Update August 2025:
I have a new cookbook to tell you about!
Flavors of al-Andalus, The Culinary Legacy of Spain was published by Hippocrene Books (NY) in August 2025.
Flavors of al-Andalus
The Culinary Legacy of Spain
In this book I tell the story of the Moorish influence on Spanish cooking through 120 recipes for modern-day dishes. From salads and vegetables to fish, poultry and meat to sweets and pastries, these are dishes that trace their heritage to foods served in medieval times.
During the nearly eight centuries that the kingdoms of al-Andalus existed, the different communities—Muslim, Sephardic-Jewish, and Mozárabe Christian—often lived together in friendly cooperation, shopping at the same markets, trading commodities, and sharing each other’s holidays and festive foods. The interweaving of cultures embedded the foodways of al-Andalus deeply in Spanish life.
Have a look at “Tapas Party with the Flavors of al-Andalus,” a short video showing a few of the recipes from my new cookbook, FLAVORS OF AL-ANDALUS, THE CULINARY LEGACY OF SPAIN. (Video shot in My Kitchen in Spain by Daniel Searl)
Flavors of al-Andalus is available in print and e-book. See below for where to order.
Saturday, November 28, 2009 (This was the original Welcome to My Kitchen in Spain, with a few updates.)
From my kitchen window I look over the tops of olive trees, down a long arroyo, across rolling hills to the Mediterranean sea. My house is tucked in a small olive grove in southern Spain, where I’ve lived for more than 50 years.

From my window, I often watch a herd of goats traversing the hillside or hear partridge call at the bottom of the arroyo. (I rarely see the goatherd anymore; instead wild mountain goats and boar roam the hillside.)
I’m not Spanish. I grew up in midwest America, land of corn and soybeans, got a degree in journalism and worked as a reporter in the Chicago area before coming to Spain. I arrived to spend a year or two abroad—and never left.
During my first year living in a Spanish village, shopping and cooking were a daily adventure. I learned Spanish cooking in village tapa bars, where I migrated to the kitchen. Intrigued by all kinds of wigglies, squigglies, uglies and unmentionables (squid, octopus, snails, baby goat, bulls’ testicles and more), I tackled the kitchen with the zeal of the investigative reporter.
What impressed me about Spanish food when I first came here to live was the freshness of it—the immediacy of fish just hours from the sea, eggs still warm from the hen, milk from the neighbor’s goat, tomatoes fragrant from the vine, oranges I picked in the back garden. Even the meat--pork chops that a day before I watched go squealing and grunting into the butcher’s back patio.
I loved discovering new produce. I had never seen artichokes growing nor cooked fresh ones. Had never tasted a cherimoya. I couldn’t even identify chard for the longest time. For someone used to reaching for powdered garlic salt, real garlic was a revelation. The variety of glistening fresh fish and shellfish astounded me.

I collected recipes from Spanish neighbors and, on travels elsewhere in Spain, from restaurant chefs and from just about anybody willing to talk about cooking. With an index file of hundreds of authentic recipes and a passionate desire to stay in my little white-washed village in Spain, I pitched a cooking column to the editor of a locally-published English-language magazine.

Inspired by the fried calamares served in tapa bars, I wrote my first article titled: “The Squid in the Kitchen”. Squid was about as exotic as anything I could imagine in those days. My first line read “Don´t be scared. The squid really won´t squirt ink in your eyes nor the octopus entwine you in a wet embrace.”
I went on to tell readers how to clean and cook squid and octopus. In 30 years of writing the monthly column, I told expats about unusual produce in the markets; what was seasonal, specialities of the regions, holiday foods, wines to drink with the meals, all accompanied by recipes. I became the expert in Spanish cuisine. I don't think of my work as “cultural appropriation.” I always thought of myself as a journalist, a “culinary foreign correspondent.”
My first cookbook, COOKING IN SPAIN, grew out of those articles. Since then I’ve written several more books about the food of Spain (titles: MY KITCHEN IN SPAIN; COOKING FROM THE HEART OF SPAIN—FOOD OF LA MANCHA; TRADITIONAL SPANISH COOKING, TAPAS—A BITE OF SPAIN and the new FLAVORS OF AL-ANDALUS).
I pick my own olives and cure them (here’s how). Although I’m not much of a gardener, I love picking seasonal vegetables from small plots on my terraced hillside. In summer, I have tomatoes for gazpacho; in fall, chard and cabbage for rustic Spanish potajes (soups and stews); then menestra, a spring medley of artichokes, fava beans and peas.
I have two sons who were born in this olive grove and grew up with this food. Grown men now, they come home with their children, my grandsons, to help me pick olives and join me at the kitchen table.
This is a blog about Spanish food and home cooking, live from my kitchen and garden. I’ll tell you what I’m eating, where I’m eating and how to cook it—with Spanish style. Let me know what you think—we cooks love feedback!
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My first cookbook, 1987. |
This cookbook explores the fascinating story of the deep and lasting influences that Islamic culture has left on modern Spanish cooking.
Author and Spanish cooking expert Janet Mendel tells the story of the Moorish influence on Spanish cooking through 120 recipes and photographs for modern-day dishes, from salads and vegetables to fish, poultry and meat to sweets and pastries, that trace their heritage to foods served in medieval times. Dishes from this era include exotic spices such as saffron, the use of fruits and almonds with savory dishes, and honeyed sweets and pastries. The flavors of al-Andalus live on in modern Spanish cooking and are what makes Spain’s cuisine distinctive from the rest of Europe. (Hippocrene Books)
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