Tag Archives: Turkey

Autumn 2023, Environment and Climate, Family and Household, Posts

Recipes for Sacred Porridge in Post-Earthquake Turkey

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By Su Hyeon Cho

Mid-August is the grape harvest season in Vakfılı, an Armenian village perched on the mountainous region of the southernmost Turkish province of Hatay. Tasting grapes takes the form of ritual in the patient waiting until Surp Asdvadzadzin, the holiday that celebrates the Annunciation of the Virgin Mary by blessing the grapes and cooking a sacred porridge. The prelude to this festive occasion consists of the drumbeats of davul and the blasting of zurna the night before. Cheerful crowds dance around seven steaming cauldrons of harisa in the churchyard overnight. The porridge, made out of sacrificed meat (madagh) and wheat, is simmered overnight on an open fire until the meat disintegrates. The repetitive labour of churning the ingredients into a viscous consistency is key, hence the name harisa (or hrisi in colloquial Arabic), which originated from ‘churning’ or ‘pounding’ in both Armenian and Arabic.

Left, Middle: Distributing harisa during Surp Asdvadzadzin in 2023 (photo credit: Ismail Zubari), Right: The destroyed cross tower on the churchyard of Surp Asdvadzadzin Church, Vakıflı.

 

This year’s Surp Asdvadzadzin was prepared by a much smaller, more dejected crowd, as Lora Baytar Çapar, a resident of Vakıflı, describes in her essay “May the taste of harisa be the same, this holiday lacks its flavour”. Earlier in February this year, a deadly earthquake shook Hatay and the wider region of north Syria and south Turkey, resulting in over 50,000 deaths and the destruction of the livelihoods of millions.

In Vakıflı, villagers also fell victim to the earthquake. Many had left the village by summer. A community centre in the village stood in for the severely damaged churchyard, and candle holders and other ecclesiastical ornaments were brought in to imitate the usual celebration. Yet, the seven once brimming cauldrons were only half full. There were no cheerful rhythms and melodies of davul and zurna. Although the setting may seem insufficient, Çapar underlines, continuing the tradition of cooking harisa is the community’s will to survive.

A cat sitting on the rubble of Hünkar Mescidi in the old town of Antakya in February 2023 (photo credit: Daniel Thorpe)

 

During my visit to Hatay in September, I witnessed construction work in progress, a series of emptied plots of land and what locals call “camp cities” (çadır kentler) along the road from Antakya to the coastal district of Samandağ. After an hour of dusty travel, I reached the Hızır Aleyhisselam Türbesi, where the suprahuman Hızır (al-Khidr) is believed to have met with Moses. In the vicinity of this spiritual centre for the Alawite community, there is a communal kitchen area where harisa is prepared throughout the year. As harisa is the most celebrated sacrificial meal in the region, locals vow to make a sacrificial offering (called adak in Turkish) for the healing, fertility, and safety of their beloved. On that account, Turkish guest workers in Europe (gurbetçi) hurriedly returned to their hometown shortly after the earthquake and cooked harisa.My interlocutors pointed out that cooking harisa is a form of prayer, and post-earthquake harisa reflects this belief even more strongly.

In the wake of the fortieth-day commemoration after the earthquake, Mişel Orduluoğlu pens an essay grieving for the capital Antakya. Orduluoğlu notes that fortieth day signals the departure of the souls that are no longer with us. The writer adds the period of “five Friday prayers, five shabbat meals, and five Sunday masses with candlelight and frankincense” had passed without Antakya’s usual soundscape, a mixture of call for prayer (ezan), church bells (çan), and Jewish canton (hazzan). “When the city has lost its spiritual sites, then where should one convene the funeral procession?” the writer rhetorically asks. The earthquake did not select its victims, and each community, of different ethno-religious backgrounds, is going through the same pain – together. Orduoğlu remarks that harisa is a means of collective mourning for the loss of the diversity of Antakya that residents have long been proud of.

Habib-i Neccar Mosque, built in the mid-7th-century, is one of many buildings with historical and religious significance in Antakya that was severely damaged during the earthquake (photo credit: Daniel Thorpe)

 

No writer would set preparing harisa in a closed, family kitchen. It is a communal dish, cooked in bulk for sharing at sites where communities feel a spiritual connection. The new kitchen setting, surrounded by rubble and debris, is an odd spectacle. In his essay, Hakan Mercan painfully details the destruction of historical buildings, from Habib-i Neccar Mosque to St. Pierre Church, allegedly the first mosque in Anatolia and the oldest cave church in the world, respectively. Amid despair, the author notes, the survival of the Hızır Aleyhisselam Türbesi gave solace to the community. The essay concludes with reclaiming harisa’s boisterous presence, which reads, “Nothing would remain the same as before, but let’s not surrender to the shadow of hopelessness… Excited children will impatiently stand in a long queue in front of the cauldrons of harisa, burning the frankincense. We will bloom again and again.”

Vernacular writing about harisa in the wake of the earthquake culminates in a recipe for compassion, sharing, solidarity, miracle work, and hope. As such, food writing on harisa does not resemble other food writing. It often contains wordy headnotes about pain and loss, without much in the way of culinary instruction or gastronomic pleasure. Gastronomic pleasure is nowhere to be found. Their recipes for harisa are in the future tense, waiting for the joviality to return, the community to revive.

Su Hyeon Cho is a DPhil candidate in Oriental Studies at the University of Oxford. Her doctoral project ‘Saints and States in a Plastic Bowl: Tales of a Sacred Porridge in Unlikely State’ focuses on harisa-cooking Alawite, Greek Orthodox, and Armenian communities from Hatay to explore the transcending power of rituals in perpetual ruptures from anthropological perspectives. Before returning to academia, she worked in different capacities at research institutions, diplomatic missions, and the United Nations in the Middle East.

Tales from the Archives

Revisiting Lisa Smith’s Coffee: A Remedy Against the Plague

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Editor’s note: Today, we revisit a post by our editor Lisa Smith on the use of coffee as an eighteenth century cure-all against smallpox and the plague. The botanist Richard Bradley claimed that coffee would be effective in treating such diseases because it ‘lifted the spirit’. I certainly find that caffeine lifts my spirits, even if temporarily, but we know that high spirits are unfortunately no protection against COVID-19 and other viruses. Still, there is no harm in taking a break – caffeinated or not – and I hope that this post will give you good cheer. Laurence Totelin

By Lisa Smith

1721, London: The plague raging in Marseilles threatened London’s busy ports. The British government took action, asking a core group of physicians to devise a plan in case the plague reached London. Smallpox was already rampant and the King had ordered a series of inoculation experiments on prisoners. Troubled times.

Enter the impecunious botanist Richard Bradley. (I discussed his interesting life in a recent blog post.) When he wasn’t in debt to booksellers, he made a living from popular medical and scientific writings, such as The virtue and use of coffee, with regard to the plague, and other infectious distempers (London, 1721). He wrote: “At this time, when every Nation in Europe is under the melancholy Apprehension of an approaching Plague or Pestilence, I think it the Business of every Man to contribute, to the utmost of his Capacity, such Observations, as may tend to the Service of the Publick.”

And in the face of the plague and smallpox he offered… coffee. Remedies prescribed by other physicians, he insisted, “are little different from each other.” Coffee, however, “is of excellent Use in the time of Pestilence, and contributes greatly to prevent the spreading of Infection.” Who knew?

Apparently the Turks. Bradley explained: “in some Parts of Turkey, where the Plague is almost constant, it is seldom mortal in those Families, who are rich enough to enjoy the free Use of Coffee.” In his treatise, he discussed coffee’s efficacy and provided (most tantalizingly for the coffee-mad Brits) “an Account of the best Method of roasting the Berries, and preserving them after roasting.”

Coffee tree (Coffea arabica). Line engraving by H. Burgh, c.1726
Credit: Wellcome Library, London. Wellcome Images

I present to you Bradley’s instructions for preparing coffee. First, he recommended spreading out the ripe berries to dry and harden beneath the sun. The husks were then to be removed so that the berries could be toasted in an “airy place to clean them.” Finally, the berries were ready for the roaster, and this was an important step: the roasting process, Bradley claimed, would determine “the Goodness of the Liquor.” Never fear, though, Bradley had “taken some pains to experience the best Method of roasting it.” His conclusion was that the berries would be heated most equally by placing them in an iron vessel and turned on a spit over a clear or charcoal fire. His personal preference was “roasted in a middle way, not overburnt.” To modern readers, this seems like a lot of work, but Bradley reassured his readers that this process could easily be done at home, as apparently many “Persons of Distinction in Holland” did.

Making the beverage also required special equipment and techniques. To prepare the decoction, earthen or stone vessels were best, as metal spoiled the flavour. Boiling the coffee evaporated “too much of the fine Spirits”. Pouring boiling water over the powder of ground berries and infusing it for four or five minutes in front of the fire would be better and “much exceeds the common way of preparing it.” He provided an alternative, too: grinding the berries into powder, adding the powder and water into a stone or silver coffee pot and leaving the pot in front of the fire for a couple minutes. The liquid was always “thick and troubled” after brewing, but could be made “clear enough for drinking” by adding a spoonful or two of cold water to force the grounds to sink.

Coffee was worth the effort, being the ultimate cure-all. Bradley described its many virtues, which included treating head pains, vertigo, lethargy, coughs, moist and cold constitutions, consumptions, swooning fits, digestive problems, sleepiness, running humours, sores, scrofula, drunkenness, rheumatism, gout, intermitting fevers and infection. It could also purify the blood, provoke urination, stimulate the menses and deworm children. Indeed, it was particularly beneficial for menstruating women. According to Bradley, Arabian women drank coffee during their “periodical Visits, and find a good Effect”, such as contraction of the bowels and toned up genitals. Coffee was not for everyone though. Those suffering from melancholy vapours, hot brains, or paralysis should avoid it.

The reason that coffee would be so efficacious in treating infectious disease was that it lifted the spirits—and those “whose Spirits are the most overcome by Fear, are the most subject to receive Infections”. The correct use of coffee supported the drinker’s “vital Flame”, protecting the drinker from fear and despair. To gain coffee’s maximum benefits, Bradley recommended the following dosage: at least twice a day, first in the morning and at four in the afternoon.

Coffee breaks: good for your health!

18th Century, Ailments, Disease, Illness, and Injury, British Studies, Food and Drink, Plants and Herbs, Remedies, Tools and Techniques

Coffee: A Remedy Against the Plague

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By Lisa Smith

1721, London: The plague raging in Marseilles threatened London’s busy ports. The British government took action, asking a core group of physicians to devise a plan in case the plague reached London. Smallpox was already rampant and the King had ordered a series of inoculation experiments on prisoners. Troubled times.

Enter the impecunious botanist Richard Bradley. (I discussed his interesting life in a recent blog post.) When he wasn’t in debt to booksellers, he made a living from popular medical and scientific writings, such as The virtue and use of coffee, with regard to the plague, and other infectious distempers (London, 1721). He wrote: “At this time, when every Nation in Europe is under the melancholy Apprehension of an approaching Plague or Pestilence, I think it the Business of every Man to contribute, to the utmost of his Capacity, such Observations, as may tend to the Service of the Publick.”

And in the face of the plague and smallpox he offered… coffee. Remedies prescribed by other physicians, he insisted, “are little different from each other.” Coffee, however, “is of excellent Use in the time of Pestilence, and contributes greatly to prevent the spreading of Infection.” Who knew?

Apparently the Turks. Bradley explained: “in some Parts of Turkey, where the Plague is almost constant, it is seldom mortal in those Families, who are rich enough to enjoy the free Use of Coffee.” In his treatise, he discussed coffee’s efficacy and provided (most tantalizingly for the coffee-mad Brits) “an Account of the best Method of roasting the Berries, and preserving them after roasting.”

Coffee tree (Coffea arabica). Line engraving by H. Burgh, c.1726
Credit: Wellcome Library, London. Wellcome Images

I present to you Bradley’s instructions for preparing coffee. First, he recommended spreading out the ripe berries to dry and harden beneath the sun. The husks were then to be removed so that the berries could be toasted in an “airy place to clean them.” Finally, the berries were ready for the roaster, and this was an important step: the roasting process, Bradley claimed, would determine “the Goodness of the Liquor.” Never fear, though, Bradley had “taken some pains to experience the best Method of roasting it.” His conclusion was that the berries would be heated most equally by placing them in an iron vessel and turned on a spit over a clear or charcoal fire. His personal preference was “roasted in a middle way, not overburnt.” To modern readers, this seems like a lot of work, but Bradley reassured his readers that this process could easily be done at home, as apparently many “Persons of Distinction in Holland” did.

Making the beverage also required special equipment and techniques. To prepare the decoction, earthen or stone vessels were best, as metal spoiled the flavour. Boiling the coffee evaporated “too much of the fine Spirits”. Pouring boiling water over the powder of ground berries and infusing it for four or five minutes in front of the fire would be better and “much exceeds the common way of preparing it.” He provided an alternative, too: grinding the berries into powder, adding the powder and water into a stone or silver coffee pot and leaving the pot in front of the fire for a couple minutes. The liquid was always “thick and troubled” after brewing, but could be made “clear enough for drinking” by adding a spoonful or two of cold water to force the grounds to sink.

Coffee was worth the effort, being the ultimate cure-all. Bradley described its many virtues, which included treating head pains, vertigo, lethargy, coughs, moist and cold constitutions, consumptions, swooning fits, digestive problems, sleepiness, running humours, sores, scrofula, drunkenness, rheumatism, gout, intermitting fevers and infection. It could also purify the blood, provoke urination, stimulate the menses and deworm children. Indeed, it was particularly beneficial for menstruating women. According to Bradley, Arabian women drank coffee during their “periodical Visits, and find a good Effect”, such as contraction of the bowels and toned up genitals. Coffee was not for everyone though. Those suffering from melancholy vapours, hot brains, or paralysis should avoid it.

The reason that coffee would be so efficacious in treating infectious disease was that it lifted the spirits—and those “whose Spirits are the most overcome by Fear, are the most subject to receive Infections”. The correct use of coffee supported the drinker’s “vital Flame”, protecting the drinker from fear and despair. To gain coffee’s maximum benefits, Bradley recommended the following dosage: at least twice a day, first in the morning and at four in the afternoon.

Coffee breaks: good for your health!