[Sca-cooks] Limuwiya

[Galefridus Peregrinus]

Back in December I announced my intention to work through as many limuwiya/limuniyya recipes as I could find. For a bunch of reasons, my cooking has been mostly on hiatus for the past several months, but tonight I resumed my plan. In December, I prepared the below recipe using ordinary grocery store carrots -- the orange variety. Sometime in February, I prepared it with eggplant, using the large variety available in most produce sections. Tonight I used Indian eggplant, a small variety the size and shape of hen's eggs:




As with my previous efforts, I found flavors of the herbs and spices blended very pleasantly. A key issue is to limit the quantities of gum mastic and rosewater -- these ingredients tend to potentiate each other, so it's wise to use less than you think is appropriate. In this case, for a total of 3 1/2 lbs of meat and chicken combined, I used a quantity of mastic a bit more than half the size of a pea and a bit less than 1 t rosewater.

With the warmer weather, I was able to cook this dish outdoors in a stone pot over a charcoal brazier, closely emulating how it would have been prepared in the medieval Baghdadi kitchen.

I find that so far I prefer eggplant over carrots. I have one more variation that I'd like to try with this recipe: I want to try heirloom carrots, either the red or the yellow-white varieties. It is my understanding from my gardening acquaintances that these two cultivars are a close approximation of what would been available in the medieval kitchen.

>From Arberry's translation of al-Baghdadi (13th century Baghdad):

Limuwiya.
Cut up the meat and tail, and leave it in the saucepan with a little salt. Cover with water, and boil until done, removing the scum. Take onions, leeks, and carrots if in season, otherwise eggplant. Wash the onions and leeks in lukewarm water and salt. Half-boil the eggplant in a separate saucepan, then add it to the rest: if carrots are used, however, they need not be boiled by themselves. Throw on top dry coriander, mastic, pepper, cinnamon and ginger well-ground, and a few sprigs of mint. Take a chicken and quarter it, then place it in the saucepan: throw in the herbs. Take the natural juice of lemons, straining off the sediment and pips, and pour into the pot. Peel and chop sweet almonds, soak in water, and add. Rub over the pot sprigs of dry mint, and spray with rose-water. Wipe the sides of the saucepan with a clean rag, and leave over the fire to settle: then remove. Some sweeten with sugar: but if sweetening, omit the mint and eggplant.

The Perry translation of al-Baghdadi is a bit different, so I'm considering trying that as well.

-- Galefridus