Qurt: The ancient road snack of Central Asian nomads
atlasobscura.com
atlasobscura.com
> Kumis is a dairy product similar to kefir, but is produced from a liquid starter culture, in contrast to the solid kefir "grains". Because mare's milk contains more sugars than cow's or goat's milk, when fermented, kumis has a higher, though still mild, alcohol content compared to kefir.
> Strictly speaking, kumis is in its own category of alcoholic drinks because it is made neither from fruit nor from grain. Technically, it is closer to wine than to beer because the fermentation occurs directly from sugars, as in wine (usually from fruit), as opposed to from starches (usually from grain) converted to sugars by mashing, as in beer. But in terms of experience and traditional manner of consumption, it is much more comparable to beer. It is even milder in alcoholic content than beer.
> Traditionally, this fermentation took place in horse-hide containers, which might be left on the top of a yurt and turned over on occasion, or strapped to a saddle and joggled around over the course of a day's riding.
https://www.amazon.com/Food-Cooking-Science-Lore-Kitchen/dp/...
By understanding the food science you can also become a better cook yourself.
The article mentions that qurt is rich in protein, but the fat is key. Jerky is very lean, and lacking carbohydrate rich foods, needs to be supplemented with fat for energy to be sustainable. The American aboriginals added tallow to jerky for this purpose, creating pemmican. Apparently dairy foods weren't part of their culture.
These foods are the closest thing we have to Tolkein's "lembas".
Pemmican as a specific "thing" came from the Americas, but the concept of mixing dried meats/preserved dairy and fats is something that is common in history
I'm fairly certain that Tolkien actually stated that lembas is a reference to the Eucharist. No doubt he had experience with hardtack, but IRL hardtack isn't really known for being nutritious or pleasant to eat.
I'd really want to see a cite for that. Tolkien was infamously hostile to any allegorical reading of The Lord of the Rings. Sometimes a fantasy epic is just a fantasy epic.
When Tolkien said he disliked allegory, he meant he disliked literary works that map directly onto some external meaning that was necessary for understanding the story. He thought a story should stand on its own, and, further, it wasn't good writing to try to force a story into allegory rather than let it take its own direction. But we also know from his letters that he purposefully incorporated religious (specifically, Catholic) metaphors into LOTR, which most people would call allegory, including Tolkien on some occasions.
> From [Tolkien's] works one could deduce the Christianity but not perhaps the Roman Catholicism, except that one critic related invocations the Elbereth and Galadriel's character to Catholic devotion to Mary. Another saw lembas, which fed the will and became more potent when fasting, as derived from the Eucharist.
I have thought of those as lembas.
Ingredients:
• 1 kg atta (wheat flour)
• 500 gm chinni (white granulated sugar)
• 500 gm ghee (clarified butter) or olive oil
• 250 gm khoya (congealed sweet cream)
• Mewa (to taste): badam (almonds), piste (pistachios), kishmish (raisins)
http://www.indoamerican-news.com/mamas-punjabi-recipes-atte-...
I felt like if I made them and didn't like them, I wouldn't know it was me screwing up the recipe or not.
Tasty, though. Great with a frosty beer after a day roasting in the steppes - which is where I first encountered them - mysterious spheres presented with a brew in dusty Aktobe.
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