Tag Archives: Allium altissimum

Mast-o Mooseer

In 2015, I blogged on “A Year in the life of the Persian Shallot” (see http://www.edimentals.com/blog/?page_id=893) and dried a few onions for future use.  Persian shallot can be one of several onion species with large bulbs, both wild collected and cultivated, apparently, mainly around the Iranian city of Hamadan, which is in the midwest part of Iran at about 1,850m asl. A couple of the species such as Allium stipitatum which I also grow now are easily obtainable as ornamental onion bulbs in garden centres in autumn (but I wouldn’t eat them as they may have been sprayed or otherwise treated badly!).

Well, I kind of forgot about them until a few days ago someone called Peyman left the following message on my blog:  “I don’t know this still be useful for you or not but here you go ;) This video shows how to make Yogurt and Persian shallot dip (Mast-o Mooseer) with dried persian shallots but you can make it with fresh persian shallots with the same instructions.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgn0-V57Eh0

I made this dish and tried it tonight. Instead of boiling I soaked for several hours. The onions were very mild tasting with only a hint of strength. Perhaps this is a combination of storing the dried “mooseer” for 3 years and then soaking for too long, but the taste of the final dip was very good and the “onion juice” was delicious, sweet rather than oniony. So, my question is whether the commercial Persian shallots are strong tasting (I read somewhere else that they were soaked overnight first to reduce the strength). It was served together with a traditional sicilian 100% wholegrain sourdough pizza! I must try again!