Roden goes to Morocco and beyond

Long before most cooks in this country had ever eaten pita bread, or hummus had become a standard item on supermarket shelves, Egyptian-born Claudia Roden was writing about Middle Eastern cuisine. Her important volume, "The Book of Middle Eastern Food" came out 40 years ago; in 2000, she revised and expanded it as "The New Book of Middle Eastern Food."

Her latest book, "Arabesque," elaborates on the cuisines of Morocco, Turkey, and Lebanon. The three countries, she writes, were places where "high culinary styles" developed, which gave us "legacies from the Islamic world, with echoes of ancient Persia and medieval Baghdad, Moorish Spain, and the Ottoman Empire.

Roden first went to England as an art student and planned to return to Egypt, to the apartment the family lived in overlooking the Nile, but the family was expelled from the country and moved to London. In order to remember home and comfort themselves, they cooked together, the young Claudia learning the specialties alongside her mother.

Claudia Roden was married for 15 years, then raised her three children by herself. She lives in Hampstead Garden Suburb in London. She turned 70 last month. We spoke by phone and e-mail.

Q How old were you when your family left Cairo and what were the circumstances?

A When I was 15, I was sent for the last term to a boarding school in Sussex , England. I had gone to an English school in Cairo and there had been riots against the British and the school bus had been stoned. I then went on to a lycee in Paris where I was a boarder for three years and where I took my baccalaureate. (We spoke French at home). After that I went to London, where my older brother was at medical school, to study art. I went back to Egypt for holidays every year until I was 18. [Egyptian leader Gamal Abdel] Nasser expelled French and British nationals and Jews without Egyptian passports. They had to leave immediately. Egyptian Jews like my parents were harassed and became afraid (many went into internment camps). My parents left at that time.

Q What was London like when you first moved there?

A In the early '50s, there were hardly any non white faces in the street, and you could hardly ever hear any foreign languages. Everything closed very early. There were no places at all for young people to go to. The food in public places was disgusting. You could not buy aubergines [eggplant], courgettes [zucchini], and peppers. There was only one place where we could get things like phyllo, bulgur, couscous, tahina, orange blossom water. The only Middle Eastern restaurants were Cypriot cafes in Soho and Camden Town doing kebabs and hummus.

Q Do old-fashioned cooks in the Middle East still make their own phyllo dough?

A No, they buy it.

Q When I visited Istanbul, I ate some of the best food I've ever had. I had the feeling that it had been made this way for centuries. Tell me some dishes made today in Turkey that are left from the days of the Ottoman Empire.

A Most of the dishes in Turkey today were developed in Ottoman times. (The Empire existed until very recently, from 1299 to 1923.) But many of the very elaborate and labor-intensive dishes have disappeared in the Turkish Republic since the armies of chefs employed by the court and the nobility could no longer be afforded.

Q What are the Turkish dishes that show both its Western and Eastern influences?

A The Ottomans have influenced the food of many Western countries including the Balkans, Hungary, Romania, Greece, so you find many of their dishes in the Western world. Among these dishes are eggplant purees, stuffed vegetables, pilafs, vegetable omelets, savory phyllo pies, rice puddings, baclava.

Q There are several communities of Lebanese-Americans in and around Boston, so many people are familiar with lamejun, and good baba ghanouj and hummus. If it's easy for us to buy these elements of the mezze table, nobody in Lebanon must be making them anymore.

A Although many people in Beirut are extra modern, they still like to cook traditional dishes and entertain a lot in a big way with the help of Sri Lankan maids.

Q Your book is one of the first I've seen that instructs the cook to soak bulgur rather than cook it in boiling water. Hot water turns it to mush! Does the misrepresentation of Middle Eastern cooking methods frustrate you?

A There are many ways to do things. If the result is good, it is fine. If it is a mush, it is not.

Q We think of Morocco as the land of couscous. That's probably because of Paula Wolfert's fine book on the subject. What other dishes are served everywhere?

A Apart from the kemias (Moroccan mezze) there are all kinds of soups, stews, braises, grills, roasts: fish with onion confit or with preserved lemon and green olives; chicken with chestnuts or with dates or with walnuts and figs; pigeons stuffed with date and almond paste; all kinds of lamb tagines with various vegetables -- artichokes and peas, fennel or eggplants. I was at a festival of regional foods where there were seemingly hundreds of dishes and only a few couscous ones.

Q The Moors were expelled from Spain around the same time as the Jews and many in both groups went to Morocco. Does that mean that Moroccan cuisine is infused with influences from both?

A Yes and they say so. I went to a festival in Fez recently where they celebrated the legacies of the "Andalusian" Moors and of the Jews. The title of the festival was "La Cuisine du Lien" (of the bond). They had invited me to speak about Jewish food.

Q Do you think of yourself as a Sephardic Jew, an Egyptian, or an English woman?

A All three. I have a multiple identity. I have lived most of my life in Britain, where I brought up my children, and I have also had a pied-a-terre in Paris for many years. I feel somewhat international. We were happy in Egypt and although today it is not the same Egypt that I knew -- I go there and have a great fondness for the country.

Q When you have guests for an informal dinner, what might be on the menu?

A It is usually dishes that I am writing about and that I keep retrying. Some people say they always expect to eat something they have never eaten before.

Q What do you eat when you've come home late and you're tired and you want something comforting?

A When I'm not traveling I spend nearly all my time at home during the day and go out in the evening. If I don't go out to eat, I have something just before. When I get home it is often too late. If I don't have leftovers and if I'm not trying out a recipe, I have something very quick and simple like sauteed fish, calf's liver, lamb burger, egg fried with garlic and tomato, boiled vegetables with olive oil.

Claudia Roden will be at Boston University’s Food and Wine Seminars on Nov. 9 from 6 to 8 p.m. to cook from "Arabesque" and talk about the cuisines of Morocco, Turkey, and Lebanon. The cost is $80, which includes tastings and a copy of her book. Call 617-353-9852 or go to bu.edu/foodandwine.