Asura is a sweet porridge with dry fruits and nuts. It is delicious and rich with flavors and mainly made from wheat. It is called Turkish or Balkan Asura, but the story behind Asura goes back many years to Noah’s Arc. The story told, is that at the end of Noah’s journey through rain and floods, just before the storm passed, there was not a lot of food left on the arc. Noah asked his wife to collect everything left and mixed it all together, making Asura.

The base of Asura is wheat. I used organic Hard Red Winter Wheat. The wheat has to be soaked over night, then slow cooked for at least 2 hours over low heat. At the end of the cooking you add what you like, or have left on your arc…. I used organic dried fruits (raisins, apricots, nuts and mango) and my favorite spices. I added cinnamon, rose water and cloves. Many recipes call for lots of sugar but I put less than a  1/3 of a cup into a very big pot of wheat (you can skip the sugar all together). You mix a tablespoon of corn starch into a cup of cold water and add that to the wheat. Cook it all for about 10 minutes and turn off the heat. Asura can be eaten hot, warm or cold.

It is sweet, filling and gives a great boost to your day as breakfast. You can add it to yogurt, eat on its own with a spoon or place some on ice cream, hot apples or any other idea.

I used organic fruits and wheat to decrease the amount of unnecessarily chemicals in it. Besides, I guess Noah used organic as well…..