From the set that Gastronomika has installed in the Akelarre restaurant un by Pedro Subijana (who Morales calls “Don Pedro”), Paco Morales took a look back at the four and a half years that he has spent at his two-Michelin-starred restaurant Noor in Cordoba revising Andalusian cuisine without a fixed menu. Morales brought three emblematic dishes from his home to San Sebastian “that champion the region”, an Al-Andalus that has worked holistically and will continue to do so “as there is still a long way to go”. According to the chef, it is a journey “that looks back but also looks forward”.

To prove it, Morales cooked “a beautiful dish” live based on pine nuts, dried fruit and “architecture on a plate, a very Cordoban dish”, a cold cream of toasted pine nuts, green apples and ras el hanout that surprises with its velvety texture, which preceded a grilled chanterelle with a boletus confit, scalded sea cucumber and “a sort of leek soup without potatoes or pumpkin” (Noor does not have products from the new world) with pieces of cod. The last dish was a vegetable stew with leek, turnip, pickled courgette, aubergine, boletus confit and morels, “all caressed with almonds in a classic pilpil”.

These were just three examples, some of them with a nod to Basque cuisine, from Morales' kitchen, which depict history “through emotion. It's like a Back to the Future but to the Past”, he explained. Sponsored by the Department of Agri-food Quality of the Andalusian Regional Government, the presentation also included comprehensive explanations prompted by questions from the virtual audience, such as the immediacy of Morales' cooking. “Noor has a lot of 'à la minute' cooking. We are a team of 20 people for eight tables, which means we can afford to do this”, explained the chef, who also explained the importance of intangibles at his restaurant: “Our tableware comes out with the temperature that the ingredient it contains requires. Every detail is important”.

Paco Morales wants to continue with the work he has started, that of presenting the 11th, 12th, 13th and 14th centuries of his region gastronomically in a modern way, meaning that symmetry “is the hallmark of the restaurant, just as mathematics was for the Arabs. Every ingredient has its place in the dish”. That is what Al-Andalus was about. That is how Noor is.