SC - Qata'if -- duck and bread

[david friedman]

At 10:03 AM -0400 8/30/00, Philip & Susan Troy wrote:
>david friedman wrote:
>>
>>  Puzzle:
>>
>>  How many different things (in and out of period) are called "Harisa,"
>>  and what is the connection?
>
>Or, to put it another way, sometimes a cigar is just not a cigar.  It
>might be better to speak of differences, rather than similarities,
>between the known definitions of harissa. I'm only aware of two, one
>being a meat, vegetable, and, I think, grain stew, the other being a
>chili pepper sauce. Possibilities for why these two different items
>share a name might include:
>
>1. Corruption and equivocation of names (as with the goulash that is
>really nothing more than a freshly-made, and hopefully higher-quality,
>version of the canned product, Beef-a-Roni)
>
>2. Similarity of names from different languages
>
>3. The possibility (understand that I speak neither Persian nor Arabic)
>that the name means "stew", and that the chili sauce is derived from a
>chili pepper stew (such dishes do exist in Spain, Portugal, Italy,
>France, and the Basque country, so perhaps the modern sauce is descended
>from a North African original)
>
>4. The harissa sauce may be intended to be served with the stew, and has
>taken its name from it, although then I wonder why it isn't called couscous.

"Harisa" is also the name of a pastry that is sometimes available in 
modern middle-eastern restaurants.

I have been told that the root word means "wheat," which presumably 
would explain the first and the third. Possibly the chili pepper 
sauce is intended to be served over wheat?
- -- 
David/Cariadoc
http://www.daviddfriedman.com/