[Sca-cooks] Dikabrika

[Patrick Levesque]

Decided to work from Perry's new translation of a Baghdad Cookery Book
tonight, and I happened to have all the ingredients for that dish. I don't
feel too comfortable copying the translation straight out (would Charles
Perry mind?), but it's easy to find in PPC #79 (ask Devra :-))

So here goes my interpretation:

1 pound veal cubes
1 leek
2 onions
1 handful of coarsely chopped fresh coriander
1 teaspoon powdered coriander seeds
9 ounces canned chickpeas (don¹t keep the dry stuff here as I rarely cook
with them)
1/4 cup soy sauce (instead of murri, presumably; I have to venture in the
Arab market one of these days to see if I can find real murri)
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar.
Salt, pepper
 

It's actually a pretty straightforward recipe, altough I adapted some of it,
and I don't know how much I would stray from period techniques in so doing.

Basically, I browned the veal cubes in olive oil, took them out, added the
onions and leeks for a couple of minutes, added back the meat, covered with
water and added the coriander (fresh and dry) and the chickpeas, as well as
salt and pepper. 
Brought everything to a boil, added the vinegar, soy sauce and sugar.
Brought to a boil again, covered, and simmered for 90 minutes, with the last
20 minutes uncovered to boil down the sauce.

The text calls for some mixed spice near the end, which I didn't add, but I
believe a little bit of cardamom wouldn't be too bad in this case.

Once it has boiled down, the sauce is actually quite thick. This is really
unexpensive and easy to prepare, and would make a wonderful sideboard dish,
IMHO. It wasn't really sour (for a recipe that is in the 'sour dishes'
section) but then again, I didn't put in that much vinegar. Add more if
you're partial to the sharp taste. Go easy on the salt, though. It's salty
enough with the soy sauce.

Petru