XII. Elements of the Medieval Baghdadi Cuisine and Affinities with Ancient Mesopotamian Cooking

With the advent of the Abbasids, Mesopotamia regained its past glory, and Baghdad was transformed into a prosperous and cosmopolitan capital. In addition to its already vast repertoire of animal stock and agricultural products, new foodstuffs were introduced, which added to the richness and variety of its cuisine. As to what constituted this cuisine, it is essential to take into consideration in discussing such issues the newest Arabic culinary manuscripts made available to us in the last quarter of the twentieth century, and the publication of the Babylonian collection of recipes in the early 1980s (see Section VI). It is about time we steered away from the simplistic – and yet so dominant – standpoint that whatever the Abbasid cuisine had to offer is owed to the Persian influence at the time. Indeed, the Persian factor is there, loud and clear, but it was definitely not the only one.