A Primer On Medieval Islamic Food
[Image ID: Illustrated table filled with medieval Islamic dishes. For a detailed description, go to the References section, Full Image Descriptions subsection for Image 1. Illustration by rhipiduridae. /end ID]
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Welcome to this giant series of posts about medieval Islamic food. I am a food lover who fell down the research rabbithole in an Old Guard fever dream, initially to add authentic foods to fic but it turns out medieval Islamic food is really tasty. People in various forums were interested in my excited rants and gave me motivation to write stuff down so others can benefit from my haze of reading and experimenting.
Eternal thanks to @rhythmelia for proofreading, feedback, and cheerleading services; S for additional proofreading and for enduring a sudden proliferation of spices and non-vegetarian dinners; D for the beautiful kitchen, recipe critiques, and being the best sous chef; and the many people on tumblr and various discord channels who listened to my ramblings and wanted even more. This would not have been possible without any of you.
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Disclaimer: I am not a historian or professional cook, nor am I Muslim or from the MENA region. If I got anything wrong, please let me know. I will also not be covering the history or geopolitics of the general MENA region. At the same time, it is obviously important as it relates to historical food and I will make occasional references to specific locations and caliphates. I encourage you to read up on it yourself.
I am assuming readers will have some basic knowledge of modern Middle Eastern, North African, Persian, and Indian foods and ingredients. If you want any further explanations on something, just let me know!
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I will be posting (almost) every Friday. Please see below for the schedule, which will be updated with links on this post when they are live:
Part 1: Medieval Islamic Cuisine 101 A discussion on the history and characteristics of medieval Islamic food as found in cookbooks from the 10th-15th centuries, with a small section on The Old Guard.
Part 2: References Sources for all the known medieval Islamic cookbooks and other historical food references, along with detailed image IDs.
Part 3: Typical Ingredients A list of the most commonly mentioned ingredients in medieval Islamic cookbooks.
Part 4: Typical Meals A list of the most commonly mentioned dishes in medieval Islamic cookbooks.
Part 5: Recipes For Home Cooking A small sampler of recipes from the cookbooks (with modern instructions). Some of these recipes are pretty long so they will have their own posts.
Sikbāj: Sweet and sour lamb stew
Tharīd: Chicken stew with bread
Fatīr: Thin flatbread
Mujabbana: Cheese fritters
Byzantine himmas kassā: Sweet hummus
Tabāhaja: Lamb with spiced sauce
Atrāf al-Tīb: Spice mix
Murrī matbūkh lil-maghariba: Maghrebi barley sauce
Baid mutajjan: Fried hardboiled eggs
Murakkaba: Layered date cake
Bādhinjān Būrān: Eggplant of Būrān
This primer (minus the recipes) is now on AO3.



























