Tarator (sauce)


Tarator, sometimes called tahinia sauce, is a nut- or tahini- based sauce made with lemon juice and garlic that is found in Middle Eastern cuisine and usually served next to fish, falafel, or beef shawarma. It is different from tarator in Balkan cuisine, which is a yoghurt-based cucumber soup similar to tzatziki.

History

Vinegar and nut based sauces have existed in the middle east since medieval times; the 13th century Arabic cookbook kitab al-tabikh by author Muhammad bin Hasan al-Baghdadi mentions a condiment called khall wa-khardal, made from pounded, peeled, almonds and vinegar.
According to the Etymological Dictionary of Contemporary Turkish by Sevan Nişanyan, the earliest mention of tarator was by Ottoman explorer Evliya Çelebi in 1655, in his book Seyahatnâme. Evliya describes tarator as a sauce made from garlic and vinegar. Dairy-free olive oil and nut sauces like tarator were popular among Ottoman Christians during fasts.
According to historian Gil Marks, tarator was originally a ground walnut-based sauce from the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman cookbook Melceü't-Tabbâhîn, written in 1844 by Mehmed Kâmil at the Imperial School of Medicine, contained various tarator recipes, using ingredients like walnuts garlic, bread, and spices.
The word "tarator" appears twice in the 1890 dictionary by Turkish-to-English James Redhouse, A Turkish and English Lexicon, in which it is defined as "A sauce of pounded nuts and oil, eaten with bread". Another description can be found in a 1923 Egyptian Arabic-English dictionary where terator is defines as "condiment of nuts, with garlic, oil, and curdled milk, used with fish."

By region

Levant

In Levantine cuisine, is a sauce made from tahini, lemon juice, ground garlic, salt, and water. It is often served with falafels or fish dishes.
Parsley is a common addition to tahini sauce, this variation is sometimes called baqdunsieh. Yogurt is also a common ingredient. Nuts like almonds or pine nuts are sometimes added to thicken the sauce, similar to the Turkish variety.
In Lebanon, tarator is traditionally served with cooked snails, in a dish called bzeh ma' tarator.
In Palestine, tahini sauce is used in a kofta-and-potatoes casserole.

Turkey

In Turkish cuisine, tarator is a sauce made from walnuts, bread, lemon juice or vinegar, ground garlic, and olive oil. It is often served with fried calamari, for that reason it also called kalamari sos.
The sauce is also served with boiled vegetables.
There are also recipes of tarator sauce in Turkey that include yoghurt, or mayo.
Turkish tarator may also use other nuts as bases, like almonds. Regional variants of the sauce, such as that of Jehan in southern Turkey, may use tahini as thickener.
Havuç Tarator, or carrot tarator is a Turkish dip made from grated carrots, yogurt, and garlic, and sometimes walnuts.

See Also