Book Review: Feast – Food of the Islamic World by Anissa Helou
2 min read
Title: Feast – Food of the Islamic World
Author: Anissa Helou
Publisher: Ecco (29 May 2018)
Pages: 544 (Hardcover)
Reviewed by Shabana Zahoor
How do you feel when you get your eager hands on a multi-cuisine cookbook on Islamic worlds? The food which nourishes the soul, binds the family, brings smiles to friends and gives that moment of enlightenment that life is good.
This is exactly how I felt when I got a notification from my beloved library that my reserved item – Feast: Food of the Islamic World– had arrived and was ready for pick up. I couldn’t wait any longer, so I tucked my three-year old toddler into the pram and rushed to the library to lay my hands on this beautifully wrapped tome (the library had put a transparent cover to it to keep it neat), with its thoughtfully listed recipe after recipe.
At the beginning, this book by Arissa Helou, a London based chef and cookbook writer who specialises in Middle Eastern, Mediterranean and North African cuisines, seemed overwhelming, but slowly it took me to a serene, calm journey of soulful food intertwined with equally beautiful snippets of Islamic food history here and there. As you read along, you discover that it is not just a recipe book but a food journey in itself. You travel from street to street, country to country whiffing the best of the gastronomic smells wrapped in magic cloaks. Some you can imagine, some are like friends you befriend at first sight and invite over to your place to have a lovely chat over chai.
