Lamb with QuincesRe: [Sca-cooks] Menu help! Pretty please.

[david friedman]

Jadwiga asked about:

>Safarjaliyya, a Dish Made With Quinces
>This is a good food for the feverish, it excites the appetite, strengthens
>the stomach and prevents stomach vapors from rising to the head. Take the
>flesh of a young fat lamb or calf; cut in small pieces and put in the pot
>with salt, pepper, coriander seed, saffron, oil and a little water; put on
>a low fire until the meat is done; then take as much as you need of
>cleaned peeled quince, cut in fourths, and sharp vinegar, juice of unripe
>grapes (verjuice) or of pressed quince, cook for a while and use. If you
>wish, cover with eggs and it comes out like muthallath.

Our version of this one is:

1 lb lamb
1/2 t salt
1/4 t pepper
1 t coriander (ground)
~4 threads saffron
2 t oil
1 T water
1 T wine vinegar
1/4 c verjuice
(2 or 3 eggs)
1 quince = 3/4 lb

Cut up meat into bite-sized pieces, put in a pot with spices, oil, 
and water, and cook over low heat about 10 minutes, stirring 
periodically. Meanwhile, peel and core quince and cut into eighths. 
Add quince, vinegar, and verjuice to pot and cook covered about 30-40 
minutes, until quince is tender when poked with a fork. If adding 
eggs, stir them in and cook, stirring continuously for about 3 
minutes.

We have also done it using quince juice instead of verjuice: to make 
1/2 c quince juice from 1 quince, put quince through food processor 
with 1/6 c water, squeeze through cloth.

My memory of this is that it is pretty good but not spectacularly 
good. There is also a different period recipe for this dish, also in 
the anonymous Andalusian cookbook; we have our versions of both in 
the Miscellany.


>What we did:

...

>I think it was a waste of a good quince.
>
>Could it have been bad lamb or something? Or what? I've never cooked lamb
>before!

Do you like lamb when other people cook it? it does have a 
distinctive taste, and not everyone likes it.

Elizabeth of Dendermonde/Betty Cook