3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2/3 cup pitted prunes
1/2 cup dried apricots
1 medium yellow squash, cut into 3/4-inch pieces
2 teaspoons honey, optional
Freshly grated nutmeg

Emeril's North African Chicken Tagine

Overall it's fine, my observations about the chicken stock are consistent with my other reviews, as is what I think about instant couscous. Otherwise, the tagine itself looks fine. If the chicken stock is well made and not from a can (which is basically brown salted water for most brands) than certainly it wouldn't detract at all from a tagine like this, but it's an extra thing, an added step that I just don't think is necessary or adds enough for a home cook to add unless it's on hand.

By the way Emeril has a tagine in his cookware line. About as relevant as me having a hibachi in my cookware line.

1 teaspoon saffron threads
1 tablespoon warm water
1 tablespoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1 (3 1/2 to 4 pound) roasting chicken, cut into 8 pieces
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 sticks cinnamon
2 bay leaves
1 cup thinly sliced yellow onion
1 tablespoon minced garlic
2 cups chicken stock
1/2 cup golden raisins
1/3 cup rough chopped preserved lemon
1/4 cup rough chopped green olives
1/4 cup toasted almond slivers
1/4 cup chopped fresh mint
Cooked couscous, for serving, recipe follows

 

Comments

[severine]

salut ton site doit etre tres interressant dommage que je compreine pas je suis impasciente que la traduction soit fini merci avance