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Author
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Topic: Iranian food
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Lark84
My skeleton is made of creamy nougat.
Member # 1186
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posted 05-04-2007 10:09 AM
Rolken's thread made me think about what I know about Iranian food, and I realized: not a lot.
Instead of going off-topic in his thread, I decided to start my own.
What do you know about Iranian food? Do you think it would be possible to cook it without buying very special meats, fruits etc.?
I've been thinking a bit about "national" cuisine, and it hit me, that for the most part, the base ingredients are mostly the same - meat (pork, lamb, beef), carbs (potatoes, rice, noodles), vegetables and dairy products. My conclusion is that it is mostly the spices which sets the cuisine of different nations apart, except some obvious exceptions like camel meat (dunno if people eat that), japanese seaweed or the Icelandic dish consisting of dried shark buried in a sandy beach for a few months (try cooking that when you live anywhere but an Icelandic beach).
Any thoughts? Got any cool recipes you'd like to share? Is there Iranian takeout in the US?
Registered: Nov 2000
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10,000Lb.Snorlax
loves long time.
Member # 13
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posted 05-04-2007 04:55 PM
the only nationality of cuisine that I really don't like is Indian Food. It is just gross. I'm all about spice and flavor and heat and for some reason indian food still doesn't appeal to me. When I was working at microsoft everyone I worked with was Indian and when we worked late we'd get tons of indian food for dinner and I hated all of it. Granted I ate because it was there and free but gd if 50% of it doesn't just look and feel like vomit/dissentary on rice. Apparently gourmet indian food is wonderful (so people keep trying to convince me) these are the same people who love the vomit on rice stuff.
the worst was we used to get pizza with indian food as topping. Like cheese pizza with gross "spiced" indian meats and vomit on top. That was the last straw.
man I hate indian people
I MEEN FOOD!
I know nothing about Iranian food. I'm sure there are people out there (there is for every cuisine) that will claim it is great terrific and wonderful. have fun with lentil beans and boiled carrot water imo.
From: Denver | Registered: Feb 2000
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Mr. K
Racist
Member # 2
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posted 05-04-2007 09:23 PM
I also know nothing of Iranian cuisine, but if you're thinking about food and its relationship to civilization, check out Guns, Germs, and Steel.
It's an interesting analysis of how some cultures got the bone (sub-Saharan Africa, for example) because they weren't lucky enough to have a decent supply of animals and plants on which to found a civilization.
Also it splains why noone rides zebras.
From: Cinnabar Island | Registered: Feb 2000
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cogito
Farting Nudist
Member # 3809
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posted 05-05-2007 11:55 PM
I've had Iranian food. There was a restaurant a few blocks from where I lived in San Francisco. It was pretty good. Squash, eggplant, and some couscous-type dish are all I remember eating. There was something really sweet, although not as sweet as a dessert would typically be at an Indian restaurant (which is always a little too much in my opinion). The squash was good.
Don't look for restaurants serving "Iranian" food; they won't advertise that. They will call it "Persian Cuisine" and price their food higher because that's more American/British/whatever.
If anyone in the SF bay wants to check out that place I think the address was somewhere in the 300 block on E Broadway right across from one of the strip clubs. I have no idea what the name was. Something arabic.
![[That Guy]](graemlins/thatguy.gif)
From: USA | Registered: Jun 2005
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Rolken
Vulcan
Member # 7
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posted 05-06-2007 02:38 PM
quote:
Originally posted by Mr. K:
Guns, Germs, and Steel
I highly second this recommendation. I talk about that book to anyone who I think has even a passing interest in the subject matter.
The ultimate thrust of the book is to figure out the answer to the question of why some large-scale societies triumphed over others; why Pizarro defeated Atahualpa rather than Atahualpa's men rampaging through Spain. His answer (don't read this sentence if you don't want the answer 'spoiled', but Diamond divulges it pretty early himself) is that the ultimate cause is the shape of the continents - that the east-west axis of Eurasia facilitated a transfer of crops and technology due to similar climates, which triggered a cascade of cause-effect chains that form much of his discussion.
I'm currently reading another book by Jared Diamond called Collapse, in which he tracks the opposite trend; what causes societies to implode upon themselves in varying capacities. It's equally fascinating, though somewhat less far-reaching.
quote:
Originally posted by 10,000Lb.Snorlax:
the only nationality of cuisine that I really don't like is Indian Food.
I love Indian food; we had it at our wedding reception, and most people had never had it and thought it was awesome (with a few "it's interesting"s). But I grew up with it to a degree so eh. Never had Iranian.
From: Provo, UT | Registered: Feb 2000
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White Cat
Nobody knows why I'm an admin.
Member # 42
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posted 05-07-2007 02:47 AM
does ur wife(*) play pokemon
if not u r dead to us
(*) or husband, gotta be inclusive
From: Calgary | Registered: Feb 2000
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Lark84
My skeleton is made of creamy nougat.
Member # 1186
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posted 05-07-2007 03:21 PM
Guns, Germs and Steel sounds very interesting. Thanks for recommending it, K.
It is a fascinating subject matter, and one I think is not considered that often by the average Joe.
I met a man once who had lived and worked in countries like Egypt and Iran (30 years or something ago), and he said that he was convinced that the reason Europe had prospered and was at peace (with WW1 and 2 being obvious exceptions) while the Middle East was a huge powder keg and not that far ahead regarding technology, was that the heat simply made people mad. "It's no wonder they fight all the time, with that heat", he said. I thought at the time that it was an interesting theory, and I had never before considered the role the surrounding environment plays in shaping a civilization - though at second thought it's completely obvious it has a *huge* impact.
He also meant that it was not surprising that civilization (Sumerians, Egyptians etc.) had started in Middle East - with a warm climate, not freezing to death was easy, and less energy needed to be focused on constructing houses and devising ways to survive harsh winters when no food could be grown. On the other hand, he said, Europe's advances in technology came from precisely that need to invent stuff in order to not freeze to death.
I've probably bored you enough retelling his theories already. I should just read the book.
Regarding food: I've never really had Indian food. I ate some kind of Indian bread once (I think it was called Nan but I could be wrong), which was kind of like pancakes, because it was fried, not baked, and flat, and you ate it with a fried egg.
cogito: Thanks to you, I found this: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persian_cuisine> (which redirects to Iranian cuisine, LOL). My days of ignorance are over.
Unbeknownst to me I had already eaten something vaguely Persian - döner kebab (<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C3%B6ner_kebab>), which is a popular fast food in Europe (maybe in the US too?).
Registered: Nov 2000
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Mr. K
Racist
Member # 2
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posted 05-07-2007 08:11 PM
Lark84: ...Europe's advances in technology came from precisely that need to invent stuff in order to not freeze to death.
That's addressed in the book. The author said the theory doesn't hold up, or at least that it doesn't explain as much as you'd think.
He's not always entirely convincing, but he makes some solid arguments and observations.
From: Cinnabar Island | Registered: Feb 2000
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