[Sca-cooks] Ingredient Puzzles in al-Warraq

[David Friedman]

Many thanks. Fascinating.

But I still don't know what samidh is. Nasrallah says it is "fine flour, 
bran free, high in starch content, and low in gluten." Perry says it is 
coarsely ground, which is inconsistent with only the "fine" part of 
Nasrallah's description. So what modern flour would fit the description?

One thing I find puzzling is the "low in gluten." al-Warraq uses samidh 
for various leavened breads, and I thought the problem with low gluten 
flours was that they didn't rise well. Am I mistaken?

My only evidence so far is that the crumbly crackers recipe works with 
semolina, doesn't work (too wet) with cake flour or ordinary white 
flour. It works with emmer flour. But ...

You are supposed to bake it until it is golden. That fits what happens 
with semolina. But the emmer flour I got is whole wheat, it produces a 
brown dough, and it's still brown when cooked.

I may try King Arthur's white whole wheat flour next, although it isn't 
low in gluten. Other suggestions?


On 9/11/13 11:37 AM, Johnna Holloway wrote:
> That PPC critique offers a number of possibilities as to differences in translations and ingredients in the early Islamic manuscripts.
>
> https://prospectbooks.co.uk/samples/Baghdad-critique.pdf
>
> I am sure that Charles Perry might have some differences of opinions and since he is supposed to be there….
>
> Johnna
>
> On Sep 11, 2013, at 2:27 PM, David Friedman wrote:
>
>> I've been thinking about what I could offer to teach at the next West Coast culinary symposium, and it occurred to me that one possibility would be the ingredient puzzles in al-Warraq and my attempts to solve them. I have two so far--baker's borax and samidh flour. What are they?
>> Are there other interesting puzzles along those lines that people have come across? Evidence to help solve them?
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-- 
David Friedman
www.daviddfriedman.com
http://daviddfriedman.blogspot.com/