RST: Provenance of Islamic Influences on Latin Cisine

On New Year's Eve I supped on some of my in-law's knockout Guatemalteca tamales with her super-hot salsa cocida (not at all chunky, with a smooth, even consistency; contains carrots and olive oil in addition to more familiar salsa ingredients and tiny "bird" peppers). Anyway, the tamales' contents included, along with chunks of pork and turkey "enchiladas," capers, almonds, raisins and perhaps some other dried fruits. (Of course it was all encased in good masa and wrapped in a banana leaf.) I wondered whether the old world ingredients are a vestige Spanish colonialism or a product of the later Middle-Eastern immigration to Central America to which you often allude. Since you are so erudite in these matters, and I am so lazy, I thought I'd start with you. (BTW, my one faux pas of the evening was to ask whether the turkey was chicken. I was informed, somewhat gravely under the circumstances, that no Guatemalan would serve common yardbird to a guest in her home, especially in a holiday tamal. Turkey yes, but chicken, no. Oops.)

While my erudition is highly limited on the subject, I do know that almonds, raisins, cumin and various other "Arabic" foods have been common in Spanish cooking for centuries. Makes sense, when you consider that all of Spain but the Basque country was an Arab califate from 711 to 1492.

It's interesting to note, though, that the colonization of the New World by Europeans had a far more lasting impact on European (and Central Asian) cooking than most of us realize. Chocolate, chilis and other peppers, potatoes, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, turkey -- the list goes on and on -- were unknown in Europe, the Middle East and Asia until after 1492.

I sometimes wonder what "East Indian" food must have been like before the culinary cross-pollenation of the 15th and 16th centuries!

More information on the foods of the New World can be found at the below link. I forgot to mention beans, corn, squash, etc. among the other foods of Mesoamerican origin.

Link: http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~drclas/pu...

Thanks for the article Kirk. I find it interesting that as the article points out that while most products actually went fromn the "old" world to the "new" world, so many old world cuisines are no so inter-twined with new world products.

Beside the pepper heavy things, how about the potatos of nothern europe, the tomatoes of Italy or coffee all over.

If you're interested in the impact of foods on culture and history, you might want to pick up copies of two books by Mark Kurlansky: "COD: A Biography of the Fish That Changed the World," and "SALT: A History of the World." He's a very good writer, and the books are quick reads. The titles are bound to get you strange looks when you read them on the El or an airplane, but I found them fascinating.

Link: http://www.saltbook.com/author.php

I got Choice Cuts for Hannukah!

Also an excellent book!

And I got a Smithfield ham. By the way, Ron Rosenbaum is now evil Ronnie.

According to "The Heritage of Spanish Cooking" by Alicia Rios and Lourdes March, their cooking was - naturally - influenced by all their neighbours and all the occupying forces, Roman, Visigoth, Moors Etc. After the discovery of The Americas, Spain's kitchen was influenced by the new world, especially by Cuba and Argentina. Strangely, Norway too is mentioned. Spain got salted and dried cod from us, and we got wine and salt from them (Salinas de Torrevieja).

Thanks for all of the info, Kirk. Imbedded in my question whether these Islamic food elements came through Spanish colonial influences or through more direct middle eastern immigration was the assumption that Spanish food is and was highly influenced by 500 years of Spanish Islam. I don't mean to sound critical; in fact, you have highlighted a problem with some posts on this board that others have complained of lately, ie, assumptions about what everybody else reading here might know. I'll try not to be so presumptuous next time I post a specific question on this general board. Thanks.

If you or anyone else has information about recent (last 100 years) direct immigration from the Middle East to Latin America, I would be interested in seeing it.

Kirk, if you look for RST's posts below, he discusses the Levantine (I think) influence on Mexican "al pastor" meats. Anecdotally, I can tell you that there are quite a few Syrian/Lebanese Cubans, and that there are (or were circa 1960) entire neighborhoods in Havana. I also know that quipe ("kibbeh") is popular in the DR based on the influence of Middle Eastern immigrants. As for other Middle Eastern immigration into Latin America over the past hundred years, I offer the forefathers of the ridiculous and the sublime, Carlos Menem and Selma Hayek. Richard (RST) doubtless has detailed and more useful information about the immigration patterns between Latin America and the Middle East.

Thanks for the information, Jeff. "The sublime," indeed! (I am debating whether to see "Frida" this weekend.)

I did a little research this morning on speakers of Arabic and related Levantine languages in Latin America (at www.sil.org ... a great language site if you're ever interested). I was surprised to find that Argentina has more than 1 million speakers of Arabic; Mexico, 400,000; Venezuela, 110,000; and Honduras, 42,000. There are smaller "pockets" throughout Central and South America, but Guatemala doesn't stand out as one of them -- for whatever culinary deductions we want to make from that.

Thanks again, Jeff. It's always fun to learn new things!

When I lived in Brasil (early 70s) there were enough Levantines (mostly from Syria, at least the ones I knew) to support a good dedication among Brasilians of other cultures for kibbeh stands.

Most of the youngers ones were at second or even third generation.

I would like to make a distinction here, there are two very different "Islamic" influences on Latin Cuisine. The first one, is the Moorish influence on what I would refer to as Iberian food (Spain and Portugal), which then affect the latin american cuisine. That influence, though you can call it Islamic, is specifically Moorish/North African, and it is quite different from the Levantine food. Combining fruits and salty foods for example, is North African influence (Saveur Sept/Oct 2002) as well as a number of eastern spices such as cumin, corander, nutmeg, and cinnamon. That influence of North Africa is present in current latin food, such as chili, which, according to some experts SHOULD have a solid cumin taste, or even all the various uses of Coriander and Cilantro in the food, I don't know if Latin food uses cinnamon in non-dessert entrees like ME food, if it does, then yes, it is an Islamic/Moorish influence.

The second influence, which is due to the immigration of CHRISTIAN Lebanese and Syrian (which back then was called Syria), caused the integration of new foods to the various countries where these immigrants ended up, rather than it influenced the way new food is made (expect things like El Pastor where it's a different technique used instead of a new taste). Sfiha (meat pie) and Kibbeh in Brasil come to mind.

p.s. Can we also add Shakira to the list of Lebanese-Latinos?

Nazerac, thanks. A couple of points of clarification: I used "Islamic" because is is the most inclusive, and I think from an accepted historical perspective, correct, way of describing a sphere of political, religious, and most relevantly here, cultural influence that stretched from Spain, through North Africa to the Balkans and Central Asia. Doubtless, large groups of Jews, Coptic and Orthodox Christians and other non-Muslim people existed within and contributed to the culture of "Islam."

Also, I'm no expert in this area, but I'd understood that mixing the sweet and savory, esp. using dried fruit, was a hallmark of Persian as well as "Moorish" cuisine.

Regarding cinnamon, coriander and nutmeg as North African: coriander is native to the entire Mediterranean, while cinnamon (origin SE Asia) was a favorite, maybe the favorite, spice used in ancient Roman cooking. It is used in plenty of savory Mexican cooking, but I wouldn't hazard a guess as to how that happened. Nutmeg is popular in Northern Italian cuisine, prob. a remnant of the era in which "Moorish" influence on the city states was almost as important as its more direct influence on Spain.

In all, I don't think I'll get my answer from RST. I'm inclined to assume that the typically Spanish filling in the tamales represents an early "fusion" of Spanish/Moorish and pre-columbian foods, and not the influence of later migrations.

I forgot to add Gloria and Emilio Estefan (and Shakira) to the list.

One level up from the URL Kirk posted are a number of additional articles, with an introduction by Frances Moore Lappé.

Link below.

Regards,
Gary

Link: http://www.fas.harvard.edu/~drclas/pu...