Madeeda Hilba

Sudanese Dessert

MADEEDA HILBA

INGREDIENTS

¼ cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon fenugreek seeds
1½ cups water
¼ teaspoon salt
1 cup flour
1½ cups water
½ teaspoon baking soda
3 tablespoons water
1 cup milk
⅔ cup sugar

SPECIAL UTENSIL

colander

Serves 6. Takes 30 minutes.

PREPARATION

Add oil to pan. Heat oil using medium-high heat. It is hot enough when a fenugreek seed will dance in the oil Add fenugreek seeds. Sauté for 1 minute or until fenugreek seeds darken. Stir constantly. Add 1½ cups water and salt. Reduce heat to low-medium, Simmer for 12 minutes or until fenugreek seeds soften. Stir enough to prevent burning. Reserve fenugreek seeds.

While fenugreek simmers, add flour and 1½ cups water to large mixing bowl. Mix with whisk or fork until flour dissolves. It should be be quite watery. Use colander to strain fenugreek seeds from water. Keep both fenugreek seeds and fenugreek-flavored water. Add baking soda and 3 tablespoons water to cup. Stir with fork until baking soda dissolves.

Add watery flour to pot. Set heat to low-medium. Stir constantly with whisk keep flour from clumping. Add more water if necessary. Add fenugreek liquid. Stir until well blended. Stir constantly. Add milk. Stir constantly until mixture thickens. Add sugar. Stir until well blended. Add reserved fenugreek seeds. Add dissolved baking soda. Stir until mixture thickens to the consistency of porridge. Serve warm or chilled.

TIDBITS

1) This recipe, Madeeda Hilba, tells you to stir the contents while cooking. Suppose you’ve hurt both your wrists and can’t stir. What then? Simple, buy yourself a Bushnell Rotating Electric RangeTM (BRER). Simply put your liquid in a pot on top of a burner and hold firmly a spatula. Your rotating range will move the liquid around the spatula. No more stirring! Your wrists will say, “Thank you, Bushnell.”

Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.