Exploring the Fascinating History of Tagine Cooking
Tagine, a traditional North African and Middle Eastern cuisine cooked in a conical clay pot, has a rich history rooted in ancient oral tales. Originating from nomadic Berber culture, tagine dishes date back to Roman times and are now popular in Morocco and Tunisia. The versatility of tagine allows for various dishes to be cooked, combining flavors and creating unique culinary experiences.
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COOKING IN A TAGINE BY DAME SIBELLA
WHAT IS TAGINE? Tagine is both a cuisine and a pot in which that cuisine is cooked. The earliest mention of tagine style cooking occurs in One Thousand and One Nights, the collected oral history of Middle Eastern and North African tales. Many of these tales, whose authorship is unknown and varied, are bardic tales which date to the late Dark Ages and early Middle Ages.
THE THOUSAND AND ONE NIGHTS By the mid-20th century, six successive forms had been identified: two 8th-century Arabic translations of the Persian Haz r afs na, called Alf khurafah and Alf laylah; a 9th- century version based on Alf laylah but including other stories then current; the 10th- century work by al-Jahshiy r ; a 12th-century collection, including Egyptian tales; and the final version, extending to the 16th century and consisting of the earlier material with the addition of stories of the Islamic Counter-Crusades and tales brought to the Middle East by the Mongols. Most of the tales best known in the West primarily those of Aladdin, Ali Baba, and Sindbad were much later additions to the original corpus. I https://www.britannica.com/topic/The-Thousand-and-One-Nights)
EARLIEST HISTORY OF TAGINE Dishes cooked tagine-style are to be found in some of these tales. It is difficult to find evidence of exactly when and where the tagine was invented . Indeed, according to Michael Bonifay (2005) in LRCW 2: Late Roman Coarse Wares, Cooking Wares and Amphorae in the Mediterranean: Archaeology and Archaeometry, Part 1, archeological finds of Roman cookware of the 2ndcentury resembled modern Moroccan-Tunisian tagines. This type of cooking in a clay vessel is known throughout our time period and throughout this area. It likely went to Spain with the Arab invasion there. However, in modern times, it is most commonly associated with Morocco and Tunisia.
ORAL HISTORY OF TAGINE The tagine, according to oral history in the area, was originally used as a kind of mobile oven among the Berber people, a nomadic people who spread from Egypt to what is now northern West Africa (Western Sahara and Mauritania). Tagine is both a food and the dish it is cooked in. You can make anything you might bake in an oven in a tagine, and more.
COOKING TAGINES There are two distinct types of tagine. One is a red clay pot, occasionally with black decoration. These can be either glazed or unglazed. These are Moroccan cooking tagines.
SERVING TAGINES The second type is a highly decorative white glazed clay pot with painted decorations. Some examples can be seen here. These must ONLY be used to serve food, never to cook it.
WHERE CAN I BUY A TAGINE? In order to cook, you need a cooking tagine. They come in various sizes. This is a medium to large tagine. a family of four even with large appetites can easily be fed out of the large tagine. https://www.amazon.com/Moroccan-Cooking-Handmade-12- Traditional/dp/B07F94PTCV/ref=sr_1_5?dchild=1&keywords=cooking+tagine&qid=15879345 82&sr=8-5 Many people will be just as happy with a medium tagine. https://www.amazon.com/Moroccan- Medium-Cooking-Tagine- 10/dp/B003JK1G8S/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=cooking+tagine&qid=1587934582&sr=8- 2
PREPARING THE TAGINE FOR FIRST USE Whichever size you get, you absolutely must season the pot. First, you should submerge it completely in water for at least 24 hours. Ours went into a large camping tubby filled with water for several days, mostly because I forgot about it. Then, it should be dried off, and left to dry on the counter for an hour or so. Then, you should coat it inside and out with olive oil and place it in the oven. ONLY THEN should you turn the oven on. The pot must be allowed to come up to temperature gradually, lest it suffer thermal shock and crack. Set the oven to 350 degrees; once the oven reaches the temperature, set the timer for two hours. When two hours is over, turn the oven off and allow the tagine to cool completely inside the oven.
WHERE CAN I COOK WITH A TAGINE? Tagines can be used in a bed of coals, over a low campfire, on a gas stove or ring, or on an electric stove. If using it on a stove top, I recommend a heat diffuser. This helps prevent hot spots in a modern stove from transmitting to the tagine. In order to cook with the tagine, you will also need a heat diffuser if you have a gas stove or you want to use it on a gas ring or gas camping stove. https://www.amazon.com/s?k=heat+diffuser+for+gas+stovetop&crid=3C9K2C8LV14KH&spre fix=heat+diffuser+%2Caps%2C148&ref=nb_sb_ss_i_1_14 I have this one. https://www.amazon.com/Diffuser-Stove-Electric-Flame- Simmer/dp/B07664Z2MN/
THE FUN PART The most common meats cooked in tagine are beef, lamb, and chicken. Today, I am making chicken tagine. You should marinate your chicken overnight or all day, but at least two hours. Liberally coat it with a little oil, a little acid, and a lot of spices anything you like, really. Everyone makes tagine differently, and you can find a recipe for almost any taste. I will warn you that I have never seen one without onions, but that is common in African cooking and I assure you that the onions cook down into almost nothing. I like to marinate everything. So I have sliced two onions quite fine, and marinated my chicken. This will make the food tasty if you hate your taste buds you can leave this out to make some bland food.
MY RECIPE FOR THE MARINADE ON THE CHICKEN 1.5 TBS SPICE BLEND (CITRUS GARLIC RUB) 1/2 TSP SALT AND 1/2 TSP PEPPER 2 POUNDS OF BONELESS, SKINLESS THIGHS 1/8 C OIL, TBS VINEGAR
HOW TO TOOK You put the diffuser on the burner, then the tagine. Then place the onions and a little water a VERY little water in the bottom of the tagine. Turn on the burner. Then layer on the chicken. Then you close it up and cook on VERY low mine is on 2.5 here for about 30 minutes for boneless, skinless thighs. They will NOT be fully cooked. Then you layer on the vegetables: in my case, I ve marinated spears of potatoes, carrots, sweet potatoes, and squash. The first three go on first because they take longer to cook, then I wait about 15-20 minutes and layer the squash on top, since it cooks faster. Then pop the top back on.
FINAL WORDS When we come back in an hour or so, we can check on the progress. It won t be totally done, but you can see how it s going. You can serve as-is for a keto friendly meal, or with rice or, most common in North Africa, couscous. My couscous is made with about twice as much butter as the box calls for, but it s a lot better that way. And that s what I ll be eating tonight!
