Tenda wa KuSonga - Fennel and Sesame Date Leather/Bars
Tenda wa Kusonga - A swahili word for these moorish fennel and sesame date leather bars. ‘Songa’ is a hard one to translate but basically would be to beat food with a wooden spoon continuously, while Tenda means dates. In Zanzibar we keep the name of food pretty basic so I guess the closest to understanding would be to call this date leather.
These Omani/Zanzibari date bars are the perfect way to use up all the amount of dates we have sitting around, while keeping their texture and taste but with flavour. They store well and are something we always have out for guests.
Cooking notes:
Most dates will work with these except medjool as the skin on them tends to be tough, so unless you remove the skin I would avoid.
Only do this if you have the patience and arm strength to stay over your pan and continuously beat this.
You can add in other seeds or even nuts to this!
I use large amount of dates, but you can just half it for what you have.
Ingredients:
1.3kg Dates with Stones or 1.1kg (Pitted)
30g Fennel Seeds
40g Sesame Seeds
1 TSP Freshly Ground Cardamom
150ml/115g Vegetable Oil or Ghee + Extra for moulding
The date texture and look with everything mixed in.
Method:
De-seed all your dates, then add them to a non-stick pan and place on a high heat.
Break up the dates and squash them with your wooden spoon just to help separate them and allow them to heat up evenly.
Once you start to see steam and may here a slight sizzle begin mixing and smashing with the wooden spoon.
Reduce your heat to medium-high and for 5mins keep that constant mixing going.
Once you can see the texture changing and the dates are starting to soften but getting stuck altogether add in 50ml of the oil.
Mix and fold in that oil and it will start to loosen it slowly. Then go in with another 50ml and repeat the same thing then finally the last 50ml. By this time you should have been beating for another 6mins and it will be a mush smoother big huge ball of dates, don’t expect it to all spread out.
Then add in the fennel and fold in, while mixing/beating in.
Follow in with the sesame.
Once you are happy with seeds being folded in evenly you want put your date mix on a tray, put some oil on the back of your spoon and begin pressing the dates down. The easiest way to do this is to smack the dates with the spoon - my mum says its the only way to get it smooth and stop everything from sticking.
Your bars should be a minimum of 10cm thick, my mum says its better to be thick than thin.
One you have spread it out evenly, take a small sharp knife and make your shapes, don’t worry if the knife won’t go all the way through, you just want to more or less score as deeply as you can.
Leave overnight to harden and then breakup/cut through the next day.
Store in an airtight container and enjoy!