The holiday of Diwali is a time for lights, fireworks, and most importantly sweets,
so I'm making a 10th century recipe for jalebi also called zalabiya.
So thank you to Vite Ramen for sponsoring this video as we celebrate Diwali
by making 1,000 year old jalebi
this time on Tasting History.
So if today's episode has a theme, and I'm not sure that it does, but if it did the theme would be
things that have many different names and forms. We're going to talk about the festival of Diwali,
Happy Diwali!
a holiday which I first heard about from The Office
but now I know is perhaps the most diverse holiday I've ever come across.
It has many different names
is celebrated by different religions in different regions of the world, and has different origin stories and is celebrated
for different reasons and in different ways, which makes this dessert pretty apropos
not only because it is served often during Diwali but also because it has
different origins, different names, and many, many different recipe variations.
What's amazing is that the first known recipe isn't all that different from the modern version today.
What is different is the name.
It is called zalabiya which is actually similar to what they're still called in much of the Middle East
which is where the recipe comes from. It's from the 10th century Baghdadi cookbook
Kitab al-Tabikh, or 'The Book of Dishes' by Ibnn Sayyar Al Warraq,
and even within this book there are multiple recipes for it
that include different ingredients, different flavors and it's done in different shapes,
but all of them have one thing in common it's dough that is fried and then soaked in syrup.
So really no matter what you do, you can't go wrong.
Now I'm not going to read the entire recipe because it is really, really long and
partly it's because it is so well written. It's kind of astonishing.
I cover a lot of recipes from ancient Rome, Medieval Europe, all the way up to the early 20th century
and rare is it to find a recipe as well written as this one. I really, really hope that my cookbook,
available for pre-order now, can live up to this 10th century standard.
So this recipe starts off with the preparation of the dough, so for that what you'll need is:
one cup or 120 grams of all-purpose flour,
3 tablespoons or 25 grams of gram flour. This is a flour made from brown chickpeas
usually when you get chickpea flour it's made from white chickpeas so this is a bit different,
but if that's all you can find either one will work.
A pinch of saffron threads and an optional pinch of cardamom,
2 tablespoons of rose water, a half cup or 120 milliliters of water,
three tablespoons or 45 grams of yogurt, and a pinch of baking soda.
So the yogurt and baking soda are actually to help with the fermentation of the dough, and you can use other kinds of yeast for this.
What you don't want to use is what is actually in the original recipe because that was yeast,
and "a small amount of būra al-ajīn that has been dissolved in water."
That is borax and today it's usually used in like
cleaning products, that's why modern recipes tend to use the yogurt and baking soda to kind of mimic the effect of the borax.
So first soak the saffron in the rose water for 10 minutes.
Then in a large bowl whisk together, the flours, and baking soda and if you want to add cardamom,
which you should because it's amazing, whisk that in as well.
Then add the water, the rose water with saffron, and the yogurt, and whisk until smooth.
Now the saffron will give the batter a light yellowish color,
but if you want a deeper color go ahead and add a little bit of food coloring. Even a thousand years ago
they colored these very often, either yellow or orange or green.
I'm sticking with kind of an orange but go with green!
Now at this point you want the batter to be like pancake batter.
Honestly the consistency of the batter is probably the hardest part about this entire recipe.
It's kind of one of those things that you just have to play with and it's going to be a little bit different depending on the weather and everything,
but for now you actually don't really have to worry about it
because you're going to cover the bowl and let it ferment for at least 12 hours
which gives you plenty of time to watch some TV,
pet the cat [Jaime],
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and hopefully those noodles will hold you over for the 12 to 18 hours that the dough needs to sit and ferment,
but once it has you can make your syrup.
For this what you'll need is: four cups or 800 grams of sugar, four tablespoons or 60 milliliters of honey,
two cups or 475 milliliters of water, a large pinch of saffron, two tablespoons of rose water,
two tablespoons of lemon juice, and again some optional cardamom.
He also gives other flavors that you can use including musk and camphor
so if you want to use those you can but I'm sticking
with the rose water, saffron, and cardamom.
So take a saucepan and add the sugar, honey, and water
then stir together and set over low heat, slowly bringing the mixture to a light boil
then you want to let it simmer until it gets to what's called the thread stage.
Now this is between 230 and 234 degrees Fahrenheit
and it's a pretty narrow window so I definitely encourage you to use a candy thermometer
unless you have melted a lot of sugar and can know it by sight.
Now as soon as it gets to 230 degrees Fahrenheit lower the heat,
and then add in the rose water, lemon juice, saffron and cardamom and stir everything in.
This will help lower the temperature a bit but it's still going to take a while to cool off
to the 150 to 160 degrees Fahrenheit that you want to keep it at for the rest of the process.
Now while it cools check your dough and make sure there are a few little bubbles on top.
There aren't going to be a ton like if it was a bread dough rising. it's just some activity in there.
Also the consistency might have changed overnight so you might have to add a little bit more water or flour to it
to get it where it needs to be... where it needs to be is again hard to explain it's
thicker than a pancake batter but not as thick as a cake batter.
It needs to kind of be be free-flowing
but not thick enough that it's going to not come out of the five millimeter hole that you're going to have it come out of.
See you're going to fill either a piping bag or a squeeze bottle with the batter and
have a about a five millimeter hole at the end.
That's what I did but that's not what the original recipe calls for because he didn't have a squeeze bottle or piping bag
instead, it's the best part of the recipe, he uses a coconut.
"Prepare a nut-cup for pouring the batter. It is made by cutting off the rounded end of a coconut,
which leaves you with a cup-like shell.
Pierce a small hole in its bottom, the width of a bodkin... scoop some of the batter into the coconut shell,
held with the left hand, and the hole blocked with a finger."
And I kind of wish I had done that. Why didn't I do that?
So the last thing to do is to heat up your oil.
Again this is a little dicey because
you're going to want to end up frying it at like 330 degrees to 350 degrees Fahrenheit but
you want to start it off a little bit cooler, so bring it up to about 275 degrees Fahrenheit
and that should take a few minutes which will give us plenty of time to talk about the history of jalebi.
A dessert of many names this jalebi...
zalebi, zolobya, jilapi, or mushabak. That's actually the name
of the modern version that is usually made during the month of Ramadan and it gets its modern name
from this 10th Century recipe which is technically for the zalabiya mūshabbaka or "lattice shaped zalabiya".
So with all these different names nobody really knows the origin of the dish or its name,
but my favorite theory is that it was named after Ziryab who was a 9th century singer poet oud player and composer.
He was born in Baghdad but then became a court musician in Cordoba. Today that is Spain but
at the time it was al-Andalus. Stories of his exploits are fantastic he was influential not only in Spanish music today
but also clothing and culture and food.
He's often credited with bringing asparagus to the Iberian Peninsula, popularizing drinking wine out of crystal,
and standardizing the three-course meal: soup, main, and the dessert.
Now whether any of that is actually true or not nobody really knows.
I hope it is and I hope that one of his favorite desserts was a fritter that was named after him.
The oldest mention of it being called ziryabiyya
but wherever the name came the first recipe that we know of was written down in 10th century Baghdad,
and it wasn't long after that that the name changed just a little bit and it appeared in the '1001 Nights of Shaharazad'.
"Of sweet Zolo-biya chain I hung a necklace around her neck. From its delicious Loops I made a ring on her ears."
Tasty if not sticky jewelry.
Now a few centuries later another recipe appears again under a slightly different name
this time in 13th century Persia and it was likely the Persians who brought it to India
where the name changed from zalabya to jalebi,
the first mention of it coming around 1450 by the Jain author Jinasura who said how popular they were when served at the feasts of wealthy merchants.
Now you can find versions of them from Morocco to Ethiopia all the way over to Nepal
so clearly everyone who came in contact with this dish thought it was tasty,
and unfortunately at one point that was used for nefarious purposes.
See in the 1860s there was a rash of poisonings on the roads of Bengal.
People were being poisoned, robbed, and then just left for dead,
and hundreds of people ended up being arrested for these crimes and one of them told the police
"The powder we use is made of Opium, Bhang and Dhatoora; that is what is kept in the bag" and
"The poison is only stated to have been given once in sweet meats, jelabees."
So if you find yourself on the roads of Bengal
in the 1860s you'll want to watch out.
Luckily today you should be able to get poison-free jalebi
pretty much anywhere in India at any time of year, though they are most popular during Diwali.
"The auspicious festival of lights which disperses the most profound the darkness."
In the year 1030 a Persian traveler wrote "When the sun marches in Libra it is called Diwali.
The people dress festively, they ride to the temples to give alms and play Merrily with each other till noon.
In the night they light a great number of lamps in every place so that the air is perfectly clear."
People wear new and colorful clothes and they decorate their houses with colored garlands
and rangoli which are ornate patterns painstakingly made from colored sand, rice, or flower petals
but it is the lamps that give Diwali its name. The word comes from a Sanskrit word meaning row of lights
and there are rows of lights absolutely everywhere at this time of year.
One 15th century Venetian merchant wrote of the spectacle when he traveled to India.
"They fix up within their temples and on the outside of the roofs an innumerable number of lamps of oil which are kept burning day and night."
Though this is hardly the first mention of the practice, it is mentioned in early Hindu texts which says
"On the night of the thirteenth day of the fortnight of Karthik month,
lighting of the Yamadeepa will prevent untimely death."
So while the lamps are literal light the holiday itself is about figurative light.
Light conquering Darkness, Good conquering Evil, Knowledge conquering Ignorance.
In the Jain religion it celebrates the anniversary of the day in 527 BCE
that Mahavira the 24th and final Tirthankara, or great teacher, ,achieved Moksha or the release from earthly reincarnation.
"The gods illuminated Pavanagari by lamps to mark the occasion. Since that time, the people of Bharat
celebrate this famous festival of "Dipalika" to worship Lord Mahavira on the occasion of his ninrvana."
That was written in the year 705 and by then the festival had been around
for probably around 2,000 years at least and so it was
known by many names by then and celebrated by many different people for different reasons.
Even in Hinduism there are multiple reasons to celebrate the holiday.
It's associated with different stories, one of the most common comes from the 'Epic Ramayana'
and it is 24,000 verses long and has like tens of thousands of named characters so
obviously I'm not going to be able to tell you the entire story right now but in a nutshell
it covers the life of Prince Rama and his defeat of the Demon King Ravana,
and his subsequent return from a 14-year exile to rule the Kingdom of Kosala
his return being celebrated with lamps ad festivities,
and while I can't go through the entire epic because it is it is epic
you really should check it out for yourself because it is a fantastic story and has some wonderful characters.
There are demons, palace intrigue, and an army of monkeys led by my favorite character Hanuman,
a monkey with super strength and the ability to leap over oceans who after having his tail lit on fire when he was in captivity
escapes by burning down the demon city of Lanka.
It's fantastic so definitely check it out, there have been lots of movies and shows about it it's really, really great.
Anyway while that is one reason to celebrate Diwali there are many others.
Many use it to worship Lakshmi the goddess of wealth and prosperity, and Ganesha god of wisdom.
In some sects of Buddhism it is the observance of the day King Oshoka the Great adopted Buddhism,
and for Sikhs it is the anniversary of the release of Guru Hargobind and 52 rajas or princes from a Mughal prison
under Emperor Jahangir in the early 17th century.
Again the name of the holiday is different, but the celebrations are often intertwined
and the holiday Diwali and all of its other forms
are not just a way to honor these past events but also honor people in the present.
Neighbors welcome each other and their families into their homes with gifts and fireworks and lavish meals
which of course include lots of sweets like jalebi which I am about to finish.
So once your batter, syrup, and oil are already the recipe says
"Let the batter run through the hole into the hot fat,
simultaneously moving your hand in circles to make the lattice form...
if your batter was done right, the moment the batter falls into the hot oil it will puff and look like a bracelet with a hollow interior."
Easier said than done, really your batter has to be perfect and the oil temperature has to be but
after a little while you'll get it. I did it took a lot of ugly ones before I got it but I did get it.
So you're letting a constant stream of batter form a spiral in the oil,
and then cross it into the center so that it doesn't come apart. Like I said they need to fry at about 330 to 350 degrees but
if you put them in at that temperature I found for me that it it hardens too quickly and they kind of break apart
so I started at 275 or 280, put the batter in and then cranked it up and let it heat up.
Even then it only takes about a minute on one side then you flip it and fry
and as soon as they're done you take the jalebi and put them into the sugar syrup.
You want to let them sit for about a minute because you're not just coating them they need time to soak up that syrup,
and once they're all fried and syruped you can garnish with a bit of pistachio and they're ready to eat,
and here we are 10th Century the zalabiya or jalebi.
So here's one that's not quite the exact shape that I want but pretty darn close and
I'm sure if I did them again I'd get them get even better by the next time but for now let's have a go.
[Crunch]
So crunchy.
That is surprising
because it's been a little while, while I've been filming,
still super crunchy, absolutely fantastic. So-
they're sweet but they're not saccharine, like they're not just overly sweet. I was a little worried they would be.
What you're getting instead are all those other flavors,
the cardamom, the saffron, the rose water,
but none of them are overwhelming.
None of- it's not like ROSE WATER, you know which can happen and the same with with saffron.
I think anything that you put in here it just kind of comes together.
Those are really, really good.
And the original recipe actually lets you know how they're supposed to turn out.
"The well-made ones should feel brittle and dry to the bite, and crumble and fall apart in the mouth.
On the other hand if they turn out to be soft and leathery when eaten, they are not good."
I agree and what's amazing is that he actually gives the reasons why they would turn out that way,
and ways to to fix it for the next time you do. I mean everything from adding different ingredients
to the the weather outside and you know wait until it's drier it's a really fantastic recipe.
Now while these are fantastic and now maybe my favorite Indian dessert
there is another Indian dessert that I love that I've made here on the channel called payasam
so if you haven't seen that video make sure to check it out and I will see you next time
on Tasting History. There are like 40 of these, I can't eat them all
but I might eat them all.