From Persia to Napa: Wine at the Persian Table - Hardcover

Najmieh Batmanglij; Dick Davis; Burke Owens

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1933823003 ISBN 13: 9781933823003

Publisher: Mage Publishers, 2006

Synopsis

Wine is seen as the natural partner of many great cuisines, but few people associate in with Persian food. The ties, in fact, are age-old. This book weaves together history, poetry, a look at modern viniculture, recipes and wine pairings to celebrate the rightful relationship of wine and food on the Persian table.

About this title

From the Inside Flap:

Wine is seen as the natural partner of many great cuisines, but few people associate it with Persian food, one of the world’s most sophisticated culinary traditions. The ties, in fact, are age-old. From Persia to Napa: Wine at the Persian Table (Mage; $50; 264 pages, with 160 color photos) weaves together history, poetry, a look at modern viniculture, and a wealth of recipes and wine pairings to celebrate the rightful relationship of wine and food on the Persian table.“Whoever seeks the origins of wine must be crazy,” a Persian poet once declared, implying that simple enjoyment of this greatest gift of the grape ought to be enough. Since he wrote those words, however, winemaking has been traced all the way back to the northern uplands of the Fertile Crescent some seven millennia ago, the start of a journey that would take it across the Near East and then into Europe in the dawning years of civilization. Iran was one of the nurseries of the wine grape, and, as empires rose and fell there, princes, priests, poets and people in ordinary walks of life all embraced wine in various ways. After Islam came to Iran, wine drinking sometimes slipped from public view, but it never disappeared.In this lavishly illustrated book, Najmieh Batmanglij explores that long and eventful history, then shifts her story to California’s famed Napa Valley, half a world away. There, in a kind of up-to-the-minute homage to the past, an Iranian-American named Darioush Khaledi uses the latest vinicultural techniques to make superb wines at a winery reminiscent of Persepolis, the ceremonial capital of the ancient Persian empire. The final section of the book offers 80 recipes, a guide to Persian hospitality, both old and new, and seasonal menus for various occasions. Grapes play a role in most of the recipes, whether in the form of the fruit, the leaf, the juice, the syrup, unripe grapes or their juice (verjuice), vinegar or wine. Although these recipes are presented for the modern table, they are traditional—based on sources as various as a tenth-century Persian cookbook or the culinary archives of a sixteenth-century Persian court.The book has two special sections. One, written by Dick Davis, a leading authority on Persian literature, discusses the unique links between poetry and wine-drinking in Persian culture. The other, by wine-and-food expert Burke Owens, offers guidelines for pairing wine with the distinctive ingredients used in Persian cooking. He has also provided wine suggestions for each recipe.

About the Author:

Introducing people to the pleasures of Persian cuisine has been a lifelong mission for Najmieh Batmanglij. Her New Food of Life: Ancient Persian and Modern Iranian Cooking and Cerimonies was called "The definitive book of Persian cooking" by The Los Angeles Times, and her Silk Road Cooking: A Vegetarian Journey was selected as one of the Vegetarian Cookbooks of 2004 by The New York Times. She has spent the past 25 years traveling, teaching cooking, and adapting authentic Persian recipes to tastes and techniques in the West. She is a member of Les Dames d'Escoffier and has taught and lectured throughout the United States. She currently lives in Washington, DC, where she is teaching master classes in Persian cooking and is working on a new book for children to cook with the family.

DICK DAVIS is a poet, scholar and professor. He is also the foremost translator of Persian poetry as well as a poet who has published numerous volumes of his own poetry to critical acclaim, including: Belonging: Poems (the Economist magazines's 2002 poetry book of the year). He is currently professor of Persian at Ohio State University and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

BURKE OWENS is Associate Curator of Wine at Copia: The American Center for Wine, Food & the Arts in Napa, California, where he is responsible for Copia's many and varied wine programs, including wine education.

About this edition

• Publisher: Mage Publishers
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 1933823003
• ISBN 13: 9781933823003
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 264