Fair’s Fair “For Book Lovers”

I have accumulated a lot of books, but there is one type of book I don’t own and that’s a cookbook. I have no need for one, since I just throw everything into the microwave or a hot pot. But, if I were in need of a cookbook, I would likely turn to the ones online first. Tonight, I decided to explore what’s available should I ever decide to become domestic and actually use the oven or the electric stove for the purposes they were meant to serve. In truth, though, it’s not that I’ve never read a cookbook! There is one online I enjoy and that’s Serving the Guest: Sufi Cookbook and Art Gallerystrong>at the following:. http://www.superluminal.com/cookbook/ .

Serving the Guest contains everything from quotations concerning the word “sustenance” to stories about food in China and other parts of the world, dating back to ancient times, to ancient Sufi prayers, and discussions about “generosity and giving” contributed to the Prophet Mohammed. The selections of Islamic Art are quite beautiful and the site as a whole is stunningly artistic. The recipes for various types of tea and meals are extremely good. I can attest to this, since I have a friend in Edmonton who during one of her sabbaticals decided to experiment with the recipes on the site. She became a bit obsessive about trying every recipe. Once per week for months we made tea, based on the Sufi site recipes for this ancient beverage. I lived in a small suite and was attempting to study for my Ph.D. exams at the time, so I had few dishes and not a lot of space, because most of my kitchen shelves sufficed as bookcases for my personal library.

Anyway, I had enough space and a kettle to make tea—from rose hip tea to various types of ginger tea. We ground, boiled, stirred, and brewed, and made the various concoctions that were usually quite tasty. Sometimes this tea-making took us on journeys in search of the right ingredients to what is known as Little India—an area in Edmonton that has a number of India related restaurants, groceries, clothing shops, and books and music in Urdu, Arabic, and various other languages of the East and Middle East.

At my friend’s house (a house with about ten rooms and a large kitchen) we experimented with meals. The official taste tester, I ate a lot of things that I had never tried before, and occasionally when I was short of cash I would make Sufi curry at my place and eat it for a week or so. The spices just seemed to blend in all the more, the more it was re-microwaved. I became a bit obsessed with chickpeas that year. It always fascinated me that so few could make so much. They always shone in the pot, and they would make little crackling noises as if trying to speak. No, I’m not schizophrenic. I know they didn’t really speak to me, but I liked to pretend that they did.

And thus, the Sufi Cookbook online carries for me fond memories of tasty food, friendship, journies, and the exotic world far from that of the life of the graduate student I was then. I gather that some people become cookbook collectors, which in another lifetime, if I become a collector of things, might be a fun pursuit. Now, though, I’ll just read the stories on the Serving the Guest: Sufi Cookbook site and hope others buy all the cookbooks that are out there waiting to be thumbed and tested.