Tragēmata — sweets of the symposion, to nibble with wine
Sesame and Honey Itria
FestiveReconstruction🍯facile25 min
Thin crispy sesame wafers bound with hot honey, claimed ancestors of Greek pasteli. Toast the sesame, drown it in boiling honey, spread, and let set. Sweet, crunchy, fragrant — the banquet confection.
Tragēmata — sweets of the symposion, to nibble with wine
Thin crispy sesame wafers bound with hot honey, claimed ancestors of Greek pasteli. Toast the sesame, drown it in boiling honey, spread, and let set. Sweet, crunchy, fragrant — the banquet confection.
When the gods feast in my honor, it is not my lameness they look at, but what my hands can do — and my hands also know honey. Heat the honey until it sings, throw in the toasted sesame, stir quickly, spread on an oiled stone before it hardens. Cut them while they are warm, mortal, for once cold they resist like tempered bronze. Serve them with the wine mixed with water: this is what sweetens the most mocking tongues.
Ingredients
- •Sesame seeds — a good measure (crunchy base)
- •Honey (thyme honey preferably) — enough to coat (binder and sweetness)
- •Olive oil — a drizzle (non-stick)
How it was made : The Greeks knew many honey and sesame cakes (itria, sēsamē), served at weddings, festivals, and the symposion. Without sugar — unknown — honey was the only sweetener. Athenaeus mentions several varieties. The exact ancient recipe is not preserved in detail, hence a plausible reconstruction inspired by the pasteli still made in Greece.
Sources : Athenaeus of Naucratis, The Learned Banqueters, book XIV (cakes, plakous, sēsamē) · A. Dalby, Siren Feasts: A History of Food and Gastronomy in Greece (1996)