Greece and Turkey, on two sides of the Aegean Sea, are often at odds over a string of issues, despite sharing a common history and immense cultural ties. Bickering over the origins of dishes aside, the two countries have likely found something to agree upon: halva. The dessert loved both by Turks and Greeks dominated the headlines in Greece following the Greek prime minister’s recent visit to Turkey. Kyriakos Mitsotakis, in his rare visit, had the opportunity to sample a different kind of halva, made of roasted chickpeas, during a lunch with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Istanbul.
The unusual dessert was apparently out of a cookbook by Turkey’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism. First lady Emine Erdoğan was among the patrons of the book entitled “Turkish Cuisine With Timeless Recipes.” The first lady had promoted the book in a video where she is seen preparing roasted chickpea halva. The dessert made the Greek media curious. Greece’s SKAI TV even shared a recipe of the halva following the prime minister’s visit and soon, Greek news websites were flooded with recipes for the dessert. SKAI TV went further and presented the halva in a morning show, courtesy of Greek celebrity chef Akis Petretzikis, who also cooked galaktoboureko, a dish common to Turkish and Greek cuisines and known as “laz böreği” in Turkish, with a recipe from the cookbook of Mitsotakis’ late mother.
Çorum, a central Turkish province known as the country’s “chickpea capital” with the grain legume being its most famous export, was quick to seek a way to cash in on new publicity. The province’s mayor, Halil Ibrahim Aşgın, invited journalists to a restaurant on Wednesday, serving them chickpea halva. Aşgın invited Mitsotakis to the province to eat the dish. He said the roasted chickpea halva was once served in Ottoman royal court and the “best” version of the dessert is made in Çorum.
“Çorum is where the Kadesh peace treaty was born, and these lands always contributed to peace. We are happy that our roasted chickpea halva gave a warm air to our relations with Greece,” the mayor said. Indeed, it was in Çorum that one of the copies of the earliest known surviving peace treaty between Hittites and Egyptians was found, in a site that once hosted the Hittite capital Hattuşa. The mayor said they also wanted to serve the dessert to Russian President Vladimir Putin, whose country is currently engaged in a conflict with Ukraine. “We hope everyone eating it will be instilled with a sense of peace,” the mayor said.
