[Sca-cooks] Middle Eastern Food

[Mark.S Harris]

Jaime asked:
> Question concerning yogurt in Middle Eastern period dishes.  I was under the impression that yogurt back then was more like sour cream today?  Is that correct?  My ex-father in law is from the Middle East and he always said that the yogurt here was not strong or thick enough. <

I'm not sure I've got a definite answer to your question. For one
thing, medieval "sour cream" may not resemble what we usually think
of as "sour cream". You might check through this file:
dairy-prod-msg    (80K) 10/ 4/01    Dairy products. milk, butter, curds,
cream.
http://www.florilegium.org/files/FOOD/dairy-prod-msg.html

Depending upon whether you really want to talk about it or actually
eat it, there is some "interesting" information in there about
various creams and dairy products. :-)

Here is some of the info:
> Date: Mon, 03 Nov 1997 20:40:14 -0400
> From: Philip & Susan Troy <troy at asan.com>
> Subject: Re: SC - Sour Cream
>
> LrdRas at aol.com wrote:
> > If you leave unhomogonized, raw milk on the counter over night the
> > cream rises. The milk and cream also sour. Thus you have sour cream.
>
> Actually, Ras, you get cream, which will probably have soured without
> the benefit of the microbes that give dairy sour cream (and I know I
> used the term "dairy sour" cream specifically to make this distinction)
> its distinctive flavor. In other words, you get cream that is sour, but
> not sour cream.
>
> Margali, whereever did you find that unhomogenized, raw, pasteurized
> milk that rots on the counter ;  )  ?
>
> Seriously, though, some Middle Eastern groceries sell a Lebanese cream
> yogurt called Laban or labneh. Labneh just means yogurt, pretty much, so
> you will have to read the ingredients to determine whether it is milk
> yogurt or cream yogurt. Cream Laban is great, but not quite the same as
> smetana, the Russian (I think) stuff we've come to know as sour cream. I
> believe there's a different bug involved.
>
> Adamantius

Stefan li Rous
Keeper of strange comments on strange foods... :-)