Aseedah (ةديصع) is one of the staple dishes in Yemen and is usually served for lunch, dinner or both. Its ingredients include wholemeal wheat, boiling water and salt as needed.

On a high heat a pot is placed and then boiling water is added. Slowly, handfuls of wholemeal wheat are added and then are mixed quickly with a large wooden spoon so that clumps do not form. The process is repeated until the mixture is very thick. Traditionally the cook lowers the pot to the floor where they wrap their flip-flops around the hot pot and start vigorously mixing the dough. Finally, using bare oiled hands the hot, steaming dough is shaped by the cook and usually placed in a wide, wooden bowl.

Sometimes a depression is made in the middle of the shaped Aseedah so that a hot chili tomato paste is added or Helba, a fenugreek mixture made with parsley and garlic. Lamb or chicken stock is then poured around the Aseedah. It is then served hot.

Aseedah can also be made using white, bleached wheat. Furthermore honey can be used instead of stock and chili/Helba.

[edit] Further reading

• Barnard, Hans (2008-07-04), Eastern desert ware : traces of the inhabitants of the eastern desert in Egypt and Sudan during the 4th-6th centuries CE, Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University, http://hdl.handle.net/1887/12929, retrieved 2009-10-26 

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