Saghar Setarehさんのインスタグラム写真 - (Saghar SetarehInstagram)「There is a passage in the “Honourable Cookbook'' (Ketab-e Mostatab-e Aashpazi) by the late author and literary translator, Najaf Daryabandari, where he says that the Iranian cuisine, so much like Iranian carpet weaving, is the art of the working class, that merely expands in size and uses higher quality ingredients, when it appears on the tables (or should I say “sofreh”) of the rich and aristocrats. In other words, the haute cuisine uses the same methods and times of the people’s cooking; the difference is only in the quantity and quality of ingredients. According to Daryabandari and his ginormous 2000 page page beauty of a cookbook, this characteristic is unique to Iranian food. But I don’t know. On my spiral of research for #LabNoonCookbook, I also came upon these GORGEOUS photographs by Antoin Sevruguin, a Russian photographer who documented many parts of Iran in the late 1800s and early 20th century. In this small collection you can see three shots of stores at some bazaar probably, selling mostly herbs and legumes and spices (see one with sugar cones hanging from the ceiling?). There’s one that looks a bit more modern, definitely from a royal feast, with a table laden with mounds of fruits and sweets I can almost easily recognize. There are two scenes of preparation of a royal feast (see the trayfuls of legumes, fruits, nuts, probably Kashk and heaps of aubergines with what looks like the body of many lambs?), and in one you can spot the king himself, Naser al-Din Shah, in his typical pose as if he owned everything and everyone. Then there’s that one photo that definitely looks like it was taken in a much more domestic situation, with a butcher cutting off a lamb, with women holding on to what seems like spinach, though I’m not sure. At least from what we see in these pictures, and also by the account of 3 cookbooks of the court, one from 1600s, and 2 from 1800s, and these photos, what Daryabandari says about the cooking in Iran is true. The last photo, probably my favorite photo of this collection, again with the king himself (an older one), has no food in it. But two men with sharp gazes and figures, who probably held still for a long time」1月5日 2時23分