Moro: The Cookbook

They bake their own sourdough bread every day, using their own sourdough yeast, make their own yogurt and somehow find ingredients that most of us have never heard of (but they give a comprehensive list of suppliers at the back).

The recipes are simply described, with lots of practical advice and little anecdotes about their discovery of the recipes in tiny restaurants - for example, queuing up outside a hole in the wall that only sold lentil soup! But what a soup!

Think Spain - think paella (usually a hotch-potch of rice and everything thrown in to produce a gluey mass) - but this book resets that impression with a series of recipes that are light, tasty, unusual and definitely NOT stodgy!

Beautifully illustrated and lovingly written, you really feel the atmosphere of the Spanish/Muslim cookery surrounding you as you get drawn, drooling, into this gorgeous book.


Fabulous but not for first-timers   January 29, 2004
J. Holland (Sydney Australia)
8 out of 9 found this review helpful

This is a fabulous book, with such depth and breadth each time you go back to flip it open something new catches your eye. That said, authenticity is prized over simplicity, and many of the dishes I enjoyed in Spain and wanted to recreate at home are surprisingly time-consuming if not complex to make - potatas bravas and potatas tortilla are 2 examples. However the rice dishes are outstanding and it's a wonderful education in using spices such as saffron and smoked paprika.

This isn't a book for mid-week suppers or beginning cooks looking for everything condensed into a 5 easy steps. But the food it helps you produce is outstanding and its a great couch read.


Moro   March 1, 2004
3 out of 5 found this review helpful

One of the best cookbooks I have seen. Every recipe is a gem.


V ery Disappointed   August 22, 2007
Yousef Salem (Sunnyvale, CA USA)
3 out of 19 found this review helpful

I received Moro and I was very disappointed, and I intend to return it. Since the word "Moro", or "Moros" refers the the Muslim Arabs from Morocco, hence Moors, who ruled Spain from 7-11 to 1492 and were responsible for the vast studies in science, mathematics, optics, pharmacology, dentistry, anatomy, botany, architecture, hyrdaulics, astronomy, irrigation, and many other fields, and that knowledge was later tramsmitted to the West and brought it out of its Dark Ages and into its so-called "Renaissance" (how can something be reborn into, or restored to, a thing that it never was?), the title suggested that the recipes would be for authentic Spanish Muslim recipes. I was aghast when I realized that most of the recipes include pork and alcohol, both forbidden to Muslims, and that many of them are Arab recipes far removed from those used by Muslims in Spain. Frankly, the inclusion of pork and alcohol is highly offensive to Muslims, if not a direct insult. It is akin to a book on kosher cuisine whose recipes include pork. I urge Muslims to NOT buy this book. Yousef Salem



more moro please   July 22, 2002
Mary (Gaucin, Malaga Spain)
2 out of 14 found this review helpful

i loved the book but there were too many Spanish recipes for my taste. As I live in Spain not too usefull. however anyone wanting mediterranean food would find it of use.