The khazana of the middle eastern desert COUNTRIES… An oasis full of date orchards!

THIS Ramadan I woke up to…dates, in all their glory! Now why didn’t I think of this before? That actually, truly, dates are the most gorgeous sweets of them all, the best “mithai.” Better than most chocolate we stuff ourselves with! Forget man-made mithai, forget chocolate, discover the wonderland of dates …like I said earlier this Ramzan I became keenly conscious of dates or khajur (which is Persian for dates, also in Urdu) and at Basheer & Bros’ Farm Fresh Fruits & Vegetables at Taleigao, I found myself looking at them anew. They stock a selection of dates from the small, round ones to the elongated, fat, golden brown date on the palm of my hand — it looked like it was glowing from within! Dates may look like gems.
I can’t for the life of me recognise the different dates by name, although now in my dotage I’m planning to become a dates connoisseur. Honey, there must be something like 30 to 40 plus varieties of dates in the world and date palms are some of the most ancient palms growing in the hot desert oasis areas of Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Algeria, etc. Say the fruit of the date palm trees have kept civilisation well-fed and healthy, wealthy and wise! Think of the wonderland of dates this Ramazan — when Muslims fast from dawn to dusk and break their fast at about 6.40 pm or so with some water and a couple of dates…dates in the Muslim world are manna from heaven, some dates more prized as sacred than other dates, those hard to find and cost a fortune, perhaps only the queens and concubines of Sultan Suleiman of the Turkish empire got to eat them!
THERE can’t be another dry fresh fruit with such a concentration of sunshine in it…and I learn that we are far better off eating a date or two daily for breakfast, instead of an elaichi banana or two. Why? There’s more potassium in dates and a wealth of other nutrients which can make up for poor blood and poor bones…things like anemia and osteoporosis. Yes, young people today who suffer from osteoporosis should eat a couple of dates daily! Dates are blood and bones food.

I think the khajoor or khajur we eat most of the time is the humble variety called khudri/khadrawi/khadrawy), golden brown and firm to the bite, a bit like chewy toffee. More aristocratic dates come with names like ajwa, medjool, deglet nour, some say the healthiest date is the piarom…and in between there’re mazafati, safawi, halawi, dayri, sukkari, google and look up some more dates if you wish. Or fly to Egypt or Morocco to scout around the lanes of the local souk market to look at rarer dates…(sigh)…I wish I could do that!
Mostly dates come reddish brown to dark toffee brown and may be small and round or elongated, fat, wreathed with “wrinkles…they may be glossy or matt finished. There are also light gold beauties and darker gold beauties, rare are the black complexioned dates…there are dates with substance and style and dates with more substance and style. Some are not so sweet, some sweeter and soft, melt in the mouth like honey, some have caramel notes. Some will make you chew a little to release their full flavour, some may be a little crunchy too. Altogether dates are flavorful something sweet, divine sweets.

I would say dates are on the top of the list of super foods of the world. They are fruit of the Middle Eastern desert countries we know and I didn’t know how much I loved dates till recently when I went on an impromptu tasting spree! Once introduced to dates you may shun mithai or more or less give it up…becoming choosier and choosier. For example, I can’t eat peda anymore be they white, ivory or saffron or the ghastly jalebi to be found everywhere dripping with ghee(jalebi are no longer what they used to be in my Gujarati memory of old). Even true Mysore mysore paak is hard to find these days and all those atrocious dairy and ghee-empowered mawa sweets…the less said of them, the better. Our Indian mithai is utterly forgettable 99 per cent of the time!
AND last week I was zapped looking at various dates and you will find a real variety if you roam around the Panaji market. At one time I remember various kinds of dates were tucked into tall bottles and one bought them by the weight. Nowadays the dates come pretty well vacuumed packed in packages. Some vendors do buy in bulk and re-package them in economical pouches of Rs20 or Rs50 packets and no brand names, thank-you. We have date palms in India too in Rajasthan, Gujarat and a few more states but most of the time what we see in the market is the dates imported from the Middle Eastern countries.
One need not stock dates in the fridge although in our tropical, humid climate one may as well do it. Dates make for great clean-sweep evacuation if you suffer from constipation! I would say they’re divine laxative food! You constipated? Eat a date or two and see what happens. Don’t make any connections you don’t want to but I tend to perceive fruit fresh or dry as more or less laxative, more or less constipating food…banana is laxative, papaya is laxative, apple is constipating. So if you’re suffering from a spot of constipation, eat a banana, eat some papaya – eat a couple of dates; if you’re suffering from a spot of diarrhoea – eat an apple!
Very often I tell a friend of mine who thinks IBS plays a major role in his life, “Why don’t you eat a laxative fruit like a banana or a constipating fruit like an apple…depending on how you feel? Then you don’t have to pump so many Emodium in you to torture your stomach!” (Sigh) Life is not so simple and one may drag a horse to the riverside but one may not make the animal drink the water of life even if he or she is in dire straits and in need of drug rationalisation!
Body beautiful is the most difficult creation to understand perfectly for it is a combo of mind and body, heart and soul. The stomach and the brain are connected or so it is said today…eat right and your mind will think clear or vice versa. The closer we eat to mother earth the more we endure and of course, the less we eat, the older we grow, the longer we live. All that is also true! The little that you put in your mouth must be organic, nutritious, and faithful to the textures and flavours of the good earth – today’s good earth is far too poisoned by our lifestyles of stupidity – lack of knowledge and discipline! Today’s mod con human beings are weaklings although they dream of being supermen and superwomen!
FINALLY, back to the story of dates. We should eat a date or two daily or go on a diet of just a handful of dates for a week…dates are rich in iron, calcium, potassium, magnesium, selenium…somewhere I read, they contain all 20 amino acids and are rich in the vitamin B complex vitamins: “Ajwa dates bring flexibility to blood vessels, strengthen heart, vitamin B plays an imperative role in removal of harmful levels of homocysteine in blood…” The general prescription is to eat two ajwa dates daily.
Medjool or medjoul dates are also called “King of Dates.” Oh yes, dates can be very expensive, the fresh kalmi variety may be Rs3,890 kg; medjoul jumbo may be Rs1,905 per kg…final word, dates are said to be fat free and cholesterol free. This doesn’t mean you may hog on them and you won’t put on weight, if you go overboard on treating yourself to dates morning, noon and night it will contribute towards obesity!
In any case what kind of health we enjoy or suffer is a matter of all things being equal or unequal. So be happy, eat a date or two daily. Buy whatever is available, taste them, stay with the ones which agree with you the most. I yet have to make up my mind but that’s because I haven’t yet tasted too many varieties yet…I wish there would be a dates festival in Goa! By the way you may serve dates, seeds removed, stuffed with nuts or herbs of choice. Bring out the dessert platter of dates alone, please. So easy, nah? There is so much to the fruit of the date.

Postscript: Interestingly, Muslims around the world observe the month of Ramadan as the holy month when the Holy Book, the Koran, was revealed to Prophet Mohamed. They fast from sunrise to sunset in memory of this event and break each day’s fast with a date.