Moroccan Cuisine Updated

Morocco was always the mainstay of traditional and expected North African cuisine. There were always the traditional tagines and kabobs. In short typical tourist fare. However two new cookbooks ares rediscovering some old recipes and doing justice to new. Consider it an update on a centuries old table.

The New York Times Dining regular, Julia Moskin wrote about this in her column yesterday. The first cookbook is by Alice Wolfert who had spent sometime in the exotic country back in the seventies. Her book, The Food of Morocco by Ecco Publishers is a reworking of the original that put her on the map. The second is by Mourad Lahlou, born in the famed Casablanca. His book is Mourad: New Moroccan by Artisan . Both explore the region's dishes however each has their own spin on them. Mr. Lahlou is the more modern of the two, taking the cuisine to new heights with different spins.

He believes that variety can spice up this traditional cuisine. Moroccan dishes were first influenced by the Berber tribe and later by the Spanish and the French, Persian and Turkish. Lahlou wants to shake up the traditional tagines , get rid of the couscous recipes and introduce more family based ones. Ms. Wolfert goes more for the traditional route, taught to her by Morocco cooks back in the Seventies. She feels that the dishes have to be elaborately made, using no modern shortcuts. After all she ground spices and learned how to preserve lemons in salt along with even grinding wheat. She feels that losing these labor intensive but valuable techniques will take away from true Moroccan cuisine.

The two chefs are right in their own way. Ms . Wolfert believes in preserving the country's culinary past while Mr. Lahlou wants to modernize the ancient dishes. No matter what book is bought there will be a wealth of delicious and exotic dishes.