Cooking is the easiest way of crossing the threshold into another culture. Paris has become as important on the ethnic cuisine circuit as London or New York. The regions included in this book are the Maghreb: Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria; Southeast Asia and China: Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos, and ••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• China; Japan; Lebanon; and the former French Paris is a great food city. Its unrivalled West Africa and French Congo: Senegal, Mali, reputation spans the globe. The city’s Mauritania, and Congo. At-home cooks will fi nd exceptional and delicious culinary scene has it easy to bring the multicultural fl avors of the been slowly evolving so that today, eating in French melting pot into their own kitchens. Paris is no longer limited to traditional French cuisine. Mouth-watering ethnic cuisine, cooked With the added bonus of travel tips in Paris more often than not by immigrants from former to four-star ethnic restaurants as well as French colonies, has turned Paris into a delight corner shops in ethnic markets and beautiful, for Epicureans who not only relish a traditional original four-color line drawings by Paris-based French confi t de canard, but who also want to Lebanese illustrator Dinah Diwan, The Ethnic savor tastes of a Moroccan prune tangine or a Paris Cookbook enables cooks to travel via savory Vietnamese Pho. their palate—ethnic Parisian cuisine will come to your kitchen. The fi rst book on the market to focus on the CHARLOTTE PUCKETTE, chef and owner of Cuisines et Traditions du Monde, her catering company ethnic infl uences on Paris’s haute cuisine, the based in Paris, France, was born in North Carolina. Charlotte developed her passion for cooking while more than 100 recipes—including starters, she was traveling and working in East Africa. Currently Charlotte is actively introducing people to ethnic BRINGING THE FRENCH MELTING POT INTO YOUR KITCHEN All illustrations by Dinah Diwan. cuisine through her catering. She teaches cooking classes and guides tours through Paris food markets. main courses, and desserts—are selected and Author photo courtesy of the authors. adapted from internationally renowned chefs OLIVIA KIANG-SNAIJE was born in Egypt of Chinese and American parents. She grew up in Rome such as Faterna Hal of the Mansouria restaurant and Paris and later caught the travel bug, in particular spending time in North Africa and the Middle East and Robert Vifi an of Tan Dinh restaurant, as well where she fell in love with the food. As editor-in-chief of World Media in Paris, Olivia published a magazine as from food lovers transplanted from places as circulated by 26 newspapers worldwide. She is a reporter for The Daily Star, the largest English-language vast as Cambodia, Tunisia, or the Ivory Coast, newspaper in the Middle East, and writes for Tango magazine in New York. She lives in London. who are now established Parisians but retain their culture through their cuisine. However, complex fl avors don’t necessarily mean complicated recipes. These will be easy-to- follow recipes with step-by-step instructions. 7¼ x 9¼” • 256 pages 100 full-color illustrations throughout $30.00 USA • $35.00 Canada Publication date: April 2007 Discover more at www.dk.com Author tour CHARLOTTE PUCKETTE AND OLIVIA KIANG-SNAIJE 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 001 11/10/06 K72 00 the ethnic paris cookbook Titles: Ethnic Paris Cook Book-TD309 Size: 184 x 235 (Bleed5mm) 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 002 11/10/06 K72 00 003 11/10/06 K72 00 Titles: Ethnic Paris Cook Book-TD309 Size: 184 x 235 (Bleed5mm) 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 002 11/10/06 K72 00 003 11/10/06 K72 00 the ethnic paris cookbook by charlotte puckette and olivia kiang-snaije dk publishing Titles: Ethnic Paris Cook Book-TD309 Size: 184 x 235 (Bleed5mm) 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 004 12/10/06 K72/55 00 005 12/10/06 K72/55 00 LONDON, NEW YORK, MUNICH, MELBOURNE, AND DELHI senior editor anja schmidt designer jessica park managing art editor michelle baxter art director dirk kaufman dtp coordinator kathy farias production manager ivor parker executive managing editor sharon lucas publisher carl raymond Published by DK Publishing 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014 07 08 09 10 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 © 2007 by Dorling Kindersley Ltd. Text and illustrations © 2007 by Charlotte Puckette and Olivia Snaije All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner. DK Books are available at special discounts for bulk purchases for sales promotions, premiums, fund-raising, or educational use. For details contact DK Publishing Special Markets, 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014 or [email protected]. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN 978-0-7566-2645-7 Color reproduction by Colourscan, Singapore Printed and bound in Singapore by Star Standard (Pte.) Ltd. Discover more at www.dk.com Titles: Ethnic Paris Cook Book-TD309 Size: 184 x 235 (Bleed5mm) 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 004 12/10/06 K72/55 00 005 12/10/06 K72/55 00 contents introduction 6 •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• a culinary journey couscous in the cafeteria 10 •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• The Maghreb: Morocco, algeria, and Tunisia bo bun business 64 •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• VieTnaM, caMbodia, laos, and china Waiting for Wagashi 118 •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• japan africa sur seine 162 •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• caMeroon, senegal, The WesT indies, and The caribbean the best mezze West of beirut 206 •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• lebanon and syria glossary • index • acknoWlegments 250 •••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••• (WiTh source suggesTions and subsTiTuTe recoMMendaTions) Titles: Ethnic Paris Cook Book-TD309 Size: 184 x 235 (Bleed5mm) 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 006 11/10/06 K77 00 007 11/10/06 K77 00  THE ETHNIC PARIS COOKBOOK A CULINARY JOURNEY Tahar Ben Jelloun, the renowned Moroccan book that paid tribute to these diverse and writer and Paris resident of 37 years, once sumptuous cuisines was long overdue. wrote, “We cannot take our house, our olive When we arrived in Paris years ago, tree, our well water with us. Cooking has an cilantro, star anise, orange blossom water, almost therapeutic effect on our nostalgia.” or preserved lemons were hard to come Like Tahar Ben Jelloun, a multitude of by. Nowadays it is likely that most Paris immigrants from French ex-colonies and residents have a Tunisian greengrocer protectorates live in Paris. They have arrived around the corner who carries most of the in successive waves over the last 60 years: necessary ingredients for making a tangy Senegalese, Cameroonians, Algerians, North African carrot and cumin appetizer, or Tunisians, Moroccans, Vietnamese, a Lebanese mezzé. Cambodians, Laotians, and Lebanese, to Both transplanted from elsewhere, but name a few. Most of them go to extraordinary long-time residents of Paris, we met while lengths to reproduce the food from their dropping off our children at school. The countries, retaining their culture through their idea for writing this book came about after cuisine. As a result, eating in Paris no longer we realized our conversations consistently means just French food. turned to ethnic cuisine in Paris and which These days in Paris, it’s easy to new place we had discovered in what make a culinary journey through the neighborhood. Charlotte is a graduate of city, experiencing the best dishes from the Cordon Bleu cooking school and has France’s former colonies. We felt that a been running a catering company for several Titles: Ethnic Paris Cook Book-TD309 Size: 184 x 235 (Bleed5mm) 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 006 11/10/06 K77 00 007 11/10/06 K77 00 INTRODUCTION  years. She had drifted away from traditional and even healing ritual. It was a poetic way French cuisine, following the lead from of remembering the good things about her clients who didn’t want shrimp hors their countries. d’oeuvres with a French sauce anymore. We realized we had many resources They wanted peanut, ginger, and lime at our fingertips: from the Japanese dressing. They weren’t interested in pâté hairdresser who had been speaking en croûte; they wanted an assortment of passionately and almost exclusively about Moroccan salads. food upon each visit, to an anesthesiologist Olivia is a journalist, freelancing for a friend with family from Hong Kong—his variety of newspapers and magazines, grandmother’s Chinese restaurant turned mainly covering the foreign communities out to be the first of its kind in the now in Paris. In interviews with exiled writers, famously Asian 13th arrondissement. filmmakers, and artists, her subjects often Thérèse, the Cameroonian woman who talked about food. Discussing, preparing, opened the fair trade shop we loved to go and eating food from the countries they had to, impressed us by being a first-class cook. left behind was essential—it was a soothing Everyone had suggestions and connections. “The mere smell of cooking can evoke a whole civilizaTion.” —Fernand Braudel Titles: Ethnic Paris Cook Book-TD309 Size: 184 x 235 (Bleed5mm) 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 008 11/10/06 K77 00 009 11/10/06 K77 00  THE ETHNIC PARIS COOKBOOK Our book includes recipes we sought from a Vietnamese or Moroccan meal. (We made chefs, ranging from internationally renowned one exception and included Japan in the Fatema Hal, of the Mansouria restaurant book, because of the privileged relationship (whose line of Moroccan food products are the French and Japanese have in terms of sold around the world), to chefs from tiny an intense and mutual admiration for each neighborhood restaurants. The recipes come other’s cuisines.) from people from former French colonies and Most of the people we met were protectorates, because the largest ethnic incredibly warm and generous, showing us groups in Paris are from these countries. their kitchens, cooking with us, and patiently With London right next door, we can’t claim answering questions about sahlab or African Paris is the best place for an Indian dinner, djansan seeds. Sometimes people were but we can say with confidence that it is for so enthusiastic about feeding us that they forgot about giving us recipes. We kept returning to Feyrouz, a Lebanese restaurant, where the owner Adel Raad had promised to give us some recipes. He clucked over us and had us eating copious meals on an almost regular basis until we finally extracted the recipes from him. Other people had heartwarming success stories to tell, such as Ouendeno Moriba, a tall, elegant Malian, who now owns a company that produces natural African fruit juices, teas, spices, and vacuum-packed Titles: Ethnic Paris Cook Book-TD309 Size: 184 x 235 (Bleed5mm) 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 1 135123 2:30W2k-2 008 11/10/06 K77 00 009 11/10/06 K77 00 INTRODUCTION  “The sorT of meal one can have in Paris is a cosmoPoliTan ToTaliTy wiTh every ParT of The world rePresenTed by iTs ProducTs.” —Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin prepared African dishes. As one of the only In the end, we don’t claim in any way to African students in his field of study in a be experts on any particular type of cuisine. university in northeastern France, he vowed We simply wanted to show this vibrant side one day to introduce the French to African of Paris that we felt needed to be celebrated. cooking. Moriba, Les Saveurs d’Afrique now Our task was to go out and get people from sells all over Europe and to Fairway in the a broad ethnic swath to give us delicious United States. recipes that they cooked here in Paris, even As we went along, we asked another if they had invented them or if they weren’t mother from school, long-time Paris resident exactly traditional. We adapted their recipes and Lebanese illustrator, Dinah Diwan, to join to Western kitchens, and when there was a in on the enterprise. We felt that her evocative good story to go along with the recipe, we and colorful work would perfectly complement included it as well. the flavors of our cookbook. Needless to say, Dinah is also an excellent cook. —Paris, August 2006 Titles: Ethnic Paris Cook Book-TD309 Size: 184 x 235 (Bleed5mm)