Iradi Food Home

The pot at sunrise. We found the walnut. Not me.

It is Nauryz and I did not sleep. Every year the women of our street cook sümölök, a sweet wheat paste, for the whole night. It is only wheat sprouts, flour and water, and a lot of stirring. We put stones (or walnuts) in the cauldron to keep it from burning, and each woman stirs for an hour, with the long wooden spoon, and tells a story. At midnight the old women sing.

By the sunrise it is dark brown and sweet, no sugar needed, the wheat gives it. Who finds a stone or walnut in her plate will have luck this year. I found the walnut at four in the morning in the cauldron, but it doesn't count, it is not in my plate :)

For a small cauldron (we make 5 times this): 1 kg wheat sprouts (green wheat, 4 days in a wet cloth), 2 kg flour, 6 litres water, 1 cup oil, 6 walnuts.

Our street has half and half, a church family, a mosque family, a church family, and everyone dyes eggs in April :) My neighbour Aunt Maria showed me the old way, no paint from the shop. Onion skins, a lot of them, and the eggs go deep red-brown like a chestnut horse.

Boil the skins of 8-10 onions in 1 litre of water, 20 minutes. Put the eggs into the cold coloured water, boil 10 minutes. For the pattern press a leaf of parsley on the egg, hold it with a piece of old stocking, and tie. The leaf stays white.

On the day the children play jumurtka chokush: two eggs knock together, the one that cracks loses and the winner takes the cracked egg. My nephew has a hard egg and he cheats, I am sure, but I do not know how.