[Sca-cooks] Rue

[lilinah at earthlink.net]

Eduardo wrote:
> I think the radish leaf idea is interesting.

I've been eating it sauteed in butter since i lived in Southern France in 1973. I like the taste. But i also like young dandelion leaves (talk about bitter :-)

> I do find rue to be bitter and somewhat sour but NOT nasty.
> Then of course my two favorite flavor components are bitter and sour!
> When we were playing with Apicius the rue issue was huge, but what  
> other cuisines call for it in any quantity?

Rue appears in 21 per cent of savory recipes in the 13th century so-called Anonymous Andalusian cookbook:
http://home.earthlink.net/~al-tabbakhah/Misc_ME_Food/SpiceboxAndalusi.html

I don't know how often rue actually appears in "Fadalat al-Jiwan fi Tayyibat al-t'am wa'l-alwan" (Highlights of the table, on dishes and stews), by Abu'l-Hasan Ali ibn Muhammad ibn Abi'l-Qasim ibn Muhammad ibn Abi Bakr ibn al-Andalusi Razin al-Tujibi
from Murcia between 1228 and 1243. His is sometimes shortened "al-Razin" or "al-Tujibi" (written in Spanish as al-Tugibi, but pronounced the same as in English). His book has not yet been translated in its entirety into English, although we've translated a few from Spanish of Fernando de la Granja Santamaria to English on this list - always problematic to translate without referring to the original. There is a somewhat larger number of recipes from that work in "Medieval Cuisine of the Islamic World" by Lilia Zaouali. She includes some of the recipes that were translated by Granja Santamaria and there are some distinct differences from Suey's translations.

Rue does not appear in al-Baghdadi's 13th century cookbook, however:
http://home.earthlink.net/~al-tabbakhah/Misc_ME_Food/SpiceboxBaghdadi.html

It may be that rue is a more " Mediterranean" herb, or perhaps its use is a Roman holdover. I should also look through my Medieval Muslim pharmacopoeia (al-Kindi, al-Samarqandi, etc.) and see if rue appears.

And i have not yet done a seasoning count of the massive amount of 9th and 10th century recipes in Ibn Sayyur al-Warraq's compendium. I really need to start working on that, too.
--
Urtatim (that's urr-tah-TEEM)
the persona formerly known as Anahita