Only one recipe had an ingredient I was not able to get: sour cherry molasses for the ‘Saroja’ (fried baby aubergines with cheeses).

Imad Alarnab says his new life began while he was stranded for 64 days in Calais as a Syrian refugee in 2015. There are six chapters to the book in total, covering spice mixes, recipe basics, starters, mains, desserts and drinks. Firstly, the exact dimensions of the pan are not given, and secondly, it makes it very difficult to halve the recipe, as you cannot calculate ratios. In some respects, the recipes in Imad Alarnab’s debut cookbook, named after his recently relocated Kingly Court restaurant in London’s Soho​​, are secondary to the author’s story of journeying as a refugee from his hometown of Damascus in Syria to London in 2015. Ebooks fulfilled through Glose cannot be printed, downloaded as PDF, or read in other digital readers (like Kindle or Nook).Imad’s Syrian Kitchen is a bustling, riotous tour through 90 traditional and adapted Syrian dishes that can be made in the comfort of your own home. Soon after that he was running a pop-up restaurant in east London that was so popular tickets sold out in 24 hours, which led to him opening the doors of his Carnaby Street restaurant in 2021. Many of the dishes that have become signatures at Alarnab’s London restaurant feature, including the falafel, which are strikingly shaped with hole in the middle for a ‘crispier texture’.

sensational recipes celebrating the flavours of Syria, that can easily be made in the comfort of your own home This is the first cookbook from Imad Al Arnab, a renowned chef from Damascus. He expresses this love and affection through his cooking – gifting London with his successful restaurant, and now with his cookbook, containing favourite recipes, and notes on Syrian culture and its relationship to its food.

Imad will introduce us to the delicious flavours and techniques of the Syrian kitchen – showing you just how easy this wonderful cuisine can be. Throughout, the recipes are simple and straightforward, with almost all the ingredients obtainable in your local supermarket. There are a lot of very nice photographs of the completed recipes, and also some of the preparations and intermediary stages, where extra help might be needed. My favourite recipes were ‘Katif Ghanam’ (slow cooked marinated lamb shoulder baked in a parcel with herbs, carrots, potatoes and onion), ‘Mujadara’ (bulgar wheat and brown lentil salad) and ‘Muhammara’ (a red pepper and walnut chunky paste). I really recommend this book – both as a cookbook with very tasty recipes, and as the story of a man who risked everything to come to London.

Alarnab's story is heartbreaking and humbling, with pages of key Syrian ingredients sitting next to the story of his brutal beating by Syrian police. Syrian cuisine remains relatively unexplored in the UK, and Imad’s Syrian Kitchen ​offers a vibrant introduction to it. With a lot of help from my husband, I have made fourteen of the recipes – and have plans to try more.He was a very successful businessman and chef in Damascus, but his opposition to Assad meant that it was no longer safe for him nor his family for him to remain. The copy of the book I have is subtitled “A Love Letter from Damascus to London”, and it is book showing the deep affection the author has for his homeland of Syria, and his gratitude to Britain for giving himself and his family asylum here. He received asylum seeker status and was reunited with his family, who joined him in the UK a year after he began his journey.