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Bici Bici

A plain starch block is cut into cubes and served over ice shaved fine enough to melt on the tongue.

Vegan.

Ingredients

the bici

the syrup

to assemble

Method

  1. THE ICE HAS TO BE SHAVED FINE ENOUGH TO MELT ON THE TONGUE WITHOUT BEING CHEWED. This is the whole quality of the dessert and the thing that separates a good one from a bad one. Not crushed ice, not cubes -- ice shaved to a powdery snow, so that a spoonful collapses into cold liquid in the mouth immediately. Anything coarse enough to crunch is wrong: the pleasure of it is a cold that vanishes, and granular ice makes it merely a cold drink with lumps. A fine grater, a dedicated shaver, or a food processor pulsed hard with very cold ice.
  2. THE STARCH BLOCK IS DELIBERATELY ALMOST FLAVOURLESS. A hundred and twenty grams of cornflour in nine hundred of water with three spoonfuls of sugar -- barely sweet, faintly starchy, nothing more. It is there for texture: slippery, soft, faintly resilient cubes. All the flavour comes from the syrup poured over, and a flavoured block muddies it.
  3. IT IS SET FIRM ENOUGH TO CUT INTO CUBES AND CHOPPED, NOT SPOONED. Cooked thick, spread in a tray to a centimetre and a half, chilled until firm, then cut into small cubes with a knife. They must hold their edges in the glass.
  4. THE SYRUP IS MADE AND CHILLED SEPARATELY, AND IT IS THIN. Sugar and water boiled briefly and cooled completely, coloured pink and scented with rose. Thin, because it has to run down through the ice rather than sit on top of it, and cold, because warm syrup melts the ice on contact.
  5. IT IS ASSEMBLED IN THAT ORDER: CUBES, ICE, SYRUP, SUGAR. The starch cubes in the bottom of the glass, the shaved ice heaped over them, the cold syrup poured over that, and icing sugar dusted on last. Built any other way the ice either sits under everything and does not chill the top, or the syrup is diluted before it reaches the cubes.
  6. IT IS ASSEMBLED AT THE MOMENT OF SERVING AND NOT ONE MINUTE EARLIER. The ice begins to melt immediately. Everything is prepared ahead and kept separate -- cubes chilled, syrup chilled, ice in the freezer -- and the glasses are built as they are handed over.
  7. The cornflour whisked SMOOTH into the 900 ml of cold water with the 3 tablespoons of sugar.
  8. Brought to the boil, whisking, and cooked 6 MINUTES until very thick and glossy.
  9. Spread in a tray to about 1.5 cm and levelled.
  10. Chilled 4 HOURS until firm, then CUT INTO SMALL CUBES.
  11. SEPARATELY, the 300 g sugar and 300 ml water boiled 5 MINUTES, then cooled and the rose water and colouring stirred in. CHILLED.
  12. The ice SHAVED VERY FINE, to a powdery snow, and kept in the freezer.
  13. ASSEMBLED AT THE MOMENT OF SERVING, in this order: the starch CUBES in the glass, the shaved ICE heaped over, the cold SYRUP poured over that, then the icing SUGAR dusted on.
  14. TESTED: a spoonful of the ice should collapse on the tongue without needing to be chewed. Anything that crunches was not shaved fine enough.
  15. Pomegranate seeds on top if using. Eaten at once.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Turkey · All recipes