Bahrain 2018

So it turns out that our season of cake might be slightly hindered by the nations that don't make cake! (You might remember that for Bahrain previously we attempted Halwa which is more of a sweet.)

But in my searches, someone somewhere referenced the cake-like treat Namoura and Bahrain in the same sentence - and that's good enough for me. It is certainly a recipe sufficiently far from a Victoria sponge that we can consider it 'foreign'. It is at least middle-eastern, but most probably Lebanese (which is only 2000km away from Bahrain).

The recipe involves semolina, ghee and yogurt baked together then drenched in orange, lemon and rose flavored sugar syrup. What's not to like (except semolina, yogurt, lemon, rose and a few other ingredients)? The recipe was fairly easy and I could let Heidi do it all herself.

The end result looked appetising enough that all four of us were willing to try it. Heidi decided that it was 'too lemony' and Sian though it tasted of bubble-bath. (Having never drank bubble-bath myself, I can't determine if that is an accurate description.) I feel that it should have been made with more of the orange and rose, because neither flavour was sufficiently obvious, though I would eat it happily.

Differing from other cakes, the tin is greased with tahini (instead of butter) and I limited the quantity of sugar syrup, together making this less sweet than other cakes.

An interesting thing to have tried and perhaps we have baked something like the recipe intended.

Measuring out - having halved the quantities of the written recipe and converted from cup measurements herself

Simple mixture

Fresh out of the oven and a few of the ingredients. (The chocolate was just for sustenance of the chefs.)

Served