I sometimes wish that my literature-lovin' heart wasn't so set on the allusions that Around the World in 80 Dishes conjurs up. Not that 80 dishes are too many — it's just not the easiest number to work with when you're dividing something up for a project such as this. Ten regions seemed too few, as though interesting countries would get the short shrift, or there would be no consistency across the regions; 20 was just too many, and would require a level of internal nit-picking that I wasn't willing to undertake. And there are no other factors in between. So, 16 regions is what I settled on, and 16 regions is what I'm stuck with.
If I hadn't been so stubborn and was willing to change up my region tally, North Africa probably wouldn't be its own separate section. Perhaps it's because of the restaurants I frequent, but to me, North African food is just so intimately connected with the rest of the Mediterranean-at-large (the Middle East, Italy, Greece, and, to a lesser extent, southern Spain) that I probably would have lumped to whole shebang together, made a tagine to represent North Africa, and be done with it.
But that seems to be missing the point. The AW80D challenge is supposed to be, well, a challenge. Apart from my (woefully misguided) belief that this blog will bring me internet fame and fortune, I really want AW80D to chronicle my odyssey of food — my questing forth through the seas of culinary ignorance to the well-fed shores of awesome food...island?
So, to reel this wayward and tortured sea-faring analogy back in (oops): North Africa. For recipe-selection purposes, I am generally following the UN definition of Northern Africa: Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Sudan, Tunisia, and Western Sahara, with Mauritania added to complete the Maghreb. This is, of course, only a rough guide, and I reserve the right to employ cartographic trickery as needed (they don't call The Husband Sir Mapps-a-lot for nothing). The iconic tagine will hopefully make an appearance, but other than that, I'm still figuring out this entire North African food thing. After the first North Africa AW80D post, a friend from Tunisia pointed out that she's never had preserved lemons, which sort of complicates my "preserved lemons are such an integral part of North African cuisine" line I was pushing.
Well, then.
It seems that I may harbor a few misconceptions about what North African food really is. But this is exactly what AW80D should be — a learning experience. Maybe I should start actually researching things before I go blathering on about them?
So it'll be back to the cookbooks for me, to re-orient my culinary compass and get my tasty bearings. I just hope there don't be food dragons beyond the horizon.
(Ok, I'm done with the nautical references now. Really.)
(Yar.)
If I hadn't been so stubborn and was willing to change up my region tally, North Africa probably wouldn't be its own separate section. Perhaps it's because of the restaurants I frequent, but to me, North African food is just so intimately connected with the rest of the Mediterranean-at-large (the Middle East, Italy, Greece, and, to a lesser extent, southern Spain) that I probably would have lumped to whole shebang together, made a tagine to represent North Africa, and be done with it.
But that seems to be missing the point. The AW80D challenge is supposed to be, well, a challenge. Apart from my (woefully misguided) belief that this blog will bring me internet fame and fortune, I really want AW80D to chronicle my odyssey of food — my questing forth through the seas of culinary ignorance to the well-fed shores of awesome food...island?
So, to reel this wayward and tortured sea-faring analogy back in (oops): North Africa. For recipe-selection purposes, I am generally following the UN definition of Northern Africa: Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, Sudan, Tunisia, and Western Sahara, with Mauritania added to complete the Maghreb. This is, of course, only a rough guide, and I reserve the right to employ cartographic trickery as needed (they don't call The Husband Sir Mapps-a-lot for nothing). The iconic tagine will hopefully make an appearance, but other than that, I'm still figuring out this entire North African food thing. After the first North Africa AW80D post, a friend from Tunisia pointed out that she's never had preserved lemons, which sort of complicates my "preserved lemons are such an integral part of North African cuisine" line I was pushing.
Well, then.
It seems that I may harbor a few misconceptions about what North African food really is. But this is exactly what AW80D should be — a learning experience. Maybe I should start actually researching things before I go blathering on about them?
So it'll be back to the cookbooks for me, to re-orient my culinary compass and get my tasty bearings. I just hope there don't be food dragons beyond the horizon.
(Ok, I'm done with the nautical references now. Really.)
(Yar.)
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