Returning to his roots in Syria’s hub of cultures, Aleppo, he found some of his best recipes to satisfy his biggest passion in life — culinary art. And like an artist, he blended contemporary methods with traditional elements to bring out the same savoury essence in the centuries-old field of gastronomy.
Today he is one of the masters at the art of contemporary cuisine in the Arab world. Well-known cookery presenter and writer, Mohammad Orfali — specialising in Aleppo and modern cuisine — was recently in town at Qatar Airways Live Cooking station at the week-long Qatar International Food Festival (QIFF).
Orfali specialises in Aleppian cuisine and contemporary Arabic cuisine and is the leading Arab proponent of molecular gastronomy, the movement to incorporate technologies and new techniques in the preparation and presentation.
“When I started my journey in the culinary art I wanted to learn French and Italian cuisines. And after 13 years I realised that I could not make any Italian or French food like an Italian or French chef,” Orfali tells Community in a chat prior to his show at the station where his aromatic contemporary techniques attracted huge crowds.
“And I realised I have incredible cuisine, the Aleppian cuisine that nobody has touched upon as yet. It is like a diamond that needs to be polished to shine again,” says the chef, explaining how he chose Aleppian cuisine as his faculty.
When he studied more about the Aleppian cuisine, he found incredible ingredients that are considered as molecular cooking. When you boil an egg and change the colour of egg white from transparent white to solid white, this is molecular cuisine, explains the chef.
Molecular cuisine is not about surprises, he says. Nor is it about using fancy expensive ingredients to show it to the people and to make show off. It is modern contemporary cooking.
“And I would say it has changed in the last 10-15 years. Now molecular cuisine is raising awareness about what is cooking. When you transform the ingredients from different stages, say from solid to liquid and liquid to solid, this is molecular cuisine,” he explains.
However, he does not exactly call it molecular. Every chef, he says, has a different name for it while he prefers to call it modern contemporary cooking. It is more about ingredients and how to manipulate your ingredients in different ways using technology.
“I met one guy named Massimo Bottura from Italy. He is one of the big influences on me. He was the first man to start modern Italian cooking. When he started his restaurant, most of the Italians criticised him, which is really destructive,” says Orfali.
“No one wanted to touch the food. So he told them, listen guys, do you think my grandpa was respecting the ingredients when boiling meat in the water and losing all the flavour and texture. If I have a new technology and I can adopt it with my food, why should I not use it?” he adds.
Similarly, Orfali says he did not change the name, the soul, the spirit or the flavour, he is just changing the way he cooks the ingredients.
People usually do not understand this in the beginning. They even did not understand his show in the beginning, he acknowledges. But through his show he wanted to deliver a message to the new chefs, someone who had recently joined the culinary art on how to be creative and at the same time how to respect ingredients.
It was when he went back to his roots, Orfali says, he found an incredible potential in his cuisine. Aleppian cuisine, he says, is a mix of seven different civilisations and cultures.
“I would call it a pot of civilisations. We have many elements in it. We have something from Indian, Chinese, Armenian, Turkish and others which we adapted according to our native ingredients,” says Orfali.
Aleppo was the last point of Silk Route, therefore all the traders assembling there brought with them influences of other cuisines.
“After 18 years in culinary art I believe if you think being passionate about food is enough, it is not. Curiosity, madness, pushing the limits to transform the food into art was a kind of emotions that evoked my beautiful memories,” Orfali explains his philosophy.
He has more than 18 years of culinary profession and kitchen management experience. Dynamic, result-oriented, and team-spirited he exemplifies leadership qualities and professionalism, backed by a consistent, verifiable record of achievements.