Algerian Cuisine Cuisine Algerienne by Farid ZADI

Changes in Algerian and North African recipes over the past 30-40 years

I have a decent collection of Algerian and North African cookbooks published in French in North Africa or in France. Next time I go to France and Algeria I'll have access to more through libraries and general bookstores. In studying recipes printed in cookbooks and magazines over the past 30-35 years the most significant differences I see are listed below.

I'm not including North African cookbooks that are heavily Frenchified for a mainstream audience. I'm saving that for a separate post. However, I am including North African cookbooks published in France for a Maghrebine audience. They are for the most part the same as North African cookbooks published in North Africa for the obvious reason that the same books are often distributed in France and North Africa. I'll break down the different kinds of cookbooks in a later post.

1. Higher production values in both French and Algerian published cookbooks. The photographs of food look much cleaner, brighter and fresher than they did 30-35 years ago. This isn't a distinctive feature of North African cookbooks, go back and look through old cookbooks from various food cultures and you'll see what I mean: dark, heavy, dense looking photos of food.

2. More recipes with fresh dairy products: milk, cheese, fresh butter, whipped cream, sour cream, etc... Note, I say MORE, because the use of the ingredients existed before but not as commonly. Smen or fermented butter is used less and less. Margarine is a relatively inexpensive substitute for butter and is a French influence (it was invented in France). It's less expensive than fresh butter and has a longer shelf life.

3. Recipes that call for the use of chicken breasts for dishes such as bricks or boureks. I thought this was more for a French audience or a Franco-Maghrebine audience, but I'm seeing this more often in recipes published in North Africa. A by-product of industrialization, I think.

4. The most dramatic effects seem to be on pastry recipes. I see more recipes with a croissant dough base and vienoisserie type pastries. More chocolate and glaçage too. Vanilla instead of flower waters. Sponge cakes or genoise and tarts are also more common. For example an Algerian balkawa is now also made in the shape of a round tart with a lattice crust. An Algerianized mille-feuille is made with layers of fried warka leaves, rosewater scented pastry cream and garnished with candied almonds.

5. Pasta and noodle recipes now call for packaged pasta more often, rather than always insisting on homemade pasta or noodles. In Algerian cooking the word macaronne (there are regional variations in spelling and pronunciation) refers to dried semolina flour pastas in general.

 

Blog of The Week Cocinalia

I'm  bumping up this almost two year old post because there's a recent question about the recipe which I've answered and because I've been thinking a lot about Mexican moles recently.

The blogger of the week is from Spain, Cocinalia. To my pleasant surprise cocinalia has a Curso de Cocina Maghrebi.

When I think of Spain in relation to North Africa, I think of my days in Oran. One of my favorite cities in Algeria.

The most significant culinary interplay between Spain and North Africa begins with the Moors. After more than 700 years of reign on the Iberian peninsula they returned to Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia with Spanish influences that are still evident in the Maghreb.

Seventeen years after Christopher Columbus set sail for the Americas the Spanish captured the port of Oran in 1509.

Rachel Lauden has written a thoroughly researched piece on The Mexican Kitchen's Islamic Connection.  What intrigues for the moment are the moles.

The most common ingredients for the endless varieties of mole include: tomato, onion, cinnamon, tortillas, chiles—including anchos, pasillas, mulattos and chipotles—pumpkin seeds, raisins, star anise, cloves, sesame seeds, almonds, tablets of chocolate, tomatillos, oil, garlic, salt, allspice and serrano chiles. Nearly half these ingredients arrived in the New World with the Spanish.

The Spanish also quickly transported ingredients from The Americas throughout the Mediterranean making possible the chicken dish I had in Oran. Actually that's a bit of an overstatement since I recognize only tomatoes and chili peppers as being from the "New World" in the dish.

I present a recipe that I've recreated from memory.

The Mexican Kitchen’s Islamic Connection with Rachel Laudan on Public Radio

I'm sure this is a topic of interest for regular readers of my blog. More details at Rachel Laudan, article here and Here on Earth: Radio without borders with Jean Feraca.

Mark your calenders for Friday September 21st from 3 to 4 Central Time. You can can call in, email in or download a podcast later. Isn't the internet amazing?

The show has aired since I posted this. It's a fascinating topic and Rachel Laudan speaks about it magnificently.

link to podcast

Ten Lucky Hospital Students Are Going to Paris

Ten Lucky Hospital Patients Are Going to Paris

"Ten patients from the Children's Hospital Los Angeles are getting a once-in-a-lifetime treat. They're going to Paris! As part of the experience, they got a taste of exquisite French food cooked by the students of the California School of Culinary Arts."

I spent 3 1/2 hours with them in the restaurant talking to the children about Paris, the food, sightseeing and I sang an Edith Piaf song for them. They told me about themselves and their interest in traveling independently.  If you click on the link you will see how happy the children were. They were all really excited about going to Paris.

The reporter refers to me "as one of the waiters". Why, I am a chef (insert Inspector Clouseau accent)! KCOP (channel 13 in Los Angeles) was also there and one of my students claimed to have seen a clip on CNN.

Sfriya (Sfiriya)- Algerian croquettes, dumplings rissoles and falafels (?)

In Algerian cuisine sfriya are a category of round, football (oval shapped with tapered ends) or patty shaped croquettes, dumplings or rissoles that are steamed, boiled or deep or shallow fried. The word sfriya is derived from the Medieval Arabic Isfîriyâ.

 

They can be based on a variety of starches such as potatoes, flour, bread or legumes. Potato or semolina flour based one are probably the most common (potato croquettes are also called  maqouda, meaning "the pounded"). In sub-Saharan Algeria sfriyas are made with black eyed peas and are similar to West African akara.

An Anonymous Andalusian Cookbook of the 13th Century Translated by Charles Perry

A Recipe of Isfîriyâ

Take some red meat and pound as before. Put it in some water and add some sour dough dissolved with as much egg as the meat will take, and salt, pepper, saffron, cumin, and coriander seed, and knead it all together. Then put a pan with fresh oil on the fire, and when the oil has boiled, add a spoon of isfîriya and pour it in the frying pan carefully so that it forms thin cakes. Then make a sauce for it.

Simple Isfîriyâ

Break however many eggs you like into a big plate and add some sourdough, dissolved with a commensurate number of eggs, and also pepper, coriander, saffron, cumin, and cinnamon. Beat it all together, then put it in a frying pan with oil over a moderate fire and make thin cakes out of it, as before.

Counterfeit (Vegetarian) Isfîriyâ of Garbanzos

Pound some garbanzos, take out the skins and grind them into flour. And take some of the flour and put into a bowl with a bit of sourdough and some egg, and beat with spices until it's all mixed. Fry it as before in thin cakes, and make a sauce for them.

The last one looks like a simple falafel to me. Chick pea or fava bean based rissoles are made in Algeria but they differ from Middle Eastern style falafels. Falafels are more of a restaurant item in Algeria and definitely considered Middle Eastern in origin.

Semolina Bread- Quick Version for Ramadan

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This is a very fast and easy bread, ideal for Ramadan. It tastes like a cross between a yeast leavened semolina bread and a cornbread. This is a master recipe of sorts for a range of sweet semolina cakes or savory breads.

Chorba for Ramadan

This chorba is very low salt, nutrient dense and soothing- perfect for suhur (pre-sunrise meal). Instead of using a more traditional whole chicken I used cubed chicken breast for a lighter finished product. I used a soup pot but this recipe can be made in a pressure cooker or slow cooker.

This soup is so easy that it's a none recipe. I went to Whole Foods (oops, didn't have a chance to go to a farmer's market) and purchased a variety of vegetables based on freshness and color. I bought onions, garlic, carrots, kale, yellow zucchini, a fresh fennel bulb, and kuri squash. The key ingredient for me is the kuri squash, it gave the soup a beautiful golden yellow/orange hue and added body to the broth. You can substitute acorn, kombucha or pumpkin.

I finely chopped the onion and minced the garlic, the kale was cut into a chiffonade and the remaining vegetables were cut into small cubes.

EmerilWare Tagine (All Clad Tagine) Cookware Review

The average list price online for the EmerilWare tagine is $99.99. Amazon currently has Le Creuset's tagine on sale for $118.99. Comparing the two at similar price points is irresistible. I do not enthusiastically recommend All Clad's tagine vessel. For $20 more Le Creuset makes a superior tagine vessel.

The All Clad tagine has a four quart capacity compared to Le Creuset's 1.75 quart. But I don't think that even a substantially larger base makes up for the lesser quality craftsmanship and lower market appearance compared to Le Creuset's version.

Emeril's tagine also has a patented Steam-Surround™ similar in effect to a pressure cooker. But the All-Clad Steam-Surround™ process reduces cooking time only by about 25% compared to a pressure cooker which can reduce cooking time by up to 70%. I've already posted about how pressure cookers are very common in North Africa these days.

Enameled cast iron or aluminum cookware really doesn't mimic clay tagine cooking vessels anyway. As I've said before they are more about appearance and ease of use. The conical lids on "modern tagine vessels" are about as functional as a lid for pheasant under glass. However, as I've noted before appearance is an important part of enjoying a meal. I understand the positive effects of this very well.

Considering the price, function, and form of the All Clad tagine I'd rather buy a casserole, dutch oven or pressure cooker to prepare my tagine and transfer to a clay one for serving.

Overall I think the All Clad tagine serves a lot of "middle of the road" functions, and certainly if a great deal can't be had on a Le Creuset tagine the price point would be "middle of the road" as well. If you have one it is a perfectly functional and useful piece of equipment, there's no need to run out to buy another modern tagine cooking vessel.

I can't help but have a "middle of the road" response to this piece of cookware. A pressure cooker makes North African cooking much faster. A slow cooker makes slow cooking more convenient. As for modern and convenient, Le Creuset's has the edge.

The ideal "modern and convenient" tagine vessel for me would combine aspects of the All Clad and Le Creuset tagines, with a few improvements. A large enameled cast iron base, some kind of pressure cooker technology, can be fired to temps up to 450F, comes with a heavy flat terracotta lid and a conical one, etc...

It doesn't offer what terracotta tagines do either. Terracotta tagines add to the mood of slow cooking and there is also the aroma of the terracotta itself that is cured over time. Cooking with traditional vessels remind us to slow down, relax, enjoy all the sensual pleasures of cooking and eating. And they can be purchased for 50%-75% less than an All Clad tagine.

When I saw it and touched it I didn't love it like I did the Le Creuset or my terracotta tagines, both look much nicer as part of a table setting. And Le Creuset tagine can be fired to higher temps in the oven for last minute glazing or browning.

Kitchen Kapers cookware store provides a bullet point list of the EmerilWare tagine. The All Clad website or Emeril's website. Maybe it's there but it's not showing up through the search functions.

Tagine Cooking- Chicken Cooked Under Bricks

Actually, I've never heard of cooking anything under a brick within the context of Algerian cooking. However, we do have a method of cooking tagines with a flat terra cotta lid on top of which hot ashes or coals are placed. When I taught a Tuscan cooking glass a few months ago I discovered a way of duplicating an Algerian cooking method using a cooking dish for pollo al mattone. I purchased it at Sur La Table at the same time I bought my Portuguese made terra cotta tagine.

As luck would have it the lid for the pollo al mattone vessel also fits on my oven safe tagine!

Tagine of Lemon Saffron Chicken with Potato Crust

This baked chicken tagine is definitely for chicken fat lovers. I have an alternative recipe using the same ingredients for a lighter version. The reason this version is rich is because the potatoes soak up the rendered fat from the legs. You can bake the chicken separately and drain off the the fat, but you will also have to roast the potatoes separately.

I used the bottom of my terracotta tagine with the lid off for this casserole type tagine.