Mourad New Moroccan
Working with Mourad Lahlou is like doing ecstatic dancing in Converse high tops to a mix of Jay Z and Berber trance music. The ideas are whirling around faster than you can scribble and the food keeps hypnotizing you in weird and mysterious ways. We spent a year and a half turning Mourad’s recipes, stories, and self-invented, citizen-of-two-worlds perspective into a coherent, modern take on Moroccan cuisine. We suggested we write two books in one. The first hundred pages is seven hands-on cooking classes on the fundamental building blocks of Moroccan food. I wanted to create the feel of cooking alongside Mourad, with his signature mix of meticulous precision and hilarious, fuck-the-rules-it-just-needs-to-taste-awesome attitude. The rest of the book is the recipes, punctuated by stories, techniques, and surprising takes on tradition. It’s our kind of cooking, and we loved the whole process, especially our trip to Morocco, a dreamlike two weeks of nibbling, gorging, cooking, wandering through markets and palaces, and, yes, a night of ecstatic dancing.
Publisher: Artisan
Role: Writing and Creative Direction
Best Cookbooks, Epicurious
Top 5 Books, Food & Wine
Best Cookbook of the Year, Good Morning America
Best Books, Publishers Weekly
Best Books, Barnes & Noble
Gift Books Roundup, Associated Press
“A superbly executed work on a style and subject we would all benefit from knowing more about.”
— Anthony Bourdain
“The soul of Moroccan cooking, thoughtfully reimagined and generously shared.”
— Thomas Keller
“This book is a treasure. It captures Mourad’s intelligence and curiousity, and, more important, his warmth and generosity.”
—Daniel Patterson, Chef and author of Aroma
Credits
Author: Mourad Lahlou
Writer: Steve Siegelman
Designer: Janet Mumford
Photographer: Deborah Jones