[Sca-cooks] Question - What Ottoman Recipes to Include in C.A.

[lilinah at earthlink.net]

First let me add, after my looooong post, that i am asking for suggestions because I DO NOT LIKE THE SMELL OR FLAVOR OF LAMB (and don't get me started on mutton or goat, both of which i have eaten). I eat it because, as a cook of foods from Muslim lands, i kinda have to. I tend to lean to chicken dishes, and i know a lot of people seem to like lamb. So, folks, please let me know OFF-LIST which of the untested recipes YOU would like to eat.

I wrote:
> When recipes call for Fat = sheep tail fat, not necessarily easy to find 
> (i'm sure i can find it where i live, but the recipes should be do-able in 
> other places). Lard is obviously out; butter would be the closest 
> substitute i can think of.

Stefan, lard is right out. It would be just wrong to cook Muslim dishes with pork fat... kinda like what the Spanish Christians following the Reconquista - one test of converted Jews was to require them to eat pork in front of an inquisitor. Also, there are a number of SCA-period Spanish recipes called "Moorish" that use pork fat as the frying medium.

As someone without food restrictions, i still shudder when i think of what Mickey D's offers for breakfast: a bagel with cheese and bacon and egg - the bagel is Jewish, combining meat and dairy violates the laws of Kashrut, and bacon, bacon, oi, vey! Pork is treif! It reminds me of a local feast of some years back featuring almost entirely non-period food - in one course the main dish was couscous with ham... OK, that's three, count them, three examples of culinary cultural dissonance.

Bear, i did not consider chicken fat. Since i have not tried sheep tail fat, i don't know how different it would be. It certainly has many similarities to butter, although not the same flavor. I think it might be worth trying. Thanks for the suggestion.

So, folks, keep them cards and letters comin' [OFF-LIST, please] of which untested recipes YOU would like to eat.

Urtatim (that's oor-tah-TEEM)