Nile Nightshade

An Egyptian Culinary History of the Tomato

Anny Gaul

• Publisher: University of California Press
• Year: 2025
• eBook ISBN: 9780520409156
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Geschichte
• Subtopic: Geschichte des Nahen Ostens

A cultural and culinary history of modern Egypt through the nation's beloved tomato.
 
By the end of the twentieth century, the tomato—indigenous to the Americas—had become Egypt's top horticultural crop and a staple of Egyptian cuisine. The tomato brought together domestic consumers, cookbook readers, and home cooks through a shared culinary culture that sometimes transcended differences of class, region, gender, and ethnicity—and sometimes reinforced them.
 
In Nile Nightshade, Anny Gaul shows how Egyptians' embrace of the tomato and the emergence of Egypt's modern national identity were both driven by the modernization of the country's food system. Drawing from cookbooks, archival materials, oral histories, and vernacular culture, Gaul follows this commonplace food into the realms of domestic policy and labor through the hands of Egypt's overwhelmingly female home cooks. As they wrote recipes and cooked meals, these women forged key aspects of public culture that defined how Egyptians recognized themselves and one another as Egyptian.

Table of contents

• Series Page
• Title
• Copyright
• Subvention
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Illustrations
• Acknowledgments
• A Note on Units of Measurement
• Chronology
• Introduction
• 1. Tomato Trajectories: From Mexico to Misr
• 2. How Do You Say “Tomato” in Egyptian?
• 3. Magnuna ya Oota: Tomato as Complaint
• 4. Defining Egyptian Taste: Tomatoes in Domestic Cookbooks
• 5. Creating Egyptian Flavor: Tomatoes in Home Kitchens
• 6. Red Stew, Green Stew: Cooking Okra in the Nile Valley
• Conclusion: How Tomatoes Became Egyptian
• Notes
• Bibliography
• Index