Sesame Halvah

[Swisskaese]

Thanks Anzu! That is very interesting. I was to referring to all types of halvah, although I am most familar with sesame and carrot halvah.

I don't have any other information about the references to Epirus and Turkey. I will keep looking.

[Michael Fourman]

I believe the key to making halvah is the use of an extract of a root. On the packages I have read it is called halawa & one of the few ings. listed is halawa root.

It is my understanding that this comes from the mallow plant, it is a mucilagenous extract and once used to make marshmallows.

The recipes which use egg whites are simply trying to reproduce this extract, just as they use them now to make marshmallows.

Unfortunately I don't know how to get ahold of the extract. Though once I grew a nice mallow plant. I would bet it comes in a powdered form for confectionary production.

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it is a root (shirsh al halaweh) and not from the mallow plant but from soapwort. we (helen Saberi, pombo villar and myself, under the aegis of alan davidson) did a whole investigation on that soon after i finished writing my lebanese cookbok. it was published in PPC and then in the wilder shores of gastronomy, the best of ppc.[...]

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I've tried to make sesame halva for years. I once found a recipe (from Peter Conistis in Sydney, published in Australian Women's Weekly) with eggwhite, which sort-of worked, but gave a very solid halva. I bought Wilder Shores of Gastronomy because I found the pages with the Halawa root article on Google Books.

I've since followed up with more investigation on the web. It appears that Halawa Root is certainly a species of Gypsophila (see, eg reference to Museum of Thrace, cited in Wikipedia "Halva" article), but it is very unclear which species, or even whether the same name used in different regions refers to the same species. I have a number of Sesame Halva Recipes posted - these replicate fairly well some of the more solid halvas I can buy locally. However, none matches the lightness of the "Shar Halwa" ("Hair Halva", I think this means), which I can sometimes find here, although the one I call soft sesame halva, made with eggwhites, comes closest.

I believe that the secret lies in pulling the sugar-sesame mass while still warm. Booth's "Snack Food" (also browsable on Google Books) has a description of pre-mechanised halva production, which suggests this. Booth also suggests the possibility of using a commercial whipping agent, Hyfoama DS, in place of Halawa root.

In my local shops, I can find halvas from Turkey with eggwhite, Arabic halvas with Halawa Root, on other halvas with neither listed.

[Lior]

I am also looking for a Halvah recipe. No flour, just tehina, and I guess sugar, and I think arrowroot. Like the kind we can get here in Israel. None of the recipes I tried make a solid piece that can be cut...

Thanks,

Lior