Ancient cookbooks suggest that the bagel originated in the Arab world.
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 AishJewish | 2024-01-14 12:00:24 |  14,495 Views |
Bagels were invented by Jews 🥯
As a child I would stroll up the cobblestone steps to the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem’s Old City countless times offering the boy driving the ka’ak cart two shekels for a sesame ka’ak and some za’atar wrapped in newspaper clippings. If I wanted to treat myself I would buy the ka’ak at the oldest bakery in town along with some falafel and hay-roasted eggs.
As a child it never occurred to me that the delicious but common delicacy sometimes called a “Jerusalem sesame bagel” might have a rich history. Nor did it occur to me later in life that the ring-shaped loaf might have anything to do with other similarly shaped breads. But a study of old Arabic cookbooks suggests that ka’ak may in fact be the forerunner of the bagel.
The possibility first arose when I came across a recipe for a type of ka'ak in the 13th-century Arabic cookbook Kitab al Wusla ila al Habib one of the earliest cookbooks in the world in which the dough is shaped boiled and then baked. The chapter begins "We begin with various kinds of simple bread as an accompaniment to every meal. First ka'ak which are of several varieties." It ends with the words "plain ka'ak are too familiar to need describing" implying not only that these were ordinary breads but breads that had been made for so long and were therefore so familiar that they did not need to be explained. Indeed ka'ak is mentioned in the oldest recorded Arabic cookbook the 10th-century Kitab al Tabikh without much explanation as a staple of the cuisine.
