Ramadan Kareem to you all! 🌙

Instead of just brutally criticizing the commercial Ramadan dessert atrocities, I thought to bring mine to your table first.

Sobia, Sobya, Sopia? Who cares how it’s spelled?! Did you know that Sobya was originally made by soaking bread, rice, oats, raisins and/or barley in water?  And that it was sometimes fermented long enough to become an alcoholic drink..? Not-so-Ramadan after all!! LOL

In Egypt we make it out of milk and coconut. التتش المصري Such a humble drink from a time when food was scarce has now become a Ramadan staple for both the rich and the poor.
One of the things I enjoy the most about working in the kitchen is that I can take such a simple base concept and elevate it into something as elegant as a French soufflé. As a self-taught chef, I can’t help being overwhelmed with a sense of responsibility to what recipes I choose to develop. Just because everyone likes chocolate, doesn’t mean that I will throw it into all of my sweet dishes.

Honoring the true origin of Sobya and not knowing exactly what its core ingredients were due to the lack of information available to my research, I decided to use a combination of the many ingredients that have been known to make up the Sobya. That way I thought to achieve an authentic flavor. Because soufflés are so versatile, you can interactively choose to swap the ingredients around in my recipe to make a Sobya Soufflé that suits YOU! Enough about the idea and let’s get cracking on that Soufflé!

• You will need (serves up to 3 persons) :
  • 20g butter
  • 5g oat/rice flour
  • 10g coconut flour
  • 10g corn starch/AP flour
  • 50g coconut milk
  • 100g rice/oat/almond milk
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 50g sugar (+more to line the ramekins)
  • 2 eggs
  • Raisins (or dates)
  • Shredded coconut & powdered sugar (for garnish)

• Method
  1. Brush your ramekins with a bit of soft butter. Make sure you brush upwards around the edges. Apparently this helps the soufflé to rise.
  2. Coat the inside of the buttered ramekins in granulated white sugar. Gently tumble and move the ramekins around in order to get a nice even layer of sugar to adhere to butter. Shake out the excess sugar and set aside.
  3. In a medium saucepan over medium heat melt the butter and add the flours and salt to it. Stir well for one or two minutes until they form dry clumps. I like to use a heavy bottomed saucepan for this, like the one I got from my sponsor; Korkmaz, to avoid burning the roux clumps.
  4. Add the milks and the vanilla extract and continue to stir over medium heat until you have a smooth paste. Take off the heat and set aside to cool for a few minutes.
  5. Separate the eggs into whites and yolks.
  6. Adding one yolk at a time stir the yolks into the paste until completely smooth and custard-like.
  7. In a separate, clean bowl gradually whip the egg whites with the sugar until you get a soft-peaked meringue.
  8. Mix a third of the meringue into the custard to lighten it and then gently fold the rest of the two mixtures into each other. Do not over mix!
  9. Drop some raisins or date pieces (Linah Farms have the best ones!) into the bottom of ramekins and then pour your soufflé batter over them.
  10. Immediately bake them in a 200°C oven for 15 to 18 minutes.
  11. Once they are done, quickly garnish the tops with shredded coconut flakes and powdered sugar. Enjoy! Now!!