Paco Morales, the chef of the past
How beautiful the project National Library of Spain in collaboration with the firm Tramontana: it's called Chef BNE and proposes a tour of the history of our gastronomy in the form of a documentary series through its old cookbooks, manuals and treatises.
Researchers, scientists or historians. Chefs attached to the forefront ( Rodrigo de la Calle, Paco Morales or Javi Estévez ) and profiles as diverse as **the botanist from Celler de Can Roca (Evarist March)**, the archaeologist from the University of Cádiz **(Dario Bernal Casasola)**, María del Carmen Borrego Plá, historian and owner of the first sherry winery in Cadiz run by a woman, Master Sierra Wineries . Mikel Iturriaga (“El Comidista”) or the above signer —in the chapter dedicated to Sherry.
Learn from the past to cook the future . Twelve recipes, twelve proposals for (re) use that put the history of our cuisine into context, the miscegenation of its ingredients and its evolution.
One of them could even be imagined: and it is that a choice that seemed obvious is that of Paco Morales , the Cordovan chef responsible for the gastronomic and emotional archeology that illuminates (that is illuminating) the Planet Gastronomy from Cordova native, from Noor .
In just two years (two years!) Paco has already placed Noor on the essential route for gourmets ; and he has done it with a proposal as brave as it is necessary: rescue the splendor of the cuisine and service to the diner of a prodigious Al-Andalus ; recipes that start in the X century and that portray an Andalusia where Muslims, Jews and Christians of that time coexist.
Coexistence, of course, also culinary, how much we have to learn in this today so prone to conflict ; but in the end, it is inevitable to ask him... When and how did the idea arise?
“4 years ago before opening Noor, we just finished our stage in the Valencian Community and on the way to Córdoba in the middle of moving (in the car) we imagined how could we from my city value and shed light on our gastronomy ”.
Recipes from the 10th century to understand the 21st century
It's my second visit . And I am overwhelmed by the jump in quality from Year 0 to this Year 1 ( Andalusian Taifa menu ), the fault lies with the genius behind the horn-rimmed glasses: the perfectionist cook . A hurricane of ideas, perfectionist like a watchmaking craftsman from Schaffhausen —whom we have followed since his years in Madrid and especially since his time in Bocairent.
But Noor is more, much more; Is Noor a restaurant or a cultural project? (personally, I think that the future lies in breaking those limits) : “Exactly, Noor is a cultural project with a restaurant; today customers are looking for real experiences where culture and gastronomy mix n only for the enjoyment of the diner”.
A space of creative r&d and many hours of research (hand in hand with the historian Rovar Rose ) ), “Rosa is key in the entire creative process: I am very lucky to have her on the team because she describes to me what was happening from a social, historical and cultural point of view in the reality of that time and that is when she came into I play the creative part of my kitchen and my imagination to build impossible worlds”.
From this **Year 1 (Kingdom of Taifas)** I am left with four dishes: pickled aubergine juice with razor clams and mint, pistachio and botarga karim, dulce de leche with Ras Al Hanout and that pigeon already banished from the kitchen of Paco.
That has promised. Paco really likes aubergines, that's why we talked to him about how the eggplant became an element of identity for Arabs and Jews in medieval times ; and he does it by recreating one of recipe of Ruperto de Nola from 1520.
Identity, memory and cupboard; delve into our roots and learn that we are what we eat and that, so many times, the only way to grow is to look at yesterday.
Learn from the past.