Annals of the Caliphs' Kitchens

Written nearly a thousand years ago, Al-Warraq's cookbook is the most comprehensive work of its kind. This traditional cookbook with more than 600 recipes from the luxurious cuisine of medieval Islam is also a rare guide to the contemporary culinary culture.

Review:

Gourmand World Cookbook Award 2007 for best translated cookbook Honorable mention of the Arab American National Museum Book Award 2007 [...] this is an impressive piece of scholarship and a joy to read both for pleasure and for more sober historical reflection on the ways medieval bourgeois Arab Muslim, and also Christian and Jewish urbanites, enjoyed themselves at table. David Waines, Dept of Religious Studies, Lancaster University, Journal of Semitic Studies, Vol. 54, 2009. [...] this is a major resource that should be in every university library and will be consulted for years to come by anyone who is interested in the history of cuisine in the Middle East. Daniel Martin Varisco, Hofstra University, Review of Middle East Studies, 2009 Nawal Nasrallah's impressive translation of the tenth-century Baghdadi cookbook by Ibn-Sayyar al-Warraq provides a valuable resource for understanding medieval Baghdadi culture through culinary tradition. Leyla Rouhi, Williams College, Gastronomica, 2010