[Sca-cooks] rice cooked in yogurt

[Terry Decker]

You're working from a clipped message discussing just the part about cooking 
the rice.

Bear

> That's the whole recipe?
>
> On Thu, Mar 1, 2012 at 9:48 AM, <kdp at tiac.net> wrote:
>
>> Good gentles,
>> >>How can this work?
>> Put the rice into a mortar and pound it until it is the consistency of
>> cornmeal, or finer.  Then add it to the yogurt.  ...
>> Alternatively, try using rice flour.
>> Eithne of Canterbury

The full text of the originating message:

How can this work? Soaking the rice in warm water before cooking would
help, but the yogurt would still scald before the rice cooks. I could
see adding a cup of the broth back into the pot, but this translation
clearly says to remove the broth. Thoughts?

Sayyeda al-Kaslaania

39. /Labaniyya R//u-miyya/: Greek (or Byzantine) yogurt stew

  A pound of meat is parboiled to eliminate the stench, until it is
cooked halfway through; then the chopped leaves of chard are added and
cooked. When everything is cooked, the meat, the broth, and chard are
removed from the pot and pound of yogurt and a half /u-qiya/ of rice are
poured [into the pot] and mixed together so that rice is cooked. At this
point the meat and chard are added back, together with a small quantity
of broth, and cooked with mint leaves. After having transferred [the
contents of the pot] to a plate [/zubdiyya/], the [dish] is sprinkled
with crushed garlic. This can be prepared with turnips in place of the
chard.

From: Zaouali, Lilia, and M.B. DeBevoise (trans.). /Medieval Cuisine of
the Islamic World: A concise history with 174 recipes/.University of
California Press: Berkley, 2007. The recipe is translated from a
thirteenth century Syrian text called (in transliterated English) /Kitab
al-Wusla il//a-al-habi-b fi-wasf al-tayyiba-t wa-l-ti-b/("The Book of
Relation with the Beloved in the Description of the Best Dishes and
Spices"). This was translated into Italian and then into English.

During this period, rice was "typically husked white rice (/aruzz abyad
maqshur/)," according to Mark Nesbitt, et. al. in "History of Rice in
Western and Central Asia"
<http://www.ancientgrains.org/rice2010nesbitt.pdf.pdf> (Opens a .pdf.)