The Lebanese gluttony way to have a proper Mezzeh of tens of dishes culminates at Dessert time before Sheshas and Turkish Coffee (which in fact should be called Syrian Coffee as it is a Syrian couple who traveled and brought coffee to Istanbul and started the coffee preparation way. The coffee is Mokha coffee named after the Yemen port of Mokha........ hence the name of Moka for coffee)
The rub is by the time the Mezzeh is finished. The huge table is littered with empty dishes and serving plates. So, instead of clearing the table, we simply move to the adjacent table where the Desserts and Fruits are laid.
But yesterday, we went one better and instead of moving tables for Dessert, we moved restaurants and I was blinked to another Arabic Allepian Sweets place where I had a dessert which I did not have for a very very long time and is purely and strictly an Allepian dessert called Haytalieh.
My guess is that Haytalieh came into being by combining the original discovered Arabic Ice Cream and Cornstarch.
The Cornstarch is cooked separately in rectangular pans using scalded milk and laid to cool before being cuts into cubes.
This is served with some of the cooked milk and Milk Ice Cream.
The one I had was even a step higher as the Milk Ice Cream was replaced by Clotted Cream Ice Cream sprinkled with Pistachio gravel.
Yes, it brings you closer to your doctor and not recommended after a heavy meal.
BUT it is refreshingly cold and creamy and crunchy and soft and pillowy and it has magic effect which makes you feel like a child sitting at a single table in an empty prairie enjoying a bowl of Haytalieh and the whole world can go Pfffft.
I am not putting up the Mezzeh pics as I did not take any. But here are the Haytalieh pics for your enjoyment.
Haytalieh as served
Haytalieh re-shot to show the Cornstarch floating cubes
