The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1884-09-06
Cuisine and Table Manners Of the MOOrs.

The cooking one meets with in a
Moorish house is very peculiar, and, I
may say, also, very indigestible. They
have three different ways of cooking
everything by frying, baking in earthen
pots and steaming, together with, in
the case of soup, boiling. The meals
served being usually three in number,
consisting of light breakfast in the
morning, at which is served hot milk,
coffee and bread and butter The hot
milk is quite nice, it being sweetened
and having boiled in it an herb which
gives to it flavor very like cinnamon,
which l, at first, thought it was. The
coffee is like all Turkish, sweetened
when boiling, the berry being ground
very fine, you getting, in consequence,
many of the grounds. My host always
favored his with little dash of orange
flower water. The bread was bet
ter than is usually met with lis
Morocco. the flour from which ii
was made being ground and sifted ia
his own mill. The butter was on my
account, fresh. the Moors liking theirs
as rancid as possible, burying it in the
ground in stone jars, and leaving it to
season as long as four years. Some of
it is made of sheep or goat milk, and
is very white, having a not unpleasant
flavor. Lunch was about the same as
dinner, only the courses fewer. For
dinner soup was served as the first
course, and was ordinarily very nice;
a steamed dish of meat, usually NUT
ton, then followed, or a sort of stew,
the whole swimming in butter, very
rich and indigestible; fish next, fried
in cooking; this was shad of the very
finest description, more excellent and
larger than those in our country, their
size, fairness and flavor being incredi-
BILE to believe. Chicken baked in but
ter came next, finally sweets and cot
fee; the sweets not being very nice
too crude, as is all the rest of their Gu
linary art. Wine, of course there was
none, the water we had being favored
with orange flower blossoms, and
which we drank from the COM
mon bowl. Knives and forks we
had, also spoons, soup plates,
meat plates and napkins, mine
host having learned the art of using
them in his travels. Such awkward
and unnecessary implements as knives
and forks to eat with the Moor despises.
He dips the soup from the common
bowl by means of little wooden ladle
having a rounded bottom cup, and in
it carrying the soup to his mouth, or
when eating, rolling up his flowing
sleeve, he dips his left hand into the
mess of meat, selecting apiece, putting
in on plate, and by means of that
hand alone, breaks it up into pieces
and carries it to his mouth, the right
hand never being used. Between
courses he holds this hand carefully
away from everything, first having
licked it all over, in the most approved
canine fashion, and at the end of the
meal q large brass basin is passed
around, while slave from brass ket-
tie pours over the hand, held over the
basin, hot water, which is dried off by
means of a towel. Ihave spoken of the
tea, and the way they drink it, the
noise made by roomful of men drink
ing being almost deafening, those of
powerful lungs sucking up cup of tea
in one pull" From this it can be
seen that the table manners of the
Moors are not exactly such as we are
accustomed to meet with amongst the
''frst families" either in Europe or at
Cincinnati Commercial
Gazette.