Ashura (Noah’s pudding) for Tu BiShvat

Growing up in Israel, celebrating Tu BiShvat was very intuitive. In Jewish tradition, Tu BiShvat marks the New Year of the trees, and in Israel that’s the time when almond trees all around the country bloom in pink and white, kids in school plant new trees, and the newspapers are filled with dried fruit recipes. It’s easy to celebrate the fruit of the land when it’s right there in front of you in such abundance of flavor and color. 

But since I’ve moved to the U.S., Tu BiShvat has become a time of longing to my country, to fresh figs with their irresistible smell, ripe dates, sweet eggplants, bitter cracked olives, and the carob we would pick fresh from the trees and chew on as kids. As it happens, longing to the Land of Israel was the theme of Tu BiShvat as it has been celebrated by Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews in the diaspora for hundred of years.

Ashkenazim started the tradition of eating fruit or dried fruit imported from the Land of Israel hundreds of years ago. In the 17th century, Sephardi and Middle Eastern Jewish communities began celebrating the holiday with a Tu BiShvat Seder, serving dozens of different fresh and dried fruit and nuts, a custom that is attributed to the kabbalists of Safed. You can read more about it here. 

There are many culinary traditions linked to this agriculture-related holiday.

One such tradition comes from the Jews of Turkey, who make a wheat berry and dried fruit pudding called ashura (ten in Arabic), aşure or ashuriyya. The dish is also common in other Sephardi Jewish communities, like those of Saloniki or Bulgaria, who serve it in such family celebrations as when a baby’s first tooth comes in. The Jews of Egypt call it beleelah (literally a mix or a mash.)

Ashura is popular around Turkey and throughout the Middle East with Muslims and Christians too. It bares a special meaning for Shia Muslims, who serve it on the day of Ashura, on the tenth day of the month of Muharam in the Muslim calendar, to commemorate the martyrdom of al-Husayn, the grandson of the Prophet Mohammed. A similar dish is also served in Georgia during lent (where it is sometimes called tsandili or korkoti.)

But in Turkey, the aşure is known also as Noah’s pudding, paying tribute to Noah’s salvation from the flood. As the story goes, when the flood water began to recede, Noah prepared a sweet pudding using all the remaining ingredients still available in the ark, cooking it all in one big pot. After that, he landed the ark on Mount Ararat in Turkey. And indeed, the Turkish version of ashura/aşure contains chickpeas, white beans and sometimes rice, on top of the wheat berries and dried fruit.

Considering the Wheat and dried fruit, it makes sense that the Jews of Izmir in Turkey, as well as the Saloniki Jews, adopted ashura as a Tu BiShvat confection. Some recipes are sweetened with honey, and some are cooked in milk instead of water, making the dish even more symbolic in remembering the Land of Milk and Honey. The variety of dried fruit changed according to local availability, and in some cases even included chestnuts. Ashura is traditionally prepared in large quantity, just as Noah did, and is supposed to be shared with friends and family from all religions as a symbol of love and peace.