What to Eat in Iran: 7 Essential Persian Dishes [PIC]

[lastofthepatriots]

If you want to become herculean like Persians you should try more of our dishes:

I bet he drinks more milk than he actually eats to be honest.

 

[xenon54 out]

Wait really? Baklava is Israeli/Jewish? That's like my favorite desert, and I HATE sweets.

Well, i have heard Greeks, Armenians, Balkans, Azerbaijan etc. but Jewish is new to me too.

 

[Rukarl]

I bet he drinks more milk than he actually eats to be honest.

This guy is a 180kg 6ft7 behemoth. You don't get to that weight and sustaining it by drinking milk.

 

[lastofthepatriots]

This guy is a 180kg 6ft7 behemoth. You don't get to that weight and sustaining it by drinking milk.

We have a lot of pehlwan in Pakistan too, and they usually say that they drink lots of Almond milk. But they also eat a lot too.

 

[punit]

Which did you found the best?

1. Chelo- Kabab (Saffron Rice -sprinkled with berries) is my comfort food !! i can eat it 7 times a week.

2. Kashak Bademjan and Mirza Ghasemi : i am not much in to veggi food .. but these two brinjal dishes are amazing.
3. Dande Kabab ( mutton ribs)

 

[Rukarl]

1. Chelo- Kabab (Saffron Rice -sprinkled with berries) is my comfort food !! i can eat it 7 times a week.

2. Kashak Bademjan and Mirza Ghasemi : i am not much in to veggi food .. but these two brinjal dishes are amazing.
3. Dande Kabab ( mutton ribs)

What did you think of fesenjoon?

 

[Attila the Hun]

Well, i have heard Greeks, Armenians, Balkans, Azerbaijan etc. but Jewish is new to me too.

Baklava is from Topkapi Palace.(In Turkey lol)
Doner Kebab from Bursa 1800s
And so on.......ignore the trolls.

 

[Irfan Baloch]

I never really liked falooda to be honest with you.

touche.. well said

and by the way I dont like Turkish donnar kebab either. whatever its origin is
as for Origin, like I said I dont really care because sometimes a certain kind of food cuisine is discovered simultaneously in neighbouring areas with minor alterations as the traders , soldiers and travellers travelled around the countries

for me it was a the first time to see tomato roasted with meat on the skews served with Naan or Naan and Kherbuza eaten together.

 

[lastofthepatriots]

An Iranian woman comments on Persian food:

I've grown up in a Persian household, so I know about Persian cooking. Persia and the Arab countries have very different climates. Persia is a temperate climate, more like Europe. They use a lot of vegetables and herbs in Persian cooking. Persians are culturally really still Zoroastrians. They recite old Persian poetry that talks about fruit-tree flowers and stuff and believe in tons of stupid herbal remedy stuff - every herb heals something or every food is good for something, without any real explanation. My grandfather always recites this poem that goes something like "My girlfriend's cheek is red like the radish and the white of her eye is white likes it flesh" The best analogy I can come up with is medieval Europe.

So their food is based on this reverance for temperate herbs, fruits, and vegetables, but with a complete lack of any cooking skill or logic. They just take a bunch of vegetables and whatever they have lying around and throw it into a pot. They also add this dried lime thing that makes everything taste horrible, and they add it to like half their dishes. I really doubt if there are any Iranian cooks who know barely anything about cooking, the most they ever know is how to make good kebab. For example, whenever my father roasts hazelnuts, he coats them with lemon and salt, but he roasts them IN THE SHELL, so I try to explain to him that none of that flavor will actually go onto the actual nut, but he just insists this is the way they did it back in Iran. I've asked if maybe this is so that you can suck the shell sometimes to get the salty tart flavor, but sometimes he says yes, sometimes he says no, and either way he doesn't suck the shell, so it's still pointless. The only way he can answer is that this is what they did back in Iran. Iranians truly don't know how to cook other than direct copying. My mother spends who knows how much on authentic Iranian saffron, and everyday uses it on rice that she makes undercooked, dry and mealy. They'll regularly have no idea what it even is they're putting into a dish - they'll just buy the herb/spice mix package - they know that it's the right mix for the dish, but if it weren't pre-packaged, they wouldn't know what ingredients to buy to make it from scratch. They either severly undersalt the food, or don't salt it at all, because they honestly don't understand that they need to. Every dessert has the same pistachio-rosewater-saffron taste, no matter how different they look. In short, Iranians are like the opposite of the French or Thai when it comes to the kitchen.

I understand that when you go to a Persian restaurant, it usually tastes good, but you have to understand these are catered to American tastes, and everybody only really kebab there anyway. Plus they're running a restaurant, so they HAVE to make it taste good or they'll go out of business. Outside of the restaurant industry, Iranians are horrible cooks, as described above.

The only real part of Iranian cuisine that would taste good is the fruit. The fruit in Iran is probably amazing, since they have a good climate there for temperate fruits, and they probably have good-tasting, old varieties. They also have a wider variety of fruits there - they still eat Medlars, which the West hasn't eaten since like medieval times, and they eat other fruits that have been lost to time for us (cornelian cherries, hawthorn, jujubes, etc.)

http://www.chowhound.com/post/difference-persian-middle-east-food-520493?page=3



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[Rukarl]

touche.. well said

and by the way I dont like Turkish donnar kebab either. whatever its origin is
as for Origin, like I said I dont really care because sometimes a certain kind of food cuisine is discovered simultaneously in neighbouring areas with minor alterations as the traders , soldiers and travellers travelled around the countries

for me it was a the first time to see tomato roasted with meat on the skews served with Naan or Naan and Kherbuza eaten together.

I am not sure about donner in Turkey itself. But in the west I do not eat them at all. I've heard they use less than satisfactory meat in their donner meat.

When it comes to kebab,to me nothing beats joojeh kebab, i.e chicken kebab. My family eats with special rice which is cooked in rice, we call it shir berenji (milk rice). It's heavenly for me.

 

[lastofthepatriots]

touche.. well said

and by the way I dont like Turkish donnar kebab either. whatever its origin is
as for Origin, like I said I dont really care because sometimes a certain kind of food cuisine is discovered simultaneously in neighbouring areas with minor alterations as the traders , soldiers and travellers travelled around the countries

for me it was a the first time to see tomato roasted with meat on the skews served with Naan or Naan and Kherbuza eaten together.

Kherbuza!? wah wah Irfan saab. You are an international man. That accent is amazing. In Punjab, we call it Kharbooza.

 

[punit]

What did you think of fesenjoon?

its unique .. but sweet - sour taste ( any dish) does not suit my palate !!

 

[Providence]

I was fortuitous to have an Iranian professor in university. He would invite me to his home sometimes and I enjoyed the lip smacking dishes I had there.

 

[Rukarl]

its unique .. but sweet - sour taste ( any dish) does not suit my palate !!

Yes, it's one of those dishes that you either absolutely love or simply don't like. It's quite hard to get the sour-sweet balance just right.

I was fortuitous to have an Iranian professor in university. He would invite me to his home sometimes and I enjoyed the lip smacking dishes I had there.

I have to say, I have never been invited by a professor. You lucky man. Iranians are very hospitable people. Glad you enjoyed your stay.

 

[Providence]

I have to say, I have never been invited by a professor. You lucky man. Iranians are very hospitable people. Glad you enjoyed your stay.

I enjoyed his lectures and in some sense funny accent. So grades got me into his house frankly