Mediterranean cuisine

Mediterranean cuisineis the food and methods of preparation used by the people of theMediterranean Basin. The idea of a Mediterranean cuisine originates with the cookery writerElizabeth David's book,A Book of Mediterranean Food(1950), and was amplified by other writers working in English.
Many writers define the three core elements of the cuisine as the olive, wheat, and the grape, yieldingolive oil, bread and pasta, and wine; other writers deny that the widely varied foods of the Mediterranean basin constitute a cuisine at all. A common definition of the geographical area covered, proposed by David, follows the distribution of theolive tree.
The region spans a wide variety of cultures with distinct cuisines, in particular (going anticlockwise around the region) theMaghrebi,Egyptian,Levantine,Ottoman(Turkish),Greek,Italian,French(Provençal), andSpanish, although some authors include additional cuisines.Portuguese cuisine, in particular, is partly Mediterranean in character.
The historical connections of the region, as well as the impact of the Mediterranean Sea onthe region's climateand economy, mean that these cuisines share dishes beyond the core trio of oil, bread, and wine, such as roast lamb ormutton, meatstewswith vegetables and tomato (for example, Spanishandrajos), vegetable stews (Provençalratatouille, Spanishpisto, Italianciambotta),and the salted cured fish roe,bottarga, found across the region. Spirits based onaniseare drunk in many countries around the Mediterranean.
The cooking of the area is not to be confused with theMediterranean diet, made popular because of the apparent health benefits of a diet rich in olive oil, wheat and other grains,fruits,vegetables, and a certain amount ofseafood, but low inmeatanddairy products. Mediterranean cuisine encompasses the ways that these and other ingredients, including meat, are dealt with in the kitchen, whether they are health-giving or not.
Various authors have defined the scope of Mediterranean cooking either by geography or by its core ingredients.Elizabeth David, in herA Book of Mediterranean Food(1950), defines her scope as "the cooking of the Mediterranean shores" and sketches out the geographical limits:
Despite this definition, David's book focuses largely on Spain, France, Italy, and Greece.
She defines this region as coextensive with the range of theolive tree: "those blessed lands of sun and sea and olive trees."The olive's natural distribution is limited byfrostand by availability of water. It is therefore constrained to a more or less narrow zone around theMediterranean Sea, except in theMaghreband in theIberian Peninsula, where it is distributed more widely, and on the islands of the Mediterranean, where it is widespread.
The Tunisian historian Mohamed Yassine Essid similarly defines the region by the olive's presence, along with bread, wheat, and the grape as the "basic products of Mediterranean folk cuisine":
Other authors question that there is any such common core:
Some writers include the cuisines of the easternAdriaticcoast ofDalmatia—Albanian,Montenegrin, andCroatian, while most do not mention them. Some writers also include areas not touching the Mediterranean Sea or supporting olive cultivation, includingSerbian,Macedonian, andPortuguesecuisine.
Essid identifies the "trinity" of basic ingredients of traditional Mediterranean cuisine as the olive, wheat, and the grape, yielding oil, bread, and wine respectively.The archaeologistColin Renfrewcalls this the "Mediterranean triad".
The olive appears to come from the region ofPersiaandMesopotamia, at least 6,000 years ago.It spread from there to nearby areas, and has been cultivated since the early Bronze Age (up to 3,150 BC) in southernTurkey, theLevant, and Crete.The ten countries with the largest harvests (in 2011) are all near the Mediterranean (Portugal being the tenth largest): together, they produce 95% of the world's olives.
The olive yields bitter fruits, made edible by curing andfermentation, andolive oil. Some 90% of the fruit production (1996) goes into olive oil.The Mediterranean region accounts for the world's highest consumption of olive oil: in 2014, the highest-consuming country, Greece, used 17 kgper head; Italy, 12 kg, Spain, 13 kg; the United States for comparison used only 1 kg per head.
Wheat was domesticated in theFertile Crescent, in and near the Levant some 10,000 years ago. Its ancestors include wildemmer wheat; this washybridised, harvested and sown to create domestic strains with larger grains, in ears that shatter less readily than wild forms.It was spread across the Mediterranean region as far as Spain by 5,000 BC.
Wheat is a staple food in the Mediterranean region. Wheatbreadwas already critically important in the empire ofancient Rome, which included the entire region; at that time, around 2,000 years ago,North Africawas the "breadbasket" of the empire.Other staple wheat-based Mediterranean foods includepastaandsemolina(wheat middlings) products such ascouscousandbulgur.In turn, these are made into dishes such as the Greek dessertgalaktoboureko(milk börek), consisting of filo pastry parcels around a custard made with semolina.A widespread wheat dish from Turkey and the Levant to Iran and India ishalva, a dessert of sweetened semolina with butter, milk, andpine kernels.
The grape was domesticated between 7,000 and 4,000 BC between theBlack Seaand Persia; archaeological evidence shows that wine was being made there by 6,000 BC, reaching Greece and Crete in the fifth millennium BC and Spain by the last millennium BC. Winemaking started in Italy in the ninth century BC, and in France around 600 BC.
Grapes are mostly grown for making wine and vinegar as basic components of the Mediterranean diet, as well for drying asraisinsor for eating astable grapes. Raisins and table grape varieties are chosen for their flavour.
The concept of a Mediterranean cuisine is very recent, probably dating from the publication of David'sA Book of Mediterranean Food(1950).David herself did not use the term, speaking instead of Mediterranean "food", "cookery", or "cooking".The usefulness of the concept is disputed. Carol Helstosky, author of the bookFood Culture in the Mediterranean(2009), is among the authors who use "Mediterranean cuisine" interchangeably with "Mediterranean food". In the preface to her book she writes:
Essid acknowledges that "geographical differences and the vicissitudes of history" have affected the food of different Mediterranean lands, but nonetheless asserts that:
On the other hand,Sami Zubaidaargues in his bookCulinary Cultures of the Middle East(1994) that:
The cookery author Clifford A. Wright wrote in 1999: "There really is no such thing as 'Mediterranean cuisine'. At the same time, we seem to know what we mean when we use the expression ..."Wright argued that David's book itself was largely about specificallyFrenchMediterranean food, pointing out that "only 4 percent of her recipes come from North Africa or the Levant", so that the focus was on an aspect ofEuropean cuisine, largely omitting coverage ofMiddle Eastern cuisine.
Since David's time, a variety of books on Mediterranean cuisine have been written, including Abu Shihab's 2012 book of that name;Helstosky's 2009 book; books by other cookery writers include S. Rowe'sPurple Citrus and Sweet Perfume: Cuisine of the Eastern Mediterranean(2011);and Mari-Pierre Moine'sMediterranean Cookbook(2014).There are many more cookbooks covering specific cuisines in the Mediterranean area, such as B. Santich'sThe Original Mediterranean Cuisine: Medieval Recipes for Today(1995), on Catalan and Italian recipes;and H. F. Ullman's (2006), on the cooking of Tunisia,Spain,and Italy,each one subtitled "Mediterranean Cuisine".
The ingredients of Mediterranean cuisine are to an extent different from those of the cuisine ofNorthern Europe, with olive oil instead ofbutter, and wine instead ofbeer. The list of available ingredients has changed over the centuries. One major change was theintroduction of many foodsby theArabs to Portugal, Spain, andSicilyin theMiddle Ages.Those foods included aubergines,spinach,sugar cane,rice,apricots, andcitrus fruits,creating the distinctive culinary tradition ofAl-Andalus.
Another major change was thearrival of foods from the Americasinearly modern times(around the sixteenth century), notably theincorporation of the potatointo Northern European cuisine,and the eager adoption of thetomatointo Mediterranean cuisine. The tomato, so central now to that cuisine, was first described in print byPietro Andrea Mattioliin 1544. Similarly, many of the species ofPhaseolusbeansnow used around the Mediterranean, includingP. vulgaris(the French or haricot bean), were brought back from the Americas by Spanish and Portuguese explorers.
David's introduction to her 1950 book characterises the cooking of the Mediterranean countries as "conditioned naturally by variations in climate and soil and the relative industry or indolence of the inhabitants".
David identifies "the ever recurring elements" in the food of this extensive region as olive oil,saffron,garlic, "pungent" local wines, as well as the "aromatic perfume" of herbs, especiallyrosemary, wildmarjoram, andbasil, and the bright colours of fresh foods in the markets, "pimentos,aubergines,tomatoes,olives,melons,figs" and "shiny fish, silver,vermilion, or tiger-striped". She includes cheeses of "sheep's or goat's milk", "figsfrom Smyrna on long strings" and "sheets of apricot paste which is dissolved in water to make a cooling drink".
With common ingredients including the olive, wheat, and grape; a shared climate; and a long period for cultural exchange, it might be expected that a single, pan-Mediterranean cuisine would have developed. Certain items, such as olive oil,bread,wine,roast lamb, ormutton(such as Maghrebiméchoui, Greekkleftikoandsouvlaki, and Turkishshish kebab),bottarga,and stews of meat with vegetables and tomato (such as Spanishandrajos, Frenchestouffade à la provençale[fr],Italianciambotta, and Turkishbuğu kebabı), are indeed found all around the Mediterranean.Seafoodincludingsea breamandsquidis eaten, often in stews, stuffed, or fried, in Spanish, French, and Italian dishes.Despite this, however, the lands bordering the Mediterranean sea have distinct regional cuisines, from the Maghrebi, Levant, and Ottoman to the Italian, French, and Spanish. Each of those, in turn, has national and provincial variations.
Mediterranean Maghrebi cuisine includes the cuisines ofAlgeria,Libya,Morocco, andTunisia. One of the most characteristic dishes of the region is couscous, a steamed, small-grained wheat semolina, served with a stew. The dish is ancient, mentioned by the Medieval travellerIbn Battuta,and found for example also in theWestern Sicilian cuisine, especially in the province ofTrapani, where it was re-introduced after 1600.
One stew that may be served with couscous is theMoroccantagine, a hearty, somewhat dry dish of meat and vegetables, cooked slowly in a pot (called a tagine) with a tall conical lid. Dishes from the Maghreb region of North Africa are often coloured and flavoured with the hot spice mixturesharissaandras el hanout(containing such spices as cumin, coriander, saffron, cinnamon, cloves, chillies, and paprika). Other characteristic flavourings of the region are preserved lemons and dried apricots and raisins.
Egyptian cuisine hasancient roots, with evidence that, for example,cheesehas been made in Egypt since at least 3,000 BC.Falafel are small fried croquettes of bean orchickpeaflour, currently also eaten across the Levant and the West, but originating in Egypt's Roman era; they are claimed as theirs byCoptic Christians.Duqqais a dip made of pounded herbs, hazelnuts, and spices, eaten with bread.Kushariis avegandishof rice, lentils, and pasta, variously garnished; it began as food for the poor, but has become a national dish.
Levantine cuisine is the cooking of the Levant (Mediterranean coast, east of Egypt). Among the most distinctive foods of this cuisine are traditional smallmezedishes such astabbouleh,hummus, andbaba ghanoush.Tabbouleh is a dish of bulgur cracked wheat with tomatoes, parsley, mint, and onion, dressed with olive oil and lemon juice.Baba ghanoush, sometimes called "poor man's caviar", is a puree of aubergine with olive oil, often mixed with chopped onion, tomato, cumin, garlic, lemon juice, and parsley. The dish is popular across the whole of the Eastern Mediterranean and North Africa.
Ful medames, originally from Egypt and still a national dish there, consists offava beanswith oil and cumin; it is popular throughout the Levant.The dish may be ancient: dried beans ofNeolithicage have been found nearNazareth, Israel.
Ottoman cuisine has given rise to the cuisines of modernTurkey, parts of theBalkans,Cyprus, andGreece. A distinctive element is the family of small flaky pastries calledbörek. These are popular and widespread across the Eastern Mediterranean region, and date as far back as ancient Roman times.Börekare made of thin sheets offilopastry, filled with mixtures such as meat, caramelised onion and sweet peppers.
Another widespreadand popular dish ismoussaka, a baked dish of aubergine or potato with various other ingredients: often minced meat and tomatoes, sometimes a layer ofegg custardorbéchamel sauceon top. In its Greek variant, well known outside the region, it includes layers of aubergine and minced meat with custard or béchamel sauce on top, but that version is a relatively recent innovation, introduced by the chefNikolaos Tselementesin the 1920s.
Greek cookery makes wide use of vegetables, olive oil, grains, fish, wine, and meat (white and red, includinglamb,poultry,rabbit, andpork). Other important ingredients include olives, cheese, aubergine, courgette, lemon juice, vegetables, herbs, bread, and yoghurt. Some more dishes that can be traced back to ancient Greece are:lentilsoup,fasolada,retsina(white or rosé wine flavoured with pine resin), andpasteli(sesame seeds baked with honey); some to theHellenisticandRomanperiods include:loukaniko(dried pork sausage); andByzantium:feta cheese,avgotaraho(bottarga), andpaximadhia(rusk).Lakerda(pickled fish),mizithracheese and desserts such asdiples,koulourakia,moustokouloura, andmelomakaronoalso date back to the Byzantine period, while the variety of differentpitasprobably dates back to ancient times. Much of Greek cuisine is part of the larger tradition of Ottoman cuisine, the names of the dishes revealing Arabic, Persian, or Turkish roots: moussaka,tzatziki,yuvarlakia,keftes, and so on. Many dishes' names probably entered the Greek vocabulary during Ottoman times, or earlier in contact with the Persians and the Arabs. However, some dishes may be pre-Ottoman, only taking Turkish names later; the historians of food John Ash andAndrew Dalby, for example, speculate that grape-leafdolmadheswere made by the early Byzantine period, whileAlan Davidsontracestrahanato the ancient Greektragosandskordaliato the ancient Athenianskorothalmi.
David barely mentioned the non-GreekBalkans, stating only that yoghurt and moussaka are widespread in the region.Some later cooks, such as Paula Wolfert, give a few recipes from Dalmatia, some being Ottoman.
Albena Shkodrova notes that the cuisines of the coastal provinces ofIstriaand Dalmatia were influenced byVenice. She adds that cuisines labelled as "Italian" and "Mediterranean" are becoming popular in the Balkans, which she calls "a historical crossroads of Oriental, Mediterranean and Central-European influences".
MediterraneanItalian cuisineincludes much of Italy outside thenorthand the mountainous inland regions. It is a diverse cuisine, but among its best-known and most characteristic foods are pizza inNeapolitanandSicilian styles, pasta dishes such asspaghetti, andrisotto.
Risotto is a dish made using Italian short-grain rice, which is both highly absorbent and resistant to turning into a pudding when cooked withstockand flavoured with onions and garlic, cooked in butter.Anna Gosetti della Salda's book of Italian regional cookery lists 37 risotto recipes, 18 of them from the Veneto. Variations among Veneto risottos include additions of fish and white wine; chicken; eel; mushrooms and gratedParmesan cheese; quails; small pieces of beef;courgettes;clams;ragù; beans;mussels;prawns;cuttlefish; andasparagus.
Pizza is a piece of breaddoughrolled out thin, with a topping which varies from place to place, but is generally much simpler than those in the English-speaking world.Although the toppings in Italian pizzas may be, depending on the order, unquantifiable, in the most rigorous tradition ofNeapolitan cuisinethere are only two variants:Margheritaandmarinara.
Spaghetti dishes also vary. It may be eaten as David says "simply with olive oil and garlic", without cheese, or with a sauce of "very red and ripe peeled tomatoes", cooked briefly and flavoured with garlic and either basil or parsley.
MediterraneanFrench cuisineincludes the cooking styles ofProvence,Occitania, and the island ofCorsica. Distinctive dishes that make use of local ingredients includebouillabaisseandsalade niçoise.
Bouillabaisse is a substantial dish from the French port ofMarseille, capital of Provence. It is a stew for at least eight people, because it should contain many types of fish such ascrayfish,gurnard,weever,John Dory,monkfish,conger eel,whiting,sea bass, andcrab. These are cooked with Mediterranean vegetables and herbs, namely onions, garlic, tomatoes,thyme,fennel,parsley, bay, andorange peel.
Salade niçoise is a colourfulsaladof tomatoes,tuna, hard-boiled eggs,Niçoise olives, andanchovies, dressed with avinaigrette.
Spain's varied Mediterranean cuisines include the cooking ofAndalusia,Murcia,Catalonia,Valencia, and theBalearic islands.Paellais a characteristic Spanish dish, originally fromValencia, radiating early on to Catalonia and Murcia along Spain's Mediterranean coast. It comes in many versions, and may contain a mixture of chicken, pork, rabbit, orshellfish, sautéed in olive oil in a large shallow pan, with vegetables, and typicallyround-grain rice(often of the localalbufera,arròs bomba,séniavarieties or similar) cooked to absorb the water and coloured with saffron. The dish may be varied withartichoke hearts,peas, sweet peppers,lima beans,string beans, or sausages.
Catalan cuisine has developed over centuries since ancient times in a cultural context distinct from that of other parts of Spain. It arose from the cooking of the Romans who occupied Iberia for nearly 700 years, until the latter part of the 5th century. Catalan cooking is a sophisticated cuisine with its own methods and recipes, and was influenced by Moorish, French, and Italian cookery. It shares with other Mediterranean cuisines ingredients such as bread and wine, fresh herbs and fruit, olive oil, garlic, tomatoes, peppers, onions, fish and shellfish, rice, pasta, sausages, lentils, chickpeas, and nuts including hazelnuts, almonds, and pine nuts.
Portugal lies on theAtlantic, not the Mediterranean, but it is in the Mediterranean basin, characterised by olive groves and a Mediterranean climate, except on the wetter Atlantic coast.Its cuisine too is partly Mediterranean, with the usual trio of bread, wine, and olive oil, but also partly Atlantic, with a tradition of fishing and many seafood dishes such as seafood rice (arroz de Marisco), clams, squid (lulas grelhadas), andbacalhau, imported salted cod. There are, equally, many meat dishes, using chicken, pork, and rabbit. Other major ingredients are onions, garlic, bay leaves, sweet peppers (pimentão), cloves, andchouriçosausage. Portuguese vegetables include the tomatoes common in Mediterranean cuisine, but also kale, carrots, and broad beans. Sweet dishes includepastéis de nata, custard tarts with cinnamon. The country produces red wines such asAlentejo.
Aniseis used around the Mediterranean to flavour various traditionalspirits, including:
TheMediterranean diet, popularised in the 1970s, is inspired by the cuisine of Greece, especially Crete, andSouthern Italyin the early 1960s.TheAmerican Diabetes Associationwrites about "Mediterranean-Style Eating", mentioning "the traditional Mediterranean lifestyle ... of ... eating healthfully ... together among family and friends", and asserting that "Mediterranean cuisine is plant-based", citing the ingredients "whole grains, fruits, vegetables, herbs and spices, beans, nuts, seeds, and olive oil", and stating that most foods "in a Mediterranean diet come from plants".
The 1984Guida all'Italia gastronomicastates that, "around 1975, under the impulse of one of those new nutritional directives by which good cooking is too often influenced, the Americans discovered the so-called Mediterranean diet. The name even pleased Italian government officials, who made one modification: changing fromdiet—a word which has always seemed punitive and therefore unpleasant—to Mediterraneancuisine."
Since David wrote about Mediterranean food in 1950, and indeed since dietary researchers showed in the 1950s that people around the Mediterranean had lesscoronary heart diseasethan the peoples of Northern Europe, the traditional Mediterranean ways of life and of eating have changed. Increased wealth and busy lives have led people to eat more meat and less vegetables: their diet is becoming more Northern European, with moreconvenience foodsand with less of a preventive effect on cardiovascular disease.
In 2013, "Mediterranean diet", stated to encompass the "skills, knowledge, rituals, symbols and traditions concerning crops, harvesting, fishing, animal husbandry, conservation, processing, cooking, and particularly the sharing and consumption of food" of the Mediterranean basin, was inscribed on theUNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.