I absolutely love your touch on the history of what is arguably the most reputable Egyptian dessert. But I do want to note that we still and most often use roqaq for Umm Ali (ام علي). It’s the essential and more commonly used than anything else for Umm Ali (ام علي). Also a lot of the actual history discussed in this episode isn’t *completely* accurate. Shagar el dour was not a concubine as she was sold as a slave/servant. Egypt was and still is a muslim nation and any kind of adultery was forbidden and greatly frowned upon (being a concubine is an act and form of adultery under the label of “royalty” thought I hardly believe that it is acceptable regardless). The late sultan of Egypt had purchased her for marriage, freeing her from the chains of slavery. By sha’ria, a woman cannot be a leader of a country due to many factors that would ultimately lead to the nation’s downfall. (There’s a LOT more to this, please do your research and rely on the words of a well versed and educated scholar) I really appreciate your time and efforts for making and speaking about Umm Ali, but please refer to Egyptian history when touching on subjects like these because there are speculations in and around a lot of what has actually happened around the history of that time. Most of middle eastern history concerning royalty and war time that the west knows about has been, mostly if not completely told by the west from the western point of perspective.
I'm super happy to see some medieval egyptian history! So much of our pop cultural understanding of egyptian history is just pyramids and pharaos and hieroglyphs, and just sorta pretends that Egypt stopped existing after the death of Cleopatra.
I wish people would be as enthusiastic as you about it! I've collected all Egypt episodes on this playlist: ru-vid.com/group/PLIkaZtzr9JDmFc28KdUu2wCizIkFm0ntG&si=HKr7zWJMvjIeH1Bk
People like to pretend Umayyad Egypt is not real Egypt. Which is weird since everyone seems to be exited to talk about how the caliphate influenced Morocco and Spain.
@@Stroggoii Well part of it is that Umayyad Egypt was a cultural death for Egypt, and also oftentimes horrible conditions and persecution of the native Copts.
@@al4381Exactly, I was going to comment something similar. The Ptolemaic Dynasty was weaker than the "Golden Age" of Egyptian Power, but still at least maintained some strength of culture & wealth. Then the Romans who took over continued some of that, when the Romans declined it was a "Dark Age" for Egypt. Not until the Russians & French took over did they start restoring some culture of Egypt.
She actually is not forgotten in modern Egypt! Her story is part of the mandatory arabic curriculum in middle school here in Egypt she has her own dedicated book that is actually mandatory for all kids to read, so her story still lives on!
I'm Egyptian Roqaq is used for Om Ali to this day in Egypt. never heard of any other type of bread (other than Filo and puff pastry) for this specific recipe. Most people do it with roqaq. + Edit: Looked it up and it looks like the croissant is just a new niche trendy thing. again that's not the modern version . most people do it with roqaq
@@nayzak9791 Those channels are hilarious. One second you're noting the recipe down the next you're listening to the craziest housewife story of all time
@gtpower3 I vacationed in Egypt many years ago, and at the hotel I stayed at, they offered a dish that I think might have been a variation of this, but it was a bit more of a soup, and I've been wanting to find out what it was ever since, because it was so incredibly delicious. I'm so glad this video may have finally helped me find it, so I can try making it!
@@cracker0254 Was it introduced in a clay bowl ? the soup variety is I think Fattet Roqqaq فتة رقاق The same kind of bread with lots of warm buffalo or cow milk , ghee and honey or sugar but without the nuts and cream ..It is very much like breakfast corn flakes but very different type of bread , we like it in Winter .
@@marwaqoura7804 It was almost 20 years ago, so I don't remember if it was served specifically in a clay bowl, but it was served at breakfast! The hotel sadly mostly served European/American style food, so this always stuck out to me as one of the few local dishes I got to try. Thank you for the tip! I'll probably try making both!
Nah. “In shaa Allah” is something Muslims and Arabic people say before things happen or when plans are made e.g. “Let’s get together for dinner next week, in shaa Allah.”
Technically speaking Christians too can and should talk like this, I'm Orthodox and have heard of monks and nuns and even pious laypeople talk like this with many quotidian tasks.
@@gallagherchick You are, of course, 100% correct. But I also like to think that this is just how baking has felt for thousands of years. "Once all the steps are done, you'll take the dessert out of the oven, and it'll be great... God willing."
Inshallah is just a pious phrase and practicing Christians would say similar. Some sociologists from Arab speaking countries had a theory that there is a wider attitude behind it making pious people less likely to proactively engage in risks, something very similar to the concept of Russians being fatalistic. As a phrase however, it just means "God willing" and is very common.
As an Egyptian, I'm very pleased with this episode. You've done great work with both the historical story and the recipe. My minor two remarks would be: 1- At 8:19 you said that the French army had taken control of many of the cities in the Nile Delta and was moving to Egypt. Well, Mansoura and the Nile Delta are already part of Egypt so the correct phrase would be that they were heading to Cairo. Interestingly enough, for hundreds of years most rural Egyptians did refer to the Capital Cairo as "Egypt" and that may have been the name used in the source you were reading from. 2- The name of the Sultana means "Tree of pearl" and in Arabic, one tree is Shajara and the plural; trees; is Shajar. So the first part of her name would be Shajara not Shajar, and because that word ends with a vowel and the next part; al-Durr; also start with a vowel, a silent "t" that exists in the spelling of the Arabic word Shajara would now be pronounced making her name pronounced "Shajarat-al-Durr" Overall you are doing an excellent job and I really enjoy your content and appreciate the work and effort you put in it.
@@200555280 it’s correct if you’re referencing the Egyptian colloquial dialect of Arabic. Additionally, you would probably pronounce it Shagarit Id-Durr now a days if you’re from the Cairo or the Northern Nile Delta.
I actually made this dish for my 6th grade egyptology unit project. I was the only one other than my teacher who ate it because I was bullied and they all lied about being allergic to nuts. Their loss because the other food was lamb balls that tasted like how male goats smell, some runny spinach dish, and one tried to bring beer
I would like to point out that for Egyptians, Shajar al-Durr (Yes that's her first name. All of it.) is not forgotten, for I remember learning about her in class. There was even a literary work that followed her life story from childhood to her death. Just like Hatshepsut, Nefertari, and Cleopatra, she is considered an important part of our history
Seeing elements of justice out in the wild is a blast from the past! Had to look this up to be sure, never watched much beyond the original episode set
Arabic speaker here! so "Shajar al-Durr" means "Tree of Pearls" in arabic, calling her just "Shajar" is like calling her "tree", same goes for many other arabic names composed of two words like " Sala al-Din" "Nour al-Din" "Oum Qerfa"... etc! Max is Forgiven of course because He's an awesome chef with an original content and channel Thumbs UP!
I love max but the pronunciation in this episode was not good, sounded almost… French? It was distracting. It would’ve been better to stick to an American accent in this case…
@@bigdubi24 not French please, if his rendition of croissant is an indicator. Speaking from the UK I'd prefer a less US presentation, especially in the realm of measures. We're in metric so neith your cups nor pints hold any equivalent here
For anyone interested, the m is supposed to be 3 times longer, and the peak emphasis is supposed to be on the a in "Ali" (pronounced kind of like the English name "Ally", but with a really short l). Also, I have yet to see a westerner pronounce the letter 'ain well, if at all, without training. It is here the actual first letter of "Ali" (best I can describe it is if the vowel sound was instead a consonant, rather than starting abruptly like is usual in English. You pronounce it by letting the vowel sound early through a constricted larynx, rather than openly all at once).
@@minamagdy4126Kinda like Arabic speakers pronouncing the p sound as if it were a b, for instance? The English language doesn't have those "throaty" or "gutteral" sounds, so of course we don't use them.
@naelyneurkopfen9741 yes. That sound confusion in particular is hard for older Arabs to nail consistently even with training. It's an interesting perspective to be sure. I will add that we kind of have the p sound stand in for b occasionally, mostly when it appears as the ending consonant of a cvc syllable followed by a different consonant in the next syllable (ex: pepsi is usually pronounced bepsi), but that isn't much of an inclusion of it. I'd compare that to the ng sound in English appearing only as the ending consonant sound of syllables (also the case rarely in Arabic, especially in dialects with the g sound rather the j sound), which doesn't help pronouncing it in, say, the beginning of a syllable or as an independent consonant from n, which is the case in other languages.
When you try to do everything the exact same every time, only to have your cooking and baking sometimes come out great and other times not work at all. I can understand how pre-science/pre-industrial people could only reasonably conclude that the Gods were mercurial jerks who were toying with them and all they could do was hope they were in a generous mood this time around.
Tbf, the overview of world history in most schools tend to forget a lot of countries after a while Kinda like how Italy just kinda disappears after the renaissance and the US disappears after its independence and both tend to only reappear in WW2
In Bulgaria, the crushed version of the bread you made is sold in stores under the name "yufka". We were under Ottoman rule for 500 years, so three guesses where we got it from. As a kid I loved having it for breakfast, mixed with hot milk and sugar. Delicious! The texture was, indeed, exactly like noodles. I no longer live in Bulgaria, but now have a strong craving for yufka, so I have something to search for.
I don't often comment, but I thought I'd let you know that I always look forward to your videos Max. My best friend Bentley passed on the way to the vet yesterday and I've been re-watching your videos to try and feel a bit better. All the best-
My heart goes out to you! And I know it's easier to say than do, but cherish all the good times - don't linger on the times that were hard, or painful...Bentley loved you, and loved everything about you, and everything you did for him! I'm sure he had a long, happy life at your side - and that's what's important... all the love, and care, and joy that was shared between you! Take time to grieve, but don't let it crush you - I know my cats want to cuddle when I'm sad, so I'm sure your Bentley wouldn't have wanted you to stay sad for too long, either.
Please accept my sincere condolences for the loss of your pet. We just lost our girl, Robbie in June. She was 18 and our baby girl. Things will get better, but not for awhile. Take care.
This story should be made into a movie. No more revamping of old Hollywood movies. Make this story into a movie. It has a female leader in a patriarchal society, murder, deceit, food. So many wonderful thing. We would get to learn about history of a non-western country. It has everything. If people watch Shakespeare, they will watch this.
If you eat the history of the ISLAMIC CIViLIZATION THERE ARE A LOT OF FEMALE RULERS ALL OVER ISLAMIC WORLD. NOT JUST IN MIDDLE EAST BUT ALSO MUSLIMS SOUTH EAST ASIA. Not all of them ended being killed but much love by the populations. Syria, egypt, Iraq, even the Araban peninsula at one point of times in Islamic history have one female rulers or defacto rulers. The Acehnese Sultanate in Northern part of Sumatra in Indonesia in 16 century have female Navy commander who defeated a Dutch navy! Northen art of Malaysia used to have female Muslims rulers also and she able to defeated the Thai army.
Through history, especially in Egypt, woman are given temporary power because the other options are usually warmongers or tyrants. The woman in charge (usually relative of dead prior ruler) usually carries the civilization through an especially tumultuous period, keeping temporary peace and letting the tyrants kill each other, or a new calmer ruler to shine through, and then she’s overthrown and things calm to the regular drama as it was before she was in charge.
To Maximus Millerus Hardtackus (clack clack) from a fan, Greetings! I want to issue a challenge to you for your Halloween episode this year. Your choice as to which: A dish that might’ve been served at the villa on Lake Geneva Lord Byron rented during the summer of 1816 where a teenaged Mary Shelley was inspired to write the Gothic Horror novel Frankenstein. Or, A dish that might’ve been served at one of the pubs in Whitechapel when Jack the Ripper was prowling the streets. I can’t wait to see what you come up with!
My mother makes a very similar version. She makes it with regular bread, that happened to dry up from not being eaten (European bread like a baguette), milk, eggs and sugar. She heats up the milk as you did, adds some flavor (cinnamon and lemon peel). Pours it over the bread, lets it cool a bit, adds the egg and sugar, stirs it until all the bread is turned into a mush. Then prepares a glass container, pours hot caramel to the bottom, then the bread mush, and cooks it by bain-marie until it is all cooked with no liquid parts. (tested by sticking a wood pick and have it come out clean). Also delicious, and super easy to make.
Sounds like a more refined version of bread pudding,where you soak the bread in water,wring it out ,add dried fruit and spices and an egg. Pour into a baking tray and bake sometimes over an hour,depending on thickness. Its cut into biggish cubes.
@@stevenketola1613 I'm not sure about the origin, but it appears to be Spanish. Because all recipes are from Hispanic South American countries. Search for "Pudín de pan" and you will find the version I'm talking about.
I am Egyptian and I was worried that there would be errors in the story of Umm Ali’s sweets...but you told the whole story in a correct way and in a concise and interesting way...Umm Ali’s sweets today definitely taste better than in previous centuries...I am lucky to have found this the great canal. ❤❤❤❤❤
@@samarkamal5307 مثلا هو قال ان الصالح ايوب اتجوز شجر الدر بعد م مسك السلطنه دا غير انو م ذكر قصه صعود الصالح ايوب وحروبة قبل التنصيب ودور شجر الدر فيها
We Southerners in USA have a similar dish in our recipes. We use any day old left over bread. Often it's the crust ends of sandwich bread. We freeze these until there are about 20 slices. Amounts of ingredients vary depending on how much bread you use. Make up a mixture of milk, spices, vanilla, a couple beaten eggs, sugar, dried fruit and any chopped nuts. Pour over to throughly moisten the bread and mix gently. Spoon mixture into a buttered baking dish to the depth of about 3 inches. Bake in a medium temperature oven until browned and set. Allow to cool and serve warm with ice cream. Also good the next morning after refrigeration. Sliced into serving size with a large cup of coffee.
Something that I noticed here, The more traditional recipes would have utilized raw sugar in it as opposed to the refined white sugar. Normally I would brush it off but there is a noticeable difference in flavour that raw sugar brings that refined white doesn't. I would say that if you get the chance, use raw sugar instead.
I mean you have mongols , crusades , islamic inter war , a weekend at bernie's (mideval verion), betrayl, rise of one empire and fall of another , and a slave army. That's some movie type fantasy
Love Om Ali. Thank you so much. Been a fan and patron since you had around 200k subscribers! You should look into the Egyptian dish macarona bechamel. Rumor has it that it was a favorite of Napoleon and dates back to when France ruled Egypt.
It's almost exactly the same thing as an English Bread and Butter Pudding. :) Throw an egg into the hot milk to make it a custard, and use bread instead of "crackers", and you're there.
Egyptian here 🖐 You missed frying the roqaq in butter 😂 it's a game changer step.. you should try it again with the fried roqaq.. I'm sure the taste and the texture will get better. Thank you ❤
DELICIOUS dish. My wife likes to use chopped dates, in lieu of sultanas (Middle Eastern raisins), and she adds chocolate chips. (The dates are a great addition, but the chocolate is too strong and overpowers the other flavors.)
Max, you are without doubt my favourite presenter, any topic, any medium. You always raise my spirits with your enthusiasm and demeanour. As a bonus, you combine my two favourite things, history and cooking! Thank heavens you chose to leave your previous livelihood. Thank you.
I use croissants and half milk half heavy whipping cream , no raisins ever, and ALWAYS use sweetened condensed milk on top after it’s cooked… so freaking good…
14:41 "But after this heinous act, the mother decided they would celebrate with a deSERT, and the deSERT was a bread PUDDing..." I got so swept up in the drama and tragedy of the history segment that this segue--something about the contrast from Shajar's hideous end back to a nice lil' pudding--had me in stitches 🤣
The whole story is kinda uhhmmm ironic and funny ish. Because when you hear how she died as a child you dont believe that she died with slipper like shoes you would assume and then the celebration part also add a strange layer of dark humor
Om Ali is not just made with croissants, to me that feels quite recent, I just checked some Arabic recipes and I found there are definitely still recipes that use the traditional roqaq , ones that use puff pastry, filo dough, even toast, a lot of those were marked as cheat or quick at home versions. I feel like all the ones I ate in sweet shops did use the traditional roqaq though. I can check further if you want to know more
I live in Mansoura, Egypt. I'm American and have been living here for twenty-one years.❤ We have a museum here with King Louie stuff. He shared a great historical story!
It's sad and ridiculous that so many Americans think women don't have what it takes to lead a country when history provides so many examples of the opposite. Another enjoyable episode, Max.
And really, it's even more pathetic how people treat sex workers - everyone sells their body to someone else! A construction worker sells his or her body for labor, too! And frankly, who cares what consenting adults do with their time? It doesn't impair their intelligence! And this woman was smarter than almost everyone around her, it seems like! (Plus there was an American president who fell ill, and his wife did the same thing! She signed papers and spoke on his behalf...and he was basically braindead already, but she held things together when they needed to be! I just forget which First Lady it was...)
I can think of three possible reasons for that, and I suspect you're assuming it's all #1: 1) "Eww woman" 2) The particular specimens put forward for leadership 3) International relations. Quite a bit of the job involves diplomatic meetings, and having someone the other side will respect helps a _lot._
The recipe looks tasty and I’m glad to learn more about Egyptian history ! Of course Louis IX had a pretty strict interpretation of the Catholic doctrine je lived by (it was said that if he hadn’t been the heir to the throne he’d have liked to live as a monk) and he was eventually canonised as Saint Louis.
Interestingly, while Louis was away from France on the crusade, there was also a woman ruling France: his mother Blanche of Castille. Upon her death, he returned to France thereby ending the Seventh Crusade.
Love how you take a ton of information and distill it down to a palatable size. I'm one of those who had no idea about this history of Egypt. As always, thanks, Max!
With the shot of the milk and cream being poor looking black and white, I thought it was gonna get into the "Does this ever happen to you?!" part of a kitchen gadget infomercial.
She's not forgotten. I am egyptian and she's very famous here we study her history in school, there tv shows & movies made about her. There is a street named after her.
Exactly two days ago, I was preparing a tray of roqaq with ground meat, and I was eager to taste Umm Ali at the time. ☺️😄 As an Egyptian from the most harmonious delicious (OM ALI )i ever tasted was made by Indian chef Greetings from Egypt
Wonderful video Max and thank you José for the captions! Oh I laughed so hard the second time you pulled out "I did not come here to". This whole episode was full of giggles but I just loved how you put the story in modern vernacular. The attitude just matches the idea of an offended Sultana. Take care of each other! ❤️🧡💛💚💙💜🤎🖤🤍
I'm from Mansoura and the prison where the French King was held is actually a tourist place. There's also a place where over a 100 french knights were surrounded by peasants and soldiers with their back to the Nile river. They thought they could swim cross the Nile to the other side but as they got deeper people on the other bank showed up and they all either sank or killed by archers. That place now is a village literally named the 100 sunken
I am so glad you tried to make this. I had this when I lived in the Middle East and I was so saddened that so many of the Middle Eastern restaurants in America do not have this on their menu. Question: could you just use extra crunchy pita bread instead of this stuff as the base?
You mentioned at the end that it was almost like dessert noodles. Isnt that basically what a kugel is? Looks good, tho! Bread pudding might be my favorite dessert, and yours looks great! ❤
Hello from France, funny timing: I am reading a bibliography of Queen Blanche of Castile, the mother of King Louis IX of France, she was the one who ensured the regency during the crusade and the detention of the king in Egypt
@@Game_Hero i know but it's curious that it happened at the same time on both sides during the 7th crusade. That means the ransom negotiations were held between two queens.
As a kid I liked to dip my bread in my chocolate milk, this looks like a very elaborated version of that. If you are boiling the milk maybe go a bit further to make your own condensed milk. I think a few eggs would improve the texture, but that would make it a bread pudding, nothing wrong with that.
this is my favourite dessert but nobody has heard of it! I definitely recommend it with cream but definitely understand why not - with condensed milk and cream used twice in the modern version it can get a bit rich! if you use premade pastry it's also a great one to prepare quickly, with most of the other ingredients being shelf stable and just a case of "mix and throw in oven". My version is part bake pastry, cut into strips, place strips layered in a baking tray. Add pistachios and almonds, Mix condensed milk and milk together and pour over, then mix the whole thing up. Bake for about 20 minutes than add fresh cream, bake until the cream has changed colour. Leave it to cool down slightly then plate it up and add cream. I add a lot of cream. The version I was told about is basically the same but with coconut.
This is my Palestinians husband’s favorite dessert, it’s a perfect cold weather comfort dessert that I can’t wait to this fall. We like to use grands flaky layers biscuits, we tried with the puff pastry but prefer the biscuits.
Hey Max, I finished the video yet but, uh, coming from Egypt and where my family cooks Umm Ali a lot and having eaten it from restaurants and all sorts of places... I've never seen it done with croissants. Not that I'm saying it would be necessarily a bad idea, it could work. But we also, as I believe you mentioned have roqaq that you can often buy from a supermarket or a bakery which is like the roqaq you made, except it's often made much thinner (machined), is a single layer, and already crisped. That's the one you'd use for Umm Ali as well as many other dishes (often also just called Ruqaq, they're often savory but there's a sweet version). And another thing is, if someone told you about usint croissants: what we call croissants is often times very different from what the french would call a croissant unless you buy it from a good patisserie. If you go to a normal baker and ask for a croissant you'll often get something more akin to a pain au chocolat in texture (with more of a bite to it), and it might even be more bread-like in consistency. And I honestly don't think anyone here would pay the premium to get croissants from a nicer patisserie only to use it to make Umm Ali.
Camphor is still used sometimes in my state of West Bengal, India when ppl are cooking smthn for a religious offering, it really gives the food a divine smell and vibe
Egyptian here and I absolutely enjoyed your take on that part of Egypt awesome history It’s Shagarat not Shagar as the first is a singular tree while the latter is the plural form of the word ie trees 😂 I recommend you explore another famous Egyptian dish - Molokhia also dating back to Mamluks era with another very intriguing story
I had a go at making this today and it turned out awesome! Little bit of trouble getting the bread to puff up but it didn't seem to matter that much, it was crispy enough to do the job.
i never thought about medieval Egypt history and i literally love medieval history 😭 this is so interesting, i'll definitely study more (coming from an egyptian)
Potentially weird request: Are you considering at some point doing an episode on baked spaghetti? All I can find on the subject is that it may have been invented somewhere around Naples, and may have become more common during the world wars. (It’s one if my favorite foods, but my recipe is modified to be amorphous rather than layered, and contains crumbly, well-browned turkey sausage, marinara sauce, shredded mozzarella, and whole-grain spaghetti)
They indeed still have roqaq today. They also use it as bread to go with breakfast, lunch and dinner, but you can either eat it plain or cut it open and stuff things into it. We got it served at breakfast a lot.
Always love it when you explore my country's history. My aunt makes her umm ali with ruqaq and walnuts and i love it 😊. I do wonder where they make it with croissants, I havent heard of that being a thing in Egypt.
I’m Egyptian ♥️🇪🇬 and I love Om Ali and love how you narrate such a historical story that I myself forgot!! But I believe you haven’t tried Om Ali as Egyptians do it today… we do it in a way that’s irresistibly delicious!! 😋🥧
Yeah, there's a reason all the medieval dramas and stuff made in the Middle East, especially Egypt, are set specifically during Mamluke rule over Egypt, especially the years straddling the reign of Shagarat al-Durr (there's your Egyptian pronounciation). This period is very fascinating in many ways, from the military exploits of many generals to political intrigue I'sd argue is more intense than Game of Thrones (it gets very personal, very dramatic, and very dirty). About the dish itself, the recipe you show is far closer to recipes that I 've had myself than whatever you describe as modern, although it's entirely possible I simply wasn't aware of a croissant version I encountered (I don't exactly frequent this dish).
